(Cannes) Iranian director Asghar Farhadi, member of the jury of 75and Cannes Film Festival, on Tuesday challenged the accusations of one of his students claiming that he plagiarized his work for his latest film, A heroGrand Jury Prize last year.
Posted at 11:10 a.m.
Questioned during the press conference presenting the Cannes jury, the director with two Oscars spoke for the first time publicly about the complaint filed in Iran by Azadeh Masihzadeh, who studied cinema under his direction and assures that his film is based on his documentary All Winners All Losers.
A herowhich tells the story of an inmate who rose to fame after finding a purse of gold coins and returning it to its owner instead of keeping it for himself, and the documentary filmed by his student, had “the same theme” and was inspired by the same news item, admitted Mr. Farhadi.
“When an event has taken place, and it is reported in the press, it belongs to the public domain”, defended the filmmaker. ” A hero is a free interpretation of this story, like this person’s documentary, there is no question of copyright”.
Mr. Farhadi said he had brought press clippings for a workshop with his students, including one relating to this news item.
The filmmaker clarified that there had “not yet been a trial”, but only “a first stage of instruction where the case is studied by a religious authority”. This authority “simply considered that the case could be judged and that there would be a trial”.
“In this trial, if there are copyright specialists, it will be very easy to prove that the charge is not admissible,” he continued.
“Because of the efforts made by this intern in her documentary, and the research she had done, I proposed that her name be in the credits to dissipate all these controversies”, further affirmed the filmmaker ofA separation.
But the student would have refused: “she wanted me to say at the beginning of the film that it was based on her documentary, and she had financial claims to share all the income from the film. The French producer, obviously, did not accept this request at all”.
In April, the producer of the film, Alexandre Mallet-Guy, had also challenged the accusations: “the story of this former prisoner finding gold in the street and returning it to its owner is only the starting point of the plot ofA hero. The rest is purely Asghar’s invention,” he said.