TEHRAN – Several Iranian movies will be screened at the British Columbia Environmental Film Festival (BCEFF), which opened today in Vancouver, Canada.

The feature drama “Goodbye Shirazi Girl” by Afshin Hashemi and the short movies “The Cemetery” and “Seam”, both directed by Alireza Beigi, will compete in different categories.

“Goodbye Shirazi Girl”, written based on Neil Simon’s “Goodbye Girl”, is a romantic story of Mahmud who is from Abadan and Shabnam, a widow who lives with her daughter Nazi. When they both rent the same house they have to deal with each other until they find a solution.

“Seam” follows a single woman writer who lives with her child who has become careless about her surroundings.

“The Cemetery” tells the story of a lonely woman who comes out of the empty graves and is confronted by herself.

The festival, which will be running until December 15, has also selected movies recounting stories from Iran.

“3D White” by the Canada-based Iranian filmmaker Eli Shahbazi is one of the films. 

The documentary is about three-dimensional paintings of Gholam-Hossein Nami who is one of the pioneers of the modernization movement in contemporary Iranian painting.

“Song of God”, a documentary by Iranian-Canadian filmmaker Aref Mohammadi, is another movie competing in the festival.

When Mohammadi hears the story of Qadamyar, a 120-year-old Kurdish tanbur virtuoso, he takes off on a mission to discover more about the master’s spiritual life. The film follows his journey to western Iran, where he unearths the ancient traditions and teachings of Qadamyar’s faith known as Yarsanism, and its relationship to the mysterious tanbur as a meditative instrument. 

The film takes audiences on a musical and visual quest among rugged landscapes of western Iran to experience undiscovered voices and spiritual awakening. We witness the collective prayer of Yarsani tanbur players, as a practice to maintain their spiritual identity and search for inner beauty.

Iranian set, costume and production designer Iraj Raminfar is among the members of the jury, which also includes Allison Webb, Parjad Sharifi, Thomas K Mkare, Kathy Kovosi, Koom Kankesan, Banafcheh Hejazi and several other artists.

Photo: “Goodbye Shirazi Girl” directed by Afshin Hashemi.

MMS/YAW