The Hollywood Reporter also got involved in Farhadi’s “hero” controversy / the introduction of several new names in the story

Theater News Base: Questions about morality and motivation, the gap between public and private morality are raised through the film “Hero”, the latest drama of the acclaimed Iranian filmmaker Asghar Farhadi. The film, which won the Grand Jury Prize at the 2021 Cannes Film Festival, was selected by Amazon for release in the United States last January. the movie “ChampionOne of the most popular films of the 2022 Oscar season, made by director Asghar Farhadi, is the winner of two Oscars.

Farhadi is a filmmaker who won an Oscar for “Separation” in 2012 and “Seller” in 2018 and is considered one of the most prestigious filmmakers in world cinema. This year’s “Hero” was shortlisted for the Best International Film Oscar, but did not make it to the top five finalists.

But something happened around Farhadi’s new film that could have originated from one of the director’s films. Farhadi is facing a pair of lawsuits related to this film in Iran. One of the director’s former students (Azadeh MasihzadehFarhadi claims that he stole the story of the “hero” from a documentary (entitled “Two won, two lost”) made in the same director’s class, and that both the man that Masihzadeh and Farhadi claim the story The “hero” is based on it, suing the Oscar-winning director and accusing him of his notoriety in the way he portrays it.

Farhadi has denied all charges and filed a lawsuit against his former student, Azadeh Masihzadeh, accusing him of defamation. All three cases are being heard at the same time, and the court has not yet ruled.

The consequences of this case are potentially great for both Farhadi and Masihzadeh. If the court finds Farhadi guilty of plagiarism, according to Masihzadeh’s lawyer, he may be forced to hand over “all proceeds from screenings or online screenings” to Masihzadeh and may even be sentenced to prison. On the other hand, if Masihzadeh is found guilty of Farhadi’s slander and defamation, he will face up to two years in prison and 74 lashes.

The Hollywood Reporter spoke with Masihzadeh, his lawyer (who advises him but does not represent Masihzadeh in court) and several others involved in the case, as well as asking questions of Farhadi through Sophie Borowski. , The lawyer of the film distribution company “Memento” has provided.

All sides agree on the outline of the story, but there are differences in the key facts. What is clear is that Farhadi taught a documentary filmmaking workshop at the Karnameh Institute in Tehran in 2014, and Masihzadeh attended that class. To do their homework, students had to research and make a short documentary based on the idea of ​​”bringing back lost things” using real records of people who returned the money they found to the rightful owners.

Most of the news items were taken from Iranian television and national newspapers. Masihzadeh, however, found an original story of Mr. Shokri, a prisoner in the debtors’ prison in his hometown of Shiraz in southwestern Iran. In the documentary Masihzadeh, which was screened at the Shiraz Arts Festival in 2018, Shukri found a bag of gold while on leave from prison and decided to return the money.

Masihzadeh presented his idea for making a documentary about Shokri’s story to Farhadi and the rest of the class, in which he explained the story of the prisoner to Farhadi. The Hollywood Reporter watched and translated a video of the class and spoke to several people present that day.

“I remember that moment very well because we were all shocked, Mr. Farhadi was also shocked because Azadeh’s story was very interesting and he himself had said everything,” Rally Shams, a student with Masihzadeh, told the Hollywood Reporter.

Masihzadeh claims that the Oscar-winning director used this story as a basis for the “hero”, without mentioning the main source or considering the appropriate credibility for him.

Masihzadeh says that in 2019, before the production of “Hero” began, Farhadi called him to his office and asked him to sign a document showing the main idea of ​​the film.Won two heads, lost two headsIt belongs to him and all the rights to the story belong to him and he did it.

“I should not have signed it, but I was under a lot of pressure to do so,” said Masihzadeh, speaking via video from Tehran. Mr. Farhadi is the great master of Iranian cinema. He used his power to force me to sign a contract.

Farhadi’s lawyer, Borowski, points out that the document presented as evidence in the current lawsuit is legally meaningless. He rightly points out that ideas and concepts are not protected by copyright. But in response to an email from the Hollywood Reporter, the lawyer spoke somewhat vaguely and did not say why Farhadi wanted the signed document to have no legal value.

“Asghar Farhadi apparently wanted to make it clear that he had presented the idea and design of the documentary during the workshop,” Borowski writes. Farhadi, for his part, has claimed (in his interviews) that the main idea of ​​his film came up much earlier.

Borowski claims that Farhadi inspired the main theme of the story, which is related to the creation of heroes in society, from two lines of the play Galileo’s life written by Bertolt Brecht. And when Farhadi reviewed an idea of ​​his own in 2019, he decided to write and direct a feature film based on a free interpretation of Mr. Shokri’s story, which was published in the media before the workshop began.

Borowski adds that Farhadi has researched Shukri’s story independently but has not been in contact with Shukri because the film’s main character, Rahim (the new Amir), not only has no personality traits with Mr. Shokri, but in some respects is the opposite. . Therefore, there was no need to contact Mr. Shokri for investigation.

Borowski says the director’s research was conducted using “newspapers and other media.” Borowski also provided links to two Iranian news items that were apparently published online in 2012 and appear to tell Shukri’s story in detail.

Masihzadeh, however, opposes this. He claims that the only report about Shukri’s case was published in a local newspaper in Shiraz.

Masihzadeh says: Shukri’s story was not published in the national media, television, cyberspace or public files. This was a story I found and researched myself.

Negar Eskandarfar, the director of the Karnameh Institute, who was present at the documentary workshop, also supports Masihzadeh’s account of these events. He says: The subject of “two heads won, two heads lost” was presented by Azadeh himself, not Farhadi. This corresponds to the memory of Christ’s classmate Shams.

“I always follow the events of the Cannes Film Festival, so when Mr. Farhadi gave an interview about the ‘hero’ in 2021, I was listening,” Shams recalls. When he gave a synopsis of the film, I swear I froze. I thought this documentary was free.

Shams testified in court on behalf of Masihzadeh. However, several other students who participated in the same documentation workshop signed a statement in support of Farhadi’s claim.

After Masihzadeh made his allegations public, Iskanderfar says another former student approached him and made a similar allegation of stealing a project he had done in a workshop run by Farhadi in 2011. The Hollywood Reporter was able to speak to the student, who requested anonymity, although the student confirmed that he believed Farhadi had used his student project as the basis for one of his films, but said there were no legal claims against him. It will not have.

The student said: Mr. Farhadi is a genius filmmaker and what he did with my story is his work, not mine.

He pointed out: These differences have become complicated due to Farhadi’s position in Iran. The winner of two Oscars is both the most famous and the most divisive figure in Iranian cinema. His international success has garnered him widespread support and even aroused patriotic enthusiasm among some of the country’s nationalists, but the fact that Farhadi does not openly criticize the Iranian government has led some to Accused of implicit support of the country’s rulers.

German-Iranian actor and producer Farhad Payar also says that he considers Farhadi a hero on one side and a traitor on the other.

Whatever the legal outcome of the “hero” case, it has probably damaged Farhadi’s reputation, so that the headline of one of Iran’s news sites in recent months was as follows: Asghar Farhadi: Yesterday’s hero, today’s thief!

In the last year, the accusations against Asghar Farhadi have been made while none of them have reached the legal path and have been limited to accusations in the media.