Independent filmmakers in Iran face a fresh wave of repression and extreme economic hardship because of the war, risking choking off a mainstay of world cinema, top directors tell the AFP news agency.
Pegah Ahangarani, an actor-director who fled the country in 2022, is one of several Iranian filmmakers at the Cannes Film Festival, which has championed Iranian cinema for decades and awarded its top prize to Panahi last year.
“In recent years, there’s really been a massive underground, clandestine film movement, a lot of filmmakers have started making films without authorization, without women in headscarves,” the 42-year-old told AFP in Cannes.
“Now, with the war, the little information we get from Iran tends to show that it’s the same for filmmakers as for the rest of the population, meaning repression that is stronger than ever. They are much harsher than before,” she said.
Iran has carried out mass arrests and a spate of executions since the U.S.-Israeli attack on the country on Feb. 28 which also prompted authorities to block access to the international internet for most people.
Kaveh Farnam, a Dubai-based director and former head of the Iranian Independent Filmmakers Association, said inflation and internet censorship are had a devastating effect on all the technical staff who work in the Iranian cinema industry.
“I know many industry people who haven’t been able to work for months,” he told AFP. “They are badly under pressure, out of money, with no income and the prices are increasing every day.”
The war has given “an excuse for the regime to be more savage and brutal,” he said.
