Panah Panahi: Migration happens because they don’t see any hope in Iran

Panah Panahi’s film ‘Hit the Road’ received critical acclaim at prominent film festivals like Cannes, Rotterdam, Singapore among other popular festivals. He was one of the jury members at the 14th edition of the Bengaluru International Film Festival (BIFFes).

Driving across picturesque landscapes, ‘Hit the Road’ explores a family who go on a road trip to drop the eldest son at Iranian border so that he can immigrate illegally and enjoy a better life.

The director, son of legendary Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi, spoke to Showtime about the burdens he carries as an Iranian filmmaker and as the son of a popular director.

There is an undercurrent in India where a lot of people want to migrate to the West in search of better economic opportunities. ‘Hit the Road’ too, talks about migration. What makes the average Iranian migrate? Does migration happen for economic, or political reasons?

I think migration happens because they don’t see any hope in Iran, be it economics or politics. People seem to see a dead end everywhere. Educated Iranians start talking about migrating when they are in their 20s.

Even now, with the ongoing protests in Iran, where people are demanding more individual liberty and freedom, most of us are not very optimistic. Because the system comes back with stronger actions to curtail the protests.

In view of the recent progressive changes in the Iranian society, like the headscarf removal movement and the disbanding of the moral police. Does that motivate you and make you feel that change is in the air?

The clamour for change fills me with hope, but the state comes back harder and makes things more difficult after each of these protests. For example, now if anybody is seen without a headscarf in Iran, they would be fined $50,000 and won’t be allowed to travel. Yet it is encouraging to find that people are still not bothered and want to protest in their own little ways.

In contemporary India, we seem to have a section of filmmakers who are keen to be seen as close to the government. They even use the same social media toolkit handed down by the government. Do you have a similar section of filmmakers in Iran?

It happens all over the world, doesn’t it? So we have our share in Iran as well. Such filmmakers usually make propaganda films supporting the government and praising their masters. A few of them are on religious topics.

None of these fare well at the theatres, and such attempts are often laughed at, by the people.

There is a ban on several films by Jafar Panahi, and so are yours. The intent of making films is to show them to your own people and highlight their problems. How do you handle such blanket bans?

Oh, I am not able to handle such bans with composure. It is very frustrating for a filmmaker to know that his own people are unable to see a film that reflects their pain.

My film was shown in over 30 countries and even ran successfully in theatres, but I am not satisfied. It hurts that ‘Hit the Road’ was not shown in Iran where it was made.

Despite agreeing to many censor demands by the officials, their response wasn’t very positive. They probably never wanted to approve my film.For the sake of my mental peace, I gave up the idea of seeking approval.

But it gives me an idea of how hard Jafar struggled for 30 years to make sure his films were seen in Iran, and I gave up in one attempt.

Jafar Panahi handles children very well in his films, ‘White Balloon’ or ‘Taxi Tehran’ for example. In real life, how was he as a father?

Well, it’s not just Jafar, but most Iranian filmmakers seem to have a knack for handling children.

To escape the censor board of the Iranian government, we had to use children as a metaphor to convey things that matter to adults. Working with children is difficult and quite challenging because they are unpredictable and you have to have different ideas to execute.

I am not a big fan of that idea because I believe that children should be shown as children. In my film ‘Hit the Road’, the child behaves like a child.

I don’t have many memories of Jafar at home as a father because he was always out shooting, or on recce, or going abroad for film festivals.

Do you follow Indian films?

I loved Ray’s films. Bollywood films have always played in Iran and have been very popular and entertaining. There probably is no Iranian who hasn’t seen ‘Sholay’.