Film director Bahman Ghobadi challenges Iran’s draconian censorship and pays tribute to the country’s underground rappers and rockers in his new film to be shown in the Cannes film festival this week.
Ghobadi’s “Nobody Knows about the Persian Cats tells the story of two young Iranian musicians trying to put together a band and play in European festivals after being released from jail.
Today, the movie opens “Un Certain Regard, a section of Cannes spotlighting new and upcoming talent.
An upbeat musical starring real underground musicians – including women who are banned in Iran from public solo singing – the movie explores “a different and unseen side of Tehran, Ghobadi told AFP.
“Many social liberties have been taken away in Iran without a replacement being offered, he said. “In this film I’m crying out loud against the status quo.
All artistic productions and publications are vetted by Iran’s conservative culture ministry before their release and complaints of censorship abound.
The authorities have censured several forms of western music as “decadent and pronounced rap music “obscene, although this has not prevented scores of underground bands sprouting up in recent years.
In summer of 2007, Iranian police arrested 230 people in a raid on an illegal rock concert in a garden about 40 kilometers outside the capital.
Undeterred by restrictions and helped by technology, Iran’s unauthorized musicians have taken to the cyber space, releasing music produced on home computers on websites such as the YouTube.
“We spent a lot of time with these kids and listened to their stories, their dreams and disappointments, the film’s scriptwriter Hossein Mortezaian Abkenar said.
“They basically face a ban over their lyrics, the kind of instruments they use or if the tune has a dance feel to it, he said.
“The authorities frown on experimenting. They want everyone to play the lofty traditional Iranian music or bland pop, said Ghobadi, a music enthusiast who plays the drums and harmonica.
The movie features underground rock and blues band “Mirza, popular rapper “Hichkas, singing his hit track “Khoda Pasho (Wake up God), as well as other musicians of varying styles from Persian pop and folk to heavy metal.
Both Ghobadi and Abkenar have been hit by Iran’s censorship themselves.
His “Half Moon, which won the 2006 Golden shell in San Sebastian International Film Festival, has been banned from Iranian theaters “under the pretext that it incites Kurdish separatism, said Ghobadi, a Kurd himself.
Ghobadi vehemently dismisses such allegations against himself and the film, which tells the story of a legendary Iranian Kurdish musician planning to give one final concert in Iraq’s northern Kurdish region.
“Nobody Knows about the Persian Cats is Ghobadi’s first feature film set in the capital. His previous films were all shot in Kurdish-populated areas in Iran and neighboring Iraq.
The 40-year-old director rose to fame by winning the 2000 Camera d’Or in Cannes for “A Time for Drunken Horses, a story of a group of Kurdish children burdened with adult responsibilities.
Ironically his latest film is also an underground production as Ghobadi did not bother with obtaining official authorization after being denied a permit for another script for over two years.
Many Iranian films including several movies by celebrated director and 1997 Palm d’Or winner Abbas Kiarostami are banned from domestic public screening despite international critical acclaim.
Ghobadi, who is also the producer of “Nobody Knows About the Persian Cats, said he relies on revenues from screenings abroad to make a living but musicians hardly enjoy such opportunities as they need to perform to an audience.
“On the other hand they want to get on the stage and show their parents their lives have not all gone to waste, he said. “My movie is a tribute to these people.
