In the past 15 years Jafar Panhi Has been imprisoned, blindfold, interrogated and placed under house arrest with a 20-year ban on making films.
During his imprisonment in 2010, He said he told one of his interrogators, “I make movies about what I see in my environment. That’s what I’m inspired by.” The interrogations said: “But you can’t make a film of all you see. “Panahi said,” Yes, I can, and I should. It’s not in my control. Subjects only come into my work, and it has nothing to do with me. Look, right now you prevent me. This will eventually appear in one of my films. ”
Idended that he had received enough punishment and lifted Iran the travel and film ban in 2023. But Panahi still had to apply to the Ministry for Guidance for approval to make their films. He tried to get approval for a war film, he said, needed machines and a train, but gave up and returned to make their films secret. (He can make the war film outside the country.)
Panahi is a man who does not take “no” for an answer.
Sure enough, in his new movie “It was just an accident,” that was secretly filmed in Iran and won Palme d’Or on Cannes This year, Panahi tells the story of a man who brings his broken car at night to a garage. From another room, the mechanic hears him to pull his leg and knows deep in his legs that this is the man who tortured him in prison. But he never saw his face. Is it really him? He gathers a group of other one -time prisoners and they go into a dark fun journey to reveal human identity, map him in a box in a van and discuss the right thing to do.
“When you live with a group of people for seven months in any environment, it doesn’t matter where, it can be outside the prison, and then you leave that environment, you can’t forget these people,” Panahi said over coffee at Sunset Marquis Hotel. “You find any excuse to ask about them and be with them, and you want to do something for them?”
This eventually began to bug the filmmaker. When he visited his mother, he had to cross AA Bridge where he could see the prison. “It was always a reminder,” he said. “I constantly thought that these guys are inside and I’m out. You’re starting to think about past memories. You ask yourself:” What was it that I witnessed inside? “From interrogation to something else, you start to remember, and you ask yourself:” What did the interrogation look like? “But I never saw the interrogations.
In his Berlin Golden Bear winner in 2015 “Taxi“In which three hidden cameras were installed in the title cabin, the driver (Panahi) continues to hear voices. A human rights lawyer comes in the car and tells him that this is true with all prisoners:” They always think they hear their interrogation. “
Thus, the remembered voice became the starting point for history. The varied crew of characters is based on characters Panahi Met, both in prison and outside. “There is a lot of opposition outside prison and outside Iran, both, and they each have their own style and ways to oppose the thoughts they want to oppose,” Panahi said. “Some of them consider the aggressive style and the violent style as the only solution. Some of them believe that the non-violent style is the only way. I tried to represent each group by giving them a character in the film.”
The filmmaker brought in several authors to help him in different phases with the script. The range of tones in the film from slapstick to philosophical comes from Iran himself, he said: “Iran people have a great sense of humor, and they are much for happiness.”
Even when the government tried to reduce its New Year’s celebration, the people resist. “They want to be happy,” Panahi said. “The last Tuesday evening each year gathers people and they make a trunk, and they skip fire. They have a song that they sing to the fire:” Take all my Malaise and my yellowness and give me all your health and your redness. “” Despite the regime’s efforts to contain it every year, the fireworks grew greater.
Panahi and his team have developed a series of “security measures”, from a secret to prohibiting phones from the set to hiding four or five copies of images in different homes, to enable their secret filmmaking. First they shot the simplest sequences that were in cars where people would not be and sequences that would not get much attention.
The risks of being caught filmed from a regular police or traffic manager or someone who is not a security agent, a security agent from the Ministry of Information or from the political police. “They would cause problems,” said Panahi, who filmed 23 out of 25 days before 15 regularly dressed security agents arrived.
The director, the Kinematographer, Ljudmannen and an actor were with Panahi in a van when the set called. “The security agents have attacked the sets,” they said. “The security agents demanded that we return,” Panahi said. “During this time we got a chance to go and hide some of our things.”
When the agents specified that Panahi had to come, “I went to the set, and at first I did not pay them,” he said. “I went first and poured a cup of tea, and I started talking to my team members. Then the security agents came and said,” Don’t play a role for us. Bring all the negatives, all the rushes. “
“They didn’t have access to anything,” Panahi said. “We had a small camera and it had a memory card. They saw that nothing was recorded on it, that’s all they could take. They had no evidence. They asked me all the time and pressed me to give them what I had, and I said,” I won’t give you anything. “Three days later, some important events occurred in Iran, it was the second semester in the presidential election that they kept us in about four or five hours on the streets, and no matter how much they tried, they knew that if they take us, and especially me the next day it will create a lot of sound and it will be a major problem.”
Although his films have not been shown publicly in Iran (they are available through underground channels), Panahi has built strong support from its citizens, as the government knows.
“They knew this news would overshadow the elections. That’s why they freed us all,” he said. “They Asked for A MEW OF THE TEAM MEMBERS TO GO BACK THE NEXT DAY FOR interrogation. They threaten them that they cannot be working with us anymore. They were under the impression that half of the movie is still unmade. they are not allowed to keep working with me, or they will get into trouble. So I stopped, I CANCELED THE JOB, and I Thought they are going to ban me from leaving the country again. ”
Armenian Golden Apricot Yerevan International Film Festival had invited Panahi to his edition in August 2024, and he had declined. “I let them know I can participate,” Panahi said. “I did it just to test the regime and see how much evidence they had for me, because I knew if they had a lot of evidence, they would have forbidden me to leave the country. If they did not have much evidence, I knew I could go back to shooting and shoot the last days that remained. I came to Armenia and realized that I was not prohibited from leaving.
When the filmmaker returned from Armenia, he turned off the filming for a month. Then he went with a small group and shot the scenes that remained. “We finished it in one day.”
Panahi felt “we had the essence in our hand,” he said. “Because we had all the rushes and we just had to edit it. When it came to the post -production, I realized it is best to leave Iran and not do it. And so that’s the simplest part. Everything could fit a run that would fit in one hand. You would give it to someone who left Iran. I did not take it out.”
Editing in Paris was followed by the final color correction and mixed in California. After the Cannes victory, Panahi has returned to Iran, the country he hopes will submit his movie for Oscar. The film is supported by Luxembourg and France, has French producers and Panahi lives in Paris four months a year.
The process of submitting the film has changed. Panahi approves the removal of demand that the film is playing for a year in its own country – “It was just an accident” that was played in France. The academy insists that 50 percent of the selection committee, in this case The League of Cinema, is a filmmaker. But in an authoritarian country like Iran, the government can still stack the selection committee with its own choices.
“The question is that the academy does not have the right rules for the selection,” Panahi said. They must make basic changes. I’m not just talking about my own movie. It has been over 20 years that we try. We write letters, we do everything we can do. We talk to the members of the academy, anywhere we see them in the world. They do not realize that these rules are good for democratic countries. But this is a problem in China and in many other countries. The Academy Now has to correct what it has made that it has been made and to find new choices, (which are stationary countries. “We will choose it.” It has nothing to do with the filmmakers. “
What would he do to change the one film chosen per country rule? “International filmmakers should make a committee to choose the films for the international category. We did not go under the pressure to make the films based on the rules in our country and government. But now the academy is putting a lot of pressure on us to have to submit to our own government and to be subdued by them.”
How about France? “Countries such as France, Germany or other places always have their own films, and it is possible that they would like to choose them,” he said. “I want my film to represent my own country. Why would it represent another country? Even if we have co -producers in these other countries, and they tried a lot.” (Les Films Pelléas managed to land “It was just an accident” on France Shortlist of five.)
It is still ranked that Sony Pictures Classics 2006 wrote a letter to the Iranian officials on behalf of Panahi’s film “Offside”. According to Panahi: “We are sure this film can compete in Oscar“They wrote.” We will organize a big campaign for it. Just shield it for a week and announce it selected for Oscars. “
“Not only have they still not shown that movie,” Panahi said, “they never announced it. The academy forces me to ask political people to screen and choose my movie. I want my league and my colleagues to say which of our films is best to be chosen. But the academy (rules) says:” Forgo your government. “” “
Neon Will release “It was just an accident” in theaters on Friday 15 October.
