European Film Academy, Cannes, Berlin, Rotterdam Festivals & More Protest Mohammad Rasoulof Incarceration

"It all happened so much more quickly and drastically than anyone was expecting"

Leading European festivals, film academies and funders have called for the freedom of Iranian film director Mohammad Rasoulof.

Mohammad Rasoulof, the Iranian director whose latest film, There Is No Evil, won the Golden Bear for best film at the Berlin International Film Festival on Saturday, has been summoned to serve a one-year prison sentence in Tehran, according to reports. Nasser Zarafshan, a lawyer for Rasoulof, told the Associated Press on Wednesday that the Iranian authorities have ordered the director to turn himself in.

Mohammad Rasoulof, the Iranian director who won the the top award at last month’s Berlin film festival, has been ordered to serve a one-year prison sentence over his movies, his lawyer has said.

By Tom Grater

Overshadowed by a grisly, racially motivated shooting in western Germany and the growing pains of new festival leadership, this year’s Berlinale served to illuminate the market dynamics and global issues set to impact the international film and television industry in the run-up to Cannes — provided coronavirus stays away from the Croisette.

Iranian auteur Mohammad Rasoulof, whose sixth feature “There is no Evil” won the Berlin Film Festival’s Golden Bear on Saturday, is one of his country’s most prominent directors even though none of his films have screened in Iran where they are banned. In 2011, the year he won two prizes at Cannes with his censorship-themed “Goodbye,” Rasoulof was sentenced with fellow director Jafar Panahi to six years in prison and a 20-year ban on filmmaking for alleged anti-regime propaganda.

Dissident Iranian director Mohammad Rasoulof won the top prize at the Berlin film festival for There Is No Evil, a searingly critical work about the death penalty in Iran. Rasoulof, 48, is currently banned from leaving Iran and was unable to accept the Golden Bear in person.

Dissident Iranian director Mohammad Rasoulof won the top prize at the Berlin film festival for There Is No Evil, a searingly critical work about the death penalty in Iran. Rasoulof, 48, is currently banned from leaving Iran and was unable to accept the Golden Bear in person.

Dissident Iranian director Mohammad Rasoulof won the top prize at the Berlin film festival for There Is No Evil, a searingly critical work about the death penalty in Iran. Rasoulof, 48, is currently banned from leaving Iran and was unable to accept the Golden Bear in person.

Dissident Iranian director Mohammad Rasoulof won the top prize at the Berlin film festival for There Is No Evil, a searingly critical work about the death penalty in Iran. Rasoulof, 48, is currently banned from leaving Iran and was unable to accept the Golden Bear in person.

FRANKFURT, Germany -- Iranian director Mohammad Rasoulof's “There Is No Evil” won the Golden Bear prize Saturday for best picture at the Berlin Film Festival. Rasoulof wasn't there to accept the award due to a travel ban imposed on him by Iranian authorities.

Iranian director Mohammad Rasoulof’s drama “There Is No Evil” took home the top Golden Bear prize at the 2020  Berlin Film Festival.

By Nancy Tartaglione

BERLIN -- Held in the German capital from Feb. 20 to March 1, the Berlin International Film Festival is taking a darker view of the world, perhaps a reflection on the current state of world affairs, on its 70th anniversary. That focus is apparent in one of the festival’s most-awaited premieres, "Berlin Alexanderplatz," an adaptation of the seminal book by Alfred Döblin set in 1920s Berlin.

Banned from filmmaking in Iran but still active, screenwriter and director Mohammad Rasoulof returns to the great moral themes that underlie all his work in There Is No Evil(Sheytan vojud nadarad), a German/Czech/Iranian co-prod competing at the Berlin Film Festival.

BERLIN — Giant Brazilian TV network Globo has seen its bet on shorter-format series vindicated by the selection of two of their new series at this year’s Berlinale Series Market.

Constantin Film, Germany's leading indie production company, unveiled its new slate of high-end series Monday as part of the Berlin Film Festival's Berlinale Series section on small-screen productions. The big new show announced was Der Palast (The Palast) from famed director Uli Edel (The Baader Meinhof Complex), a period drama set at famed eastern Berlin theater the Friedrichstadt-Palast.