What with “why don’t you cry?” They did, is a clear example of film burning

Charso Press: Movie “Why don’t you cry?” The second movie Alireza Motamedi It is after the movie “Reza” which has been released in the cinemas of the country these days.

“Why aren’t you crying?” A film that can be considered the previous work of this director in the world of cinema. This film, whose main role is played by its director Reza, tells the story of a person who recently lost his wife and despite being grieving, he cannot cry, and his inability to cry has become a challenge in his life. Is.

We had a conversation with Alireza Motamedi about this movie and the conditions for its release.

A few days ago, regarding the release of the movie “Why don’t you cry?” You protested. Have the conditions changed or is there still no change in the screening conditions?

Nothing has changed, but we have been promised that positive things will happen this week. The main problem is that this movie was released without any proper publicity and screening; This is a clear example of movie burning, and if someone wants to destroy a movie, they should do exactly what they did with the movie “Why Aren’t You Crying?” Done.

If someone doesn’t follow some Instagram pages that promoted this movie and I don’t follow me on Instagram, they don’t know that such a movie has been released, and on the other hand, the condition of the film screenings is very disastrous, the film is released in dead screenings, and no matter how much we protest. There is no use and only tensions increase.

The main problem is that the filmmakers of the distribution company of “Why Aren’t You Crying?” It plays the movie in a completely outdated and old way; I think that in today’s world, in order to sell a product, a needs assessment should be done, and it doesn’t matter if it is an industrial product or even a cultural product. Movies like “Why Aren’t You Crying?” Their target audience is primarily the cultural middle class, including students and employees. The hours when these audiences can go to the cinema are not 11 in the morning or 3 in the afternoon or 11 at night, while 90% of our screenings are at these hours and only a few cinemas screen this film in appropriate screenings, which I myself request from these cinemas. I gave a good time to “Why don’t you cry?” assign

Many people who have seen my previous film message me that we want to see the film but we don’t know where to find this film. In addition to the bad state of advertisements and screenings, I must say that in some cinemas there is only a name of the release of this film, otherwise the film was released in a condition that is no different from not being released at all; For example, in Korosh cinema, which is the flagship cinema of “Why don’t you cry?” has been screened, the film will be shown in a theater for 10 people. Screening the movie in an inappropriate location and without advertising by the screening group is a violation. I have complained about this cinema and several other cinemas and the broadcaster to the trade union council, because according to the cinema law, the screening group must screen the film in the big hall for two weeks. The same situation exists in the Mellat campus; They showed this movie in a low-quality and dirty hall, which is clearly not used. Really “why don’t you cry?” Has it been released in a disastrous and ugly state? The blame for all these incidents lies with the movie distributor, because when the distributor releases 4 or 5 movies at the same time, it obviously sacrifices all works for a work that is more commercial. If this situation is stable, all filmmakers should stay at home and only 3 or 4 films should be made every year, and broadcasters will release the same films and people will see the same films and these people will earn money.

For a long time, many cinematographers have been protesting the state of screening in Iranian cinema, and these protests continue. Did you know these conditions before the release of “Why don’t you cry?” Didn’t you predict?

We know the conditions of Iranian cinema, I have been working in this cinema for years, but our situation in the field of screening is getting worse and worse, and we have passed the crisis, and the Filmiran company is clearly busy destroying a series of films.

As someone who was a screenwriter and cinema journalist for many years, I have to say that I feel that there is a plan behind this situation, and maybe it is supposed to homogenize this cinema and destroy all types of cinema; Even now, this situation exists. The broadcasters, who are the cinema owners and producers, now have about 20 comedy films ready to show, similar to the comedies that have been released in the past few years, and they are thinking about their release next year, and for this reason, we see that the same broadcasters, producers and cinema directors release four movies a week, but nothing They don’t give space to these films and they only want the films that are in the queue to be released and finally say that we released the film and it was your film that failed to sell and when we protest, why did they give our film a proper screening? It’s not possible, they say that this movie won’t sell, while there was no advertisement for the movie at all so that we can make a conclusion about whether the movie will sell or not.

The movie “Why don’t you cry?” Until today, it was screened in the worst conditions and I even faced the issue many times that the movie audience was unhappy with the condition of the theater. A few nights ago, someone from Isfahan Sahil cinema called me and I noticed that during the screening, the sound of the movie “Hotel” was heard, which was shown in the next hall, and the audience could not watch “Why aren’t you crying?” which is drowned in silence in some scenes, to concentrate.

Filmiran does not do anything for the films that it distributes, and when you protest, you are met with shouting and unprofessional behavior. I knew that the situation of screening in Iranian cinema was not good, but I did not think that the situation was so terrible that we could not even have the bare minimum to show our work.

What promises to address the situation of the release of “Why Don’t You Cry?” have you been given

Before the release of the film, I made a series of requests to the distributor that the film would be well advertised with a very small budget, and I was given promises that my requests for the promotion of the film would be fulfilled.

My requests before the release were that we have advertisements on more public pages, there should be a few field advertisements for this film, and I requested that an SMS panel inform those who have seen my previous film that there is a new work by the director of the film Reza. It has just been released and they can see this movie. The cost of these ads was very small, maybe as much as 20 tickets, but unfortunately, the Filmiran company did not fulfill any of these requests and limited the movie ads to three movie screens.

The two films you have directed have a similar atmosphere. “Why aren’t you crying?” How is it different from “Reza” which was screened outside the Art and Experience group in terms of audience attraction?

“Reza” was not a film of art and experience, it was a film that was made for the general audience and was exiled to art and experience. Although “Reza” was very successful in the release and was able to be the most successful film of Art and Experience group after “Fish and Cat”, but Art and Experience was never my choice for this film. “Reza” had much more potential, but these same people who don’t want to see people other than themselves at all were present in various councils and did not allow my first film to have a wider public release. This happened while films of the same era as “Reza” despite having a video production license, were able to get a cinema screening license and have a theatrical release, but this permission was not given to “Reza” movie.

Unfortunately, in the cinema of our country, if you are an independent filmmaker, all the mechanisms and influential people of the cinema will try to remove you and ignore your film, because it is against the flow and calls into question the performance of those who receive billions of budgets for years. . If independent films are seen, the question may arise as to why you could not have much success after receiving billions of dollars for years; For this reason, these people try to ignore independent cinema and they did the same with “Reza”, but fortunately they were not completely successful in achieving their goal and “Reza” was well seen.

I am not talking only about my films, this plague happens to most movies; Any film, if it has followed the most basic principles of narrative, will definitely have a minimal audience in a country of 85 million people, but unfortunately, the distribution in Iranian cinema is such that this does not happen, and the existence of such a situation is because some people want everything to be their monopoly. They will force the rest of the people to accept these conditions, release their films, and tomorrow, when the same filmmakers objected to the conditions, they will be told that the problem was your film, which could not sell well.

Both of my films were made for the general audience, and the film “Reza” was able to establish a good connection with the audience after it was released on the platforms, and the views of this film were so great that many films that were released in much better conditions. They had fewer visits. Sooner or later, “Why don’t you cry?” It will also be released online and we will see if people watch this movie or not.

Two films “Reza” and “Why don’t you cry?” For the audience familiar with cinema, they can be reminiscent of the cinema of American independent filmmakers. Can it be said that in these two films you were inspired by certain cinematographers?

I watch a lot of movies and there are many filmmakers whose cinema I like, and I can’t say that I am inspired by a particular filmmaker, and it was not at all that I wanted to make a film similar to a director’s film, but a filmmaker can never not be influenced by his favorite artists, and when you are an admirer of a If you are a filmmaker, he definitely influences your thinking and work style. Filmmakers such as Federico Fellini, Woody Allen, Nouri Bilge Jilan, Abbas Kiarostami, Ali Hatami, Bahram Bayzaei, Dariush Mehrjooi, etc. are filmmakers whom I highly admire and I have seen their films several times and they have definitely influenced my work style. .

Before making the movie “Why don’t you cry?” You had protested against the non-issuance of a production license for your film. What effect did the strictures have on the whole of this film?

I raised a protest on my Instagram page and wrote that I have worked hard to make this film, rewrote the script 6 times and lost 40 kilos and waited for a year for the production license to be issued by the previous government.

Finally, I made my own film and no censorship was applied in the film and I did not have to change much in the idea and the script. At the same time, I mentioned this issue in an article and wrote that we have two types of censorship; One type of censorship is the content that we all know, and the other type is the removal and ignoring of the filmmaker himself, and I am involved with this censorship model and have the most problems, and this censorship model is the one that has hurt me the most.

The dangerous model that I am referring to is not only related to government censorship, and by the way, a small part of this pressure is related to the government body and the cinema organization, and at that time my problem was the trade unions that do not allow you to work. The bottom line is that people remove others in the name of job protection, national interest support, or support for more sales, and you are removed with a label before you make a film and do anything. The filmmakers did this with my film, and before the release, they said that this film will not sell, so let’s release it as it is, without advertisements and proper screenings. This is the worst form of censorship.

When you are labeled you are disarmed and don’t know what you are up against and fighting. When they tell you that your movie won’t sell and we won’t have money for advertising and screening, how can you prove that it’s not like that and that your movie can sell? This is a monster that sits in the dark and unfortunately, this monster does the most damage to the culture of this country; People who depend on rent and don’t want anyone to enter the limited area they have.

You acted in both of your films. Do you write the role for yourself from the beginning or did you come to the conclusion during the production process that you should play these roles yourself?

I did not decide to act in “Reza”; I was looking for an actor for this role for about 8 months and I didn’t want to use a famous actor for it, but in the end, after seeing various options, I decided to play this role myself according to the suggestions of everyone around me. I have been an actor since I was a child and I worked in the theater for many years and was in front of the camera, but I have no interest in acting. For the movie “Reza”, I finally came to the conclusion that I should act myself, and even if I played this role, I was confident that I would be able to handle it. I was the writer, director, producer and actor in this film and I had many responsibilities, but I am satisfied with the experience of acting in “Reza” because my work as a director became easier.

But from the first day of the script “Why don’t you cry?” I wrote it for my own game and that’s why I worked hard to get the role. Ali Shahnaz This film had to look delicate, fragile and vulnerable, and I lost 40 kilos with exercise and diet to achieve the desired physique. Now, since I act in my own films, my efforts as an actor are not visible, but losing 40 kilos and maintaining it for a year and a half is not easy at all.