Iranian filmmaker Kiarostami to return with “Shirin” charity screenings

TEHRAN,Jan.8(MNA) -- Several theaters across the capital Tehran will be screening “Shirin” by Abbas Kiarostami, whose films have not been permitted to be shown in Iran over the past 15 years, in order to raise funds for the Kahrizak Charity Nursing Home. The Film Museum of Iran and the Mellat, Azadi and Farhang theaters, and probably the Felestin as well will be screening “Shirin” on Wednesday. “Shirin” (2008), Kiarostami’s production that had been denied a screening license by the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance, is simply a parade of close-ups of 113 Iranian actresses and also French star Juliette Binoche, who are watching a film which we never see. “Kiarostami plans to donate all the money collected from screening the movie to the Kahrizak Charity Nursing Home,” film distributor Ramin Rahimi told on Saturday. The movie will hit silver screens on January 11, and the posters and banners for the film are due to be placed across the capital on Monday, Rahimi said. Kiarostami described “Shirin” as an exceptional film that he would have liked to have been the last of his filmmaking career. “I have always been accused of making films for foreign audiences but the accusations have intensified over the years and I have never taken the opportunity to respond to them,” Kiarostami had said in 2009 during a workshop in Tehran. “I never made ‘Shirin’. I only prepared the environment that helped the actresses express their feelings,” Kiarostami also said at a workshop held to elaborate on his film “Shirin”. He won the 1997 Palme d’Or at Cannes for “Taste of Cherry” and the 1999 Venice Grand Jury Prize for “The Wind Will Carry Us”. Rahimi had also said in his previous interview in August that Kiarostami’s “Certified Copy”, with slight modification in hijab of Juliette Binoche, was also due to receive a public screening license.