TEHRAN – IRGC commander Mohammad Borujerdi’s struggles against separatists in western Iran to maintain the territorial integrity in the region in the early 1980s have been portrayed in a movie.

The movie entitled “The Stranger” has been produced at the Owj Arts and Media Organization by Mohammad-Hossein Latifi, director of the acclaimed war film “The Third Day”.

Babak Hamidian, who acted in the war films “Che” and “Damascus Time”, portrays Borujerdi in the movie.  

Nosratollah Mahmudzadeh, the author of the book “Mohammad, the Christ of Kordestan” about Mohammad Borujerdi, collaborated as an advisor to the project.

“Mahmudzadeh is one of the very few people who know martyr Borjerdi well,” Gol-Ali Babai, the author of several books on the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war, which is called Sacred Defense in Iran, told the Persian service of MNA.

“Due to this choice, we can hope to see an acceptable work on screen,” he added.

“The Stranger” is scheduled to premiere at the Fajr Film Festival, which will take place in Tehran in February 2023.

“In my personal research on Martyr Borujerdi, I have learned that with his skills he trained the warriors who then were assigned as senior commanders during the war as a result of his mentoring programs,” Babai said.

“Ahmad Motevasselian, Ebrahim Hemmat, Nasser Kazemi, Mohsen Vezvai, Gholam-Hossein Pichak, Alireza Movahed-Danesh, Ali-Asghar Ranjbaran and several others were among his disciples and this topic should not be treated as unimportant,” he added.

According to the writer, Borujerdi was one of the forerunners of the IRGC, who was nominated to take the helm at the army, however, he preferred to continue his assignment on the western front.

In his comment about the project, Morteza Shabani, who worked as a cameraman in director Morteza Avini’s popular documentary series “The Narration of Triumph” (“Revayate Fat’h”), asked Latifi and producer Hamed Anqa, not to exaggerate about the war heroes.

“In my opinion, what undermines the war martyrs’ position is to regard them as sacred… we do them a great service if we show their real personalities without any exaggeration,” said Shabani, the producer of the acclaimed documentary “Women with Gunpowder Earrings”.  

Born in 1954, Mohammad Borujerdi received military training in Syria and Lebanon in the 1970s.

He was a member of the guard escorting Imam Khomeini, the founder of the Islamic Republic, on his return to Iran on February 1, 1979, after living in exile abroad for years.

After the 1979 Islamic Revolution victory, he was commissioned to fight Kurdish separatists in western Iran in the early 1980s. He succeeded in maintaining the territorial integrity of the region. Ultimately, he was killed by a landmine on the road to Naqadeh from Mahabad on May 22, 1983. 

Photo: A combination photo shows IRGC commander Mohammad Borujerdi (L) and actor Babak Hamidian, who portrays him in the Owj film “The Stranger”. 

MMS/YAW