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Reza Dormishian was born in 1981 in Tehran. He studied English Language and in 1997 started writing as a film critic for several newspapers. He was an assistant to some prestigious Iranian filmmakers, including Dariush Mehrjui and worked as a screenwriter. He started making short films in 2002. His first feature film, “Hatred”, has been selected in Montreal and Venice Film Festival. His next movies are all selected and awarded in international festivals.

Fatemah Motamed-Arya was born in Tehran, Iran in 1961. From her very young age, she participated in theater dramas and muppet shows in Kanoon-e-Parvaresh in Tehran. She is a graduate of the Tehran Art Academy. She has won more than 30 acting awards. She has won more than any other Iranian actress and earned recognition as Best Iranian Actres ever. She apparead in more than 45 long features under supervision of people such as Mohsen Makhmalbaf, Rakhshan Bani-Etemad, Abbas Kiarostami or Bharam Beyzai…...

You see “Iran” and think certain things. You go to Iran and see the people, the shops, street activity, the environment, its museums and you forget the two things about it which shape your emotional reaction to it: politics and history. Being one of two Americans attending the Fajr International Film Festival makes me feel responsible for sharing my best moments with a broader public.

The Fajr International Film Festival is a gala affair, small enough to meet and share time with the many participants, both filmmakers and invitees from countries as diverse as Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Armenia, Turkey, Japan, Mongolia and Korea (and more!). I can only think of one other film event which offered such a luxurious array of experiences to go along with film watching (when Rosskino of Russia invited 25 U.S.distributors and us to Moscow and St. Petersburg and then repeated the event for Brics countries...