Classical car exhibit in Tehran

Iranian Cinema Section At Tunisian Festival

The 2012 Kartaj International Film Festival in Tunisia will dedicate a particular section for screening Iranian cinematic productions.
Acclaimed Iranian filmmaker Reza Mirkarimi’s feature-length movie ‘A Cube of Sugar’ along with some other screen creations is to represent the country’s cinematic works at the Tunisian festival, ISNA reported.
Mirkarimi’s dramatic comedy is about a family who lives in an old Iranian city and recounts the story of their attempts to deal with different problems and incidents.
‘A Cube of Sugar’ was screened at several national and international film festivals, including the 2011 Montreal International Film Festival, the 2011 Busan International Film Festival, the 2012 Lucania Film Festival and the 2012 Spain’s Cines Del Sur Film Festival.
Mohammad Ali Hashem Zehi’s documentary ‘Mokan’ and Mehdi Jafari’s short film ‘Emergency Exit’ are the other Iranian productions which are slated to be screened at the Panorama section of the festival.
Kartaj International Film Festival is to be held from November 16-24 in the Tunisian city of Kartaj.

Moradi Kermani’s Book in Russian

‘Believe It or Not’, a book by the celebrated Iranian author Houshang Moradi Kermani, has been translated into Russian.
Alexander Polischuk translated the book, which is an auto-biography of the author.
The book is being published serially in Caravan, a Russian e-journal published by the Iranian Embassy in Moscow.
The journal contains articles and issues on Iranian art and culture, and contemporary Persian literature.
‘Believe It or Not’ is a pleasant narration of Moradi Kermani from his memories of childhood and adulthood in his birthplace of Sirch village in Kerman.
The journal is available on the website of the Iranian cultural attaché’s office in Moscow.

Persian Movies Heading to Kolkata

Several recent top hit Iranian movies have been selected to be screened at the 2012 Kolkata International Film Festival in India.
Productions by prominent filmmakers such as Dariush Mehrjui, Asghar Farhadi, Abbas Kiarostami and Ali Mosaffa will be presented at the competition section of the festival.
Mehrjui’s ‘The Orange Suit’ and Kiarostami’s Japanese-language drama ‘Like Someone in Love’ are to vie at the event, ISNA reported.
Farhadi’s Academy Award winning movie ‘A Separation’ and Mosaffa’s ‘Last Step’ will also represent Iranian cinema at the 18th edition of the Indian festival.
Farhadi’s acclaimed drama ‘A Separation’ won the Oscar for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 84th Academy Awards.
Each of the participated films has been screened in some international festivals and garnered rave reviews from both critics and audience.
Founded in 1995, this year’s Kolkata International Film Festival kicked off on November 10 and will run until November 17.

Milani Retrospective Planned

The 2012 edition of Izmir International Film Festival in Turkey is to hold a retrospective of works by the acclaimed Iranian filmmaker Tahmineh Milani.
Milani’s five screen productions are slated to be reviewed during a particular section at the Turkish film festival, Press TV reported.
Milani’s latest production ‘One of We Two’, ‘Two Women’ (1999), ‘Hidden Half’ (2001), ‘The Unwanted Woman’ (2005) and ‘The Fifth Reaction’ (2003) are the movies scheduled to be screened. Born in 1960 in Tabriz, Milani usually adopts melodramatic style in her productions and focuses on gender issues, where the feminine characters become the subject of intense oppression and discrimination.
As one of Iran’s most talented women directors, screenwriters and producers, Milani has swept numerous awards in international film festivals.
She won the awards for best director, best film and best screenplay at the 51st Asia Pacific Film Festival for her ‘The Unwanted Woman’ in 2006.
She has also received the Grand Prix ‘Cinéma Tout Ecran’, Geneva Cinema Tout Ecran for The Fifth Reaction in 2003 and the Best Artistic Contribution prize of the 25th Cairo International Film Festival for ‘The Hidden Half’ in 2001.
This year’s Izmir International Film Festival kicked off on November 2 and will come to end on November 15.

Guggenheim Museum Website Highlights Picasso

In conjunction with Picasso Black and White, the Guggenheim has produced a special exhibition site featuring a selection of 22 artworks from the exhibition.
Many are presented alongside works Picasso drew inspiration from, with corresponding essays that detail his practice of looking back into art history, in perhaps an effort to establish his own indelible place within it.
View Picasso’s connection to old masters such as Francisco de Goya and Diego Velázquez, as evidenced in Mother with Dead Child II, Postscript to Guernica (Femme avec enfant mort II, Post-scriptum à Guernica) (1937) and The Maids of Honor (Las Meninas, after Velázquez) (1957). The latter is part of a large series of 58 paintings Picasso made in 1957, 44 of which were directly inspired by Velázquez’s masterpiece Las meninas (ca. 1656).
For The Charnel House (Le charnier) (1944–445), see how Picasso emulated the macabre and disturbing scenes found in Goya’s work Ravages of War (Estragos de la guerra) (1810–1812), creating brutal imagery in an unprecedented way, ArtDaily reported.
Along with the old masters, the exhibition site also explores how Picasso acquired prehistoric fertility idols and goddesses, such as the Venus of Lespugue (ca. 23,000 BCE). These objects clearly influenced Woman with Vase (Femme au vase) (1933), a formidable sculpture that is currently on view in the museum’s rotunda. Based on the physiognomy of Marie-Thérèse Walter, a young woman he met in 1927 and who became his mistress and mother to his first daughter, the figure reflects Picasso’s lifelong interest in his native country’s ancient civilizations and is one of the most significant works that the artist ever produced.

‘Hotel Transylvania 2’ in the Works For 2015 Release

‘Hotel Transylvania’, Sony Pictures Animation’s surprise monster hit, is getting a sequel.
Sony has just penciled a September 25, 2015 release date for what is presently being titled ‘Hotel Transylvania 2’.
The project is in the early development stages and has no director. Genndy Tartakovsky, who directed ‘Transylvania’, is moving on to direct SPA’s ‘Popeye’ movie project, which just got a release date of September 26, 2014, AP said.
‘Hotel Transylvania’ is a 2012 American 3D computer-animated comedy film produced by Sony Pictures Animation and distributed by Columbia Pictures. It was directed by Genndy Tartakovsky, the creator of ‘Samurai Jack’, ‘Dexter’s Laboratory’, and ‘Sym-Bionic Titan’, and produced by Michelle Murdocca.
The film tells a story of Dracula, the owner of Hotel Transylvania, where the world’s monsters can take a rest from human civilization. Dracula invites some of the most famous monsters, including Frankenstein’s monster, Mummy, a Werewolf family, and the Invisible Man, to celebrate the 118th birthday of his daughter Mavis. When the hotel is unexpectedly visited by an ordinary 21-year-old traveler named Jonathan, Dracula must protect Mavis from falling in love with him before it is too late.
‘Transylvania’ has grossed over $253 million worldwide since opening September 28, over performing with a $42 million opening. Adam Sandler led a voice cast that also included Andy Samberg, Kevin James, and Selena Gomez among others.

Prophet Muhammad (PBUH):

Two-thirds of the religion of one who bends before a rich man are gone.