Panahi''s ''Taxi'' premieres at Berlin fest

BERLIN Feb 6 (AFP): Iranian dissident director Jafar Panahi''s latest picture defying an official ban ''Taxi'' premiered to enthusiastic applause Friday at the Berlin film festival marking a new chapter of his career in the shadows. The 54-year-old''s work is celebrated in the world''s arthouses but outlawed in Iran where the regime considers his gritty socially critical productions to be subversive.

He was detained for a documentary he tried to make on the unrest following Iran''s disputed 2009 presidential election and officially banned from making more films for 20 years for ''acting against national security and propaganda against the regime''.

''Taxi'' is the third picture he''s made flouting the sentence and while he won''t be able to walk Berlin''s red carpet as he is barred from travelling abroad he issued a wrenching statement about his drive to keep working despite the risks.

''I''m a filmmaker. I can''t do anything else but make films. Cinema is my expression and the meaning of my life'' he said.

He said ''cinema as an art'' was the ''main preoccupation'' of his life.

''That is the reason why I have to continue making films under any circumstances to pay my respect and feel alive.''

In ''Taxi'' Panahi himself offers his impressions of contemporary Tehran from behind the wheel of a yellow cab ducking the authorities'' prying eyes by filming with a mounted dashboard camera.

Each person he offers a lift has a story to tell.

His first fares two strangers going the same way launch into a political debate about Sharia law and capital punishment.

The man argues that car parts thieves should be hanged while the teacher in the back seat says the state ordering the death penalty has done little to foster the social order.

''After China we have the most executions!'' she protests as the discussion grows increasingly heated.

A third man gets in and when the feuding pair finally get out of the taxi he says he recognises the director Panahi in the driver''s seat.

Thus begins a film within a film in which the man a seller of pirated film DVDs jokes with Panahi about the acting skills of the first two people in the cab.

Politeness

Panahi continues to drive and is a genial master of ceremonies treating his sometimes hysterical fares with unfailing politeness and good humour.

The tone shifts again when he picks up from school his precocious young niece a budding filmmaker who has been taught the strict rules governing movie distribution.

As she pulls out a small camera and turns it on the director she explains what she has learned from her teacher about movie-making: all women must wear the Islamic headscarf there must be no physical contact between men and women political and economic debate must be avoided and most of all: no ''sordid realism''.

Panahi humours her but when he recognises a prominent human rights lawyer by the side of the road he stops to pick her up.

The woman charms Panahi''s niece and when the director confides that he just spoke to a man who he believes interrogated him while he was forced to wear a blindfold she comforts him.

''Such simplistic tactics'' she said noting that the regime occasionally used the technique to give dissidents the maddening sense that they could never escape surveillance with some preferring actual imprisonment to paranoid ''freedom''.

The film builds to a chilling climax in which the extent and limits of the director''s liberties are revealed drawing a strongly positive reaction at a press preview. ''Taxi'' is one of 19 contenders for Berlin''s Golden Bear top prize to be awarded on Feb 14.

Panahi''s last movie 2013''s elegiac ''Closed Curtain'' was also shot in secret in the confines of his villa on the Caspian Sea.

It won a Silver Bear in Berlin for best screenplay drawing protest from the Iranian government.

The film festivals in Berlin Venice and Cannes have invited him in recent years to sit on their juries each leaving a symbolic empty chair for him since he was kept from leaving the country.

''We will keep inviting him until he can attend'' Berlin festival director Dieter Kosslick told reporters last week.

Also:

LOS ANGELES: Specialty distributor Zeitgeist Films will give a US release to ''Court'' an Indian film that has scooped several major festival circuit prizes since its debut last year in Venice.

Helmed by 27-year-old first-time feature director Chaitanya Tamhane the film follows the trial of a folk singer who''s accused of inciting a suicide through an inflammatory song. Through the case the film also explores the personal lives of the lawyers and the judge.

''Court'' won two significant awards at Venice: the Orizzonti award for best film and the Lion of the Future award for a debut film. It has now played at 19 festivals and won 16 awards.

''Anyone who is interested in the constantly changing face of India with its fascinating contradictions will appreciate ''Court.'' We don''t use the word ''amazing'' too often but there is no other way to describe this film'' said Nancy Gerstman co-president of Zeitgeist.

A Zoo Entertainment production ''Court'' is slated for an early summer release in India.

LOS ANGELES: France''s Diaphana Films has bought French distribution rights to ''Songs My Brothers Taught Me'' a US drama that earned high praise after its debut at the recent Sundance film festival.

The film by first-time director Chloe Zhao is produced by Forest Whitaker''s Significant Prods. and is represented by Hong Kong- and Amsterdam-based Fortissimo Films which picked it up at the Park City fest.

''Songs'' is a low-key portrait of life on South Dakota''s Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. Beijing-born Zhao directed from her own script.

Fortissimo is selling the picture at Berlin''s European Film Market along with two other new pickups that play in different sections of the Berlinale: ''Breathe Umphefumlo'' and ''Sergio Herman: F***ing Perfect.''

''Breathe'' is a musical feature based on Giacomo Puccini''s opera ''La Boheme'' but with songs in Xhosa one of the official languages of South Africa. It is written and directed by Mark Dornford-May who previously won the Golden Bear in 2005 with ''U-Carmen.'' ''Breathe'' plays as a Berlinale Special screening.

''Sergio Herman F***ing Perfect'' a documentary by Willemiek Kluijfhout about an obsessive Dutch chef has its world premiere in Berlin''s Culinary Cinema section.

It follows the ups and downs of Herman who is one of only two cooks ever to obtain a 20/20 score from the Gault et Millau food guide. But after reaching the top with his Oud Sluis restaurant Herman decides that he has sacrificed too much and closes down the world famous eatery.