TEHRAN – The 14th edition of Cinéma Vérité, Iran’s major international festival for documentary films, honored documentarian Kamran Shirdel with a lifetime achievement award on Sunday.

Shirdel, who is also a photographer and translator, studied architecture and film direction in Rome. He started his career in filmmaking in 1965. 

His 1968 film, “The Night It Rained”, has been awarded at several Iranian and international events.

“The Mirrors”, “Tehran Is the Capital of Iran”, “Women’s Quarter”, “Women’s Prison” and “Boom-e Simin” are among his films. 

“Paykan”, “Dubai” and “The First Loneliness” are his other movies.

Speaking at the ceremony, the director of the festival Mohammad Hamidi-Moqaddam said that the organizers had the honor to invite Shirdel to cooperate as the head of the jury.

Next, a documentary made by Hadi Afarideh on Shirdel was screened, and Afarideh spoke briefly about Shirdel who was not able to attend the ceremony due to his illness.

“This documentary reviews 60 years of history of this country,” Afarideh said.

“His specific attitudes are quite clear in his documentaries because of the classes he has been through with great masters in Italy. Besides his own talent, he was always a good manager for those who used to collect funds for his projects,” he said.

Film critic Khosro Dehqan next talked about Shirdel and said, “Perhaps, if you ask for the names of his films, not many will remember the names of his numerous films, but I should say that he made about 200 films, some of which were for companies and were industrials.

“He is like an iceberg, of whom we only see a small part, and his other parts are invisible to us,” Dehqan said.

Another film critic, Hushang Golmakani, also present at the ceremony, said, “When we look at the documentaries made by the veterans, we discover that they wanted to give information and knowledge to the viewers, while Shirdel highlighted the critical aspect of documentaries in the cinema of Iran as well,” he said.

“I still believe that his ‘The Night It Rained’ remains one of the best, although many good documentaries were made after it,” he said.

The Documentary and Experimental Film Center (DEFC) celebrated the 80th birthday of Shirdel by screening a number of his films last June.

The DEFC is the main organizer of the event. The festival ran totally online and came to an end on Monday.

Photo: Veteran documentarian Kamran Shirdel.

RM/MMS/YAW