An Iranian court has found filmmaker Asghar Farhadi guilty of stealing the idea for his latest film, A Hero, released on March 4 in Spain with the unanimous support of critics. According to the court, the film plagiarizes key elements of the documentary All Winners All Losers, made by Azadeh Masihzadeh, an alumnus of Farhadi's film workshop at Tehran's Karnameh Institute in 2014, without credit, reports The Hollywood reporter. The judgment is binding and cannot be appealed.
The two-time winner of the Oscar for best international film for Nader and Simin, a separation and The Traveler thus sees his reputation in question and will be waiting for what a second magistrate determines, which could force him to deliver to the complainant "all the income obtained by the projection of the film in theaters or on the Internet", and could even face a prison sentence. In the United States, this work that won ex aequo the Grand Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival, has been distributed by Amazon Prime Video.
The film tells how Rahim, imprisoned for a debt that he has not been able to repay, leaves prison during a two-day leave. His girlfriend finds a purse full of gold coins and he decides to put up an advertisement to return it to the owner. This act of good faith makes him an overnight hero. However, then doubts, uncertainty and interests emerge. As in the Iranian's films, society is an obstacle that prevents Rahim's action from ending with a happy ending.
Farhadi had admitted that A Hero was based on the same true story that Masihzadeh developed as a student in his documentary workshop. However, the filmmaker did not credit it, claiming that he had independently researched the story.
Still from 'A Hero'
Farhadi sued Masihzadeh for defamation and she countersued him on the grounds that the director had plagiarized her original work. The Iranian court has decided both lawsuits in favor of Masihzadeh, dismissing the defamation case and finding Farhadi guilty of plagiarism.
Asked about the origin of the story in an interview with La Vanguardia, the director said that he raised in his film workshop the idea of looking for people who had become admirable through the press. "We found different people and their stories. It can be said that this work is based on a free concept about something real that emerged in that workshop," he said.
Azadeh Masihzadeh's documentary, which can be viewed in full on Youtube, is about Shokri, a prisoner in the debtors' prison of his hometown of Shiraz in the southwest of the country. The story tells how the man found a bag of gold while on leave in jail and decided to return the money. So far Farhadi has not made any kind of statement about it.
0 Comments