TEHRAN -- An IRIB official described Marjane Satrapi’s “Persepolis” as being more dangerous than “300”, Warner Bros. ahistoric film about the Persian king Xerxes.

“‘Persepolis’ is potentially more dangerous than productions such as ‘300’, because the film depicts some reality, which has however been mixed up with a large dose of the producers’ fantasies,” program production director of the Iranian state-run Channel 3 Mahmud Hosseinizad said during a review session of the film held at the Rasaneh Cultural Center in Tehran on February 12.
However, he believes that public screening of such a film will put an end to its negative image.
“The film is not political. It just has happens to have been made at a politically sensitive juncture,” Hosseinizad added.
The animation film, which in Iran is widely viewed as being an anti-Iranian film, was directed by Vincent Paronnaud and Paris-based Iranian graphic novelist Marjane Satrapi.
The film, which is an adaptation of Satrapi’s autobiographical black and white graphic novel “Persepolis”, depicts an Iranian girl growing up during the final days of the last shah and the early days of the Islamic Republic.
“The film is an ‘auto-fiction’ rather than an autobiography. The events of the film take place in its directors’ subconscious minds,” Hosseinizad noted.
“Satrapi has skillfully interwoven facets of her own imagination in the film. Thus it can be observed that she has depicted people from her own social class as white and other social classes have been portrayed as being dark, of uniform facial appearance, and unattractive,” he added.
Nominated for Best Animated Feature Film Oscar at this year’s Academy Awards, the film is slated to be screened at the Rasaneh Cultural Center for the second time today and Iranian critic Hossein Moazzezinia will review it after the screening.