About

About IrFFNY

The first annual Iranian Film Festival New York
Presented by Daricheh Cinema

1st IrFFNY presents a selection of acclaimed and award-winning films from one of the world’s most vital and distinguished national cinemas. The festival aims to unite two strands of Iranian moviemaking – the classic art-house Iranian cinema beloved by cinephiles around the world, and new cutting-edge works that showcase the adventurousness and daring nature of younger Iranian directors.

The festival’s Opening Night selection will be the NY premiere of Bahman Farmanara’s TALE OF THE SEA (Hekayat-e Darya, 97 min) on Thursday, Jan 10 at 7pm. Following the screening, there will be a Q&A with writer-producer-director-star Farmanara. The veteran producer and director has been active in Iranian cinema since the 1970s, and the festival is proud to have him as its Guest of Honor.

The festival will also present the NY premiere of Farmanara’s controversial comedy-drama I WANT TO DANCE (Delam Mikhad, 95 min), which was just released from a four-year ban in Iran, along with a retrospective screening of the filmmaker’s striking political allegory TALL SHADOWS OF THE WIND (1978) – one of the most acclaimed films of the Iranian New Wave.

The program boasts 10 features, including Jafar Panahi’s Cannes sensation 3 FACES, the Berlinale hits PIG and HENDI & HORMOZ, plus three shorts and a special screening of noted scholar Jamsheed Akrami’s documentaries on Iranian cinema. The festival closes with the North American premiere of Houman Seyedi’s SHEEPLE, a thrilling action film about criminal gangs, featuring rising star Navid Mohammadzadeh.

Presented by: Daricheh Cinema

About Us

Iranian Film Festival New York is co-founded and co-programmed by the Festival Director, Armin Miladi, who distributes Iranian films internationally and runs the annual Iranian Film Festival of Australia, now in its eighth year and by film critic Godfrey Cheshire, who has written extensively about Iranian cinema. The festival is presented under the banner of Miladi’s company Daricheh Cinema.

Armin MiladiFestival Director and Founder

Armin Miladi is an Award winning Iranian-Australian filmmaker. After graduating from Tehran University with a Bachelor of Science and Engineering, Armin developed a keen interest in cinema and started working as a film critic for a number of major publications in Iran. In 2008 he graduated from Australian Film and TV school in writing/directing. He has since made a number of short films and documentaries. In 2010 he co-founded Iranian Film Festival Australia, now in it’s 9th consecutive year. In 2015 he established Daricheh Cinema for the purpose of distributing Iranian Films in North America and Australia. His unique and new distribution model made Daricheh Cinema one of the leading companies worldwide, specialised in distribution and exhibition of both commercial and art-house Iranian films, targeting not only diaspora Iranians but also film lovers around the world, giving them an opportunity to see new Iranian films on the big screen all year round. In 2018 Armin collaborated with Australian Embassy in Tehran as the Artistic Director to present the 1st Australian Film Week Tehran. In 2018 he also founded the 1st Iranian Film Festival New York. Armin’s strong believe in tolerance through cultural understanding has been his driving force for establishing the Iranian Film Festivals in Australia and New York. .

Godfrey Cheshire Festival Co-Founder

Godfrey Cheshire is an award-winning film critic, journalist and filmmaker based in New York City. His writings about cinema have appeared in the New York Times, Variety, Newsweek, the Village Voice, Film Comment, Sight & Sound, Cineaste, and other publications. He is recognized as an authority on Iranian film and has made several trips to Iran to study its cinema; he is currently finishing a book on the subject entitled “In the Time of Kiarostami.” In the area of filmmaking, his experience includes screenwriting, producing and directing, in both drama and documentary. In 2008, First Run Features released Cheshire’s documentary feature “Moving Midway,” about his family’s antebellum plantation and the Southern plantation’s place in the American imagination; it was named one of the year’s 10 best films in the L.A. Weekly and New York magazine. He has lectured widely about film and taught courses in cinema studies at several universities. He is a former chairman of the New York Film Critics Circle and a member of the National Society of Film Critics.

JURY

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