‘What matters now is freedom': Banned filmmaker Panahi takes top Cannes prize with jail-inspired drama on revenge and resistance
CANNES, May 25 — Iranian dissident director Jafar Panahi won the Palme d'Or top prize at the Cannes film festival yesterday, using his acceptance speech to urge his country to unite for 'freedom'.
The latest film from the 64-year-old, 'It Was Just an Accident', tells the tale of five ordinary Iranians confronting a man they believed tortured them in jail.
The core of the provocative and wry drama examines the moral dilemma faced by people if they are given an opportunity to take revenge on their oppressors.
Panahi, who was banned from making films in 2010 and has been imprisoned twice, used his own experiences in jail to write the screenplay.
'Let's set aside all problems, all differences. What matters most right now is our country and the freedom of our country,' he told the VIP-studded audience on the French Riviera.
The leading light in the Iranian New Wave cinema movement has vowed to return to Tehran after the Cannes Festival, despite the risks of prosecution.
When asked yesterday evening if he was worried about flying home, he replied: 'Not at all. Tomorrow we are leaving.'
Iran was shaken by the 'Women, Life, Freedom' protests in 2022 sparked by after the death in custody of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini after she was arrested for allegedly flouting dress rules for women.
The demonstrations were quashed in a crackdown that saw thousands detained, according to the United Nations, and hundreds shot dead by security forces, according to activists.
Fairytale
Among the other Cannes awards, Brazil's Wagner Moura — best known for playing Pablo Escobar in 'Narcos' — picked up the best actor award for his performance in police thriller 'The Secret Agent'.
Its director, Kleber Mendonca Filho, also won the best director prize, making it a good evening for Brazil.
France's Nadia Melliti continued her fairytale fortnight in Cannes by clinching the gong for best actress.
Melliti, who had never appeared in a film before, plays a 17-year-old Muslim girl struggling with her homosexuality in Hafsia Herzi's 'The Little Sister'.
The keen football player of Algerian descent was spotted by a casting agent near a shopping mall in central Paris.
'Sentimental Value' by Norway's Joachim Trier, a moving family drama given a 19-minute standing ovation yesterday, picked up the second prize Grand Prix.
Sabotage
Yesterday's closing ceremony was the final act of a drama-filled day in Cannes that saw the glitzy seaside resort suffer a more than five-hour power cut.
The outage knocked out traffic lights and had visitors and locals scrambling for paper money because cash machines were out-of-order and restaurants were unable to process card payments.
Local officials said a suspected arson attack on a substation and vandalism of an electricity pylon had caused the disruption.
'Who is going to do my hair? There's no electricity, oh my God, I'm like in a panic attack,' Mahra Lutfi, Miss Universe UAE, told AFP as she prepared to walk the red carpet.
German director Mascha Schilinski joked that she had 'had difficulty writing her speech' because of the black-out as she accepted a special jury prize for her widely praised 'Sound of Falling'.
Politics
Panahi has won a host of prizes at European film festivals and showcased his debut film 'The White Balloon' in Cannes in 1995 which won an award for best first feature.
The head of the Cannes 2025 jury, French actress Juliette Binoche, paid tribute to 'It Was Just an Accident'.
'This is a film that emerges from a place of resistance, a place of survival, and it felt essential to bring it put it on top today,' she told reporters afterwards.
Iran's state IRNA news agency hailed Panahi's award, which is the second for an Iranian director.
'The world's largest film festival made history for Iranian cinema,' it report, recalling the first win in 1997 by Abbas Kiarostami, who was also banned and jailed.
Panahi has always refused to stop making films and his efforts to smuggle them out to foreign distributors and film festivals has become the stuff of legend.
A year after being handed a 20-year ban on filmmaking in 2010 he dispatched a documentary with the cheeky title 'This is Not a Film' to the Cannes Festival on a flash drive stashed in a cake.
'I'm alive as long as I'm making films. If I'm not making films, then what happens to me no longer matters,' he told AFP this week. — AFP
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Malaysian Reserve
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The RM1.7b revival of Hotel Provençal
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Free Malaysia Today
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Iran silent as dissident director wins Cannes' top prize
Jafar Panahi has been banned from filmmaking since 2010 and jailed multiple times. (AP pic) TEHRAN : Iranian authorities offered no reaction today after dissident filmmaker Jafar Panahi won the Cannes Film Festival's top prize for his political drama. Panahi, 64, was awarded the Palme d'Or last night for 'It Was Just an Accident' – a film in which five Iranians confront a man they believe tortured them in prison. A story inspired by his own time in detention, it had led critics' polls throughout the week at Cannes. The win has so far been met with silence from Iran's government and ignored by the state broadcaster, which instead focused on a state-aligned 'Resistance' film festival. The conservative Fars news agency suggested the jury's choice was politically motivated, saying it was 'not uninfluenced by the political issues surrounding Jafar Panahi inside Iran'. Reformist newspapers Etemad, Shargh and Ham Mihan reported the win on their websites but did not feature it on their front pages, possibly due to the timing of the announcement. Panahi, who has been banned from filmmaking since 2010 and jailed multiple times, addressed the Cannes audience with a call for national unity. He confirmed plans to return to Iran immediately. Asked last night if he feared arrest, he said: 'Not at all. Tomorrow we are leaving.' This marks only the second time an Iranian director has won the Palme d'Or, after the late Abbas Kiarostami received the honour for 'Taste of Cherry' in 1997. Both directors faced bans throughout their careers.
