The 58th Berlin International Film Festival, known as Berlinale, has announced the movies which are to compete in the festival’s competition section.
The lineup includes the world premier of ’The Song of Sparrows’ directed by noted Iranian director Majid Majidi. Its cast includes Reza Najie, Maryam Akbari, Kamran Dehghan and Hossein Aghazi.
According to ISNA, 21 films will be competing for the Berlinale’s prestigious Golden Bear. The festival will be held on February 7-17.
Us director Lance Hammer is to present his film ’Ballast’ in Berlin, which stars Michael J. Smith, Jim Myron Ross and Tarra Riggs.
Also from US will be the world premiere of ’Fireflies in the Garden’ directed by Dennis Lee, starring Julia Roberts.
Others films in the competition section includes, ’Lady Jane’ by Robert Guediguian, ’Black Ice’ by Petri Kotwica, ’The Other Boleyn Girl’ by Justin Chadmichj, ’I’ve Loved You So Long’ by Philippe Claudel and ’Be Kind Rewind’ by Michel Gondry.
The list also includes ’Happy Go Lucky’ from Britain’s Mike Leigh as well as ’Caos Calmo’ (Calm Chaos) by Italian director Antonello Grimaldi, ’Kabei-Our Mother’ by Japanese director Yoji Yamada and ’Heart of Fire’, a joint German-Italian-Austrian production, by Luigi Falomi.

Curator of Topkapi Palace Museum in Turkey has described the manuscripts and artifacts maintained in Tehran’s Malek Museum as unique and invaluable.
Ilber Ortayli who was in Iran on the invitation of the Iranian Academy of the Arts, said, “I have heard a lot about the museum which maintains rare artifacts dating back to the Ottoman era.“
He was interested in a number of penholders and tableaux depicting Iranian and Ottoman soldier amid Chaldoran war, Public Relations Department of the Libraries, Museums Organization and Documents Center of Astan-e Qods Razavi Foundation said in a fax to Iran Daily.
Stating that the museum’s collection of manuscripts and documents in Turkish is of high scientific and historical significance, he said, “We will do our best to introduce such a treasure to Turkish researchers.“
Malek Museum is affiliated to Astan-e Qods Razavi Foundation, the custodian of the holy shrine of the Eighth Imam of the infallible household of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), Imam Reza (AS) in Mashhad, Khorasan Razavi province.

Mahmoud Dolatabadi

Noted Iranian novelist Mahmoud Dolatabadi said that Tazieh (passion play) is not misleading since it has a type of originality which is compatible with the national memory.
Commenting on his experiences in cinema and theater at Cinema House, he added that he became familiar with Tazieh when he was five or six years old.
“Later, in several plays, I assumed the roles of Hor Ibn Yazid Riahi, a companion of Imam Hussein (AS), Hazrat Ali Akbar (AS), son of Imam Hussein (AS), the third Imam of Prophet Muhammad’s (PBUH) Household, and even Shemr, who killed Imam Hussein,“ he said, according to ISNA.
“I came to Tehran when I was a young and have deep enthusiasm for performance,“ he said, adding, “Today, art is taught at an advanced level but that it was not so during our times. Then, interest in a particular branch of art was the main criterion.“
Describing theater as the most marvelous art, he further said that it will remain so if it maintains its correct form.
Stressing the need to revise the artistic system in the country, Dolatabadi also said that the society which does not deal with and looks critically at its creations will not make progress.
“It is not proper to ignore the weak points and fluctuations of the theater industry in the past,“ he noted.
Dolatbadi was born in Dolatabad, a village in the northeastern of Khorasan province in 1940.
He began writing in the 1960s and has published several novels, novellas as well as collections of short stories and plays. His most famous epic Kaleidar was a best
seller.

An exhibition of miniatures depicting the events of Ashura will be held at Tehran’s Reza Abbasi Museum from February 3-7.
Ashura, which is the tenth day of the lunar month of Moharram, marks the anniversary of the martyrdom of Imam Hussein (AS), the third Imam of the infallible household of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), and 72 of his loyal companions in the plains of Karbala, in present-day Iraq.
The event will feature 20 miniatures by Mehdi Farrokhi, reported the Public Relations Office of Iran’s Cultural Heritage, Handicrafts and Tourism Organization’s cultural department.
Islamic banners, dating back to the Safavid (1501-1722) and Qajar (1796-1925) eras, will also be displayed at the event.
The exhibition will be open to the public free of charge every day from 9:00 a.m. until 5:00 p.m.

Two books ’Paintings of Mausoleums in Iran’ written by Ali Asghar Mirzaei-Mehr and ’Royal Cashmeres of Iran and Kashmir’ authored jointly by Rahim and George Enadian were unveiled in a ceremony in Saba Cultural Artistic Complex.
The former features pictorial and analytical archive of mausoleums decorated with religious paintings. It took Mirzaei-Mehr 25 years to compile the book.
Paintings in mausoleums were damaged in natural calamities and negligence of visitors and the book, by including all the images, serves as a good reference on them, according to IRNA.
Addressing the gathering, Mirzaei-Mehr, a university instructor, said that the book is devoted to analyzing a branch of visual arts which is on the verge of going into oblivion.
“I visited different parts of the country since the early 1980s to collect the paintings in the mausoleums with the aim of conveying cultural documents to posterity,“ he said.
The main origin of religious painting is Gilan and for the same reason such works are found in abundance in the area, he said.
The book ’Royal Cashmeres of Iran and Kashmir’ deals with unique examples of the art of weaving cashmeres, which are facing extinction, and compares it with its Indian counterpart.
These books were published by Arts Academy.

A scene from 'The Visit' directed by Hamid Samandarian.

Over 2,500 people have so far watched ’The Visit’, written by Swiss author and dramatist Friedrich Durrenmatt and directed by Hamid Samandarian.
The play which went on stage on January 8 at City Theater’s main hall, attracted a large number of audience, reported MNA.
Samandarian had earlier staged the play about 30 years ago. He had also staged Durrenmatt’s ’Strindberg’s Play’ seven years ago.
The cast of the play includes Gohar Kheirandish, Payam Dehkordi, Ali Ramez, Houshang Qovanlou and Alireza Nassehi.
City Theater will hold a number of sessions this week to review the play.

Written by Davoud Ghaffarzadegan, the novel ’Blood Omen’, has been published by Soureh Mehr Publishing House.
The book was been produced by Islamic Culture and Relations Organization’s Art Bureau, said Soureh Mehr’s Public Relations Office in a fax to Iran Daily.
The novel was translated into English by Mohammad Reza Qanoun-Parvar, a professor of Persian language at the University of Texas, USA. It will soon be published by the university’s press.
Ghaffarzadegan contends that publication of the novel in the US will change the attitude of the Americans towards the Iraq-imposed war of 1980-1988. “The novel does not directly deal with the war, however it relies on humane aspects of war by portraying its tragic moments,“ he said.
’Blood Omen’ narrates the story of a soldier and his commanding officer who have been tasked with identifying corpses in a war zone named ’Hour’.
What the book does convey successfully is the horror of war which is expressed in most of the monologues.
’Blood Omen’ has 103 pages and its cover price is 9,500 rials.

Artistic Bureau plans to launch an online databank featuring artistic information within a year.
According to www.jamejamonline.com, director of Dadehpardaz Company, affiliated to the Artistic Bureau of Islamic Propagation Organization, said that with the commissioning of artistic websites of the headquarters and provincial branches, a rich databank will be available.
Currently, 45 active and semi-active websites of branches nationwide are in operation, he said, adding that to evaluate the state of the sites, the first festival of Artistic Bureau’s websites will be held in March.
The databank will provide information in several languages. Therefore, all artists throughout the world will be able to access the resource, he concluded.

Achaemenid archeological discovery in Nourabad, Fars province.

Second round of archeological studies by Irano-Australian team in Nourabad, Fars province, have led to the discovery of a pillared portico and a staircase from the Achaemenid era (648-330 BC).
According to CHN, director of the team Ali Reza Asgari said the design on the pillars, which are one-meter wide at the base, resembled those in Persepolis (Takht-e Jamshid) and are also comparable to the ones in Sad-Sotoun (hundred columns) Hall in the same monument.
The archeological team comprising members from Iran’s Cultural Heritage, Handicrafts and Tourism Organization’s Research Center and Sydney University began excavations in Nourabad in late December, he noted.
The experts maintain that the site is probably part of an Achaemenid city.
Given the numerous architectural structures spread out over the site and other capital bases, one can conclude that more than one monument existed in the region, he said.
The joint team conducted the first round of studies during 2002-2004, during which 51 sites were identified.
The findings of exploratory studies conducted in 1959 by an Irano-Japanese team were published by Tokyo University.