In May writer/director Mohammad Rasoulof fled Iran. On May 24 he presented “The Seed of the Sacred Fig” at the Cannes Film Festival, winning a 12-minute standing ovation, four awards plus a Palme d’Or nomination. “Fig” is also Germany’s submission for the Best International Feature Oscar.
ED RAMPELL: Can you say where you currently are?
MOHAMMAD RASOULOF: New York, because we’ve had screenings here.
Your films have never been publicly screened in Iran. How has Iran’s regime punished you?
I’ve made eight features so far, not one of which has ever been screened inside of an Iranian cinema or any official screening. Until this day, I have yet to see some of my own films inside of a cinema. Because I was banned from leaving the country for many years and this possibility did not exist. So, the first thing the Islamic Republic does is try to interrupt my relationship with my primary Iranian audience.
Then, of course, there’s been imprisonment, interrogations, court cases and there’s an eight-year prison sentence expecting me in Iran… If I were to go back to Iran one day, I’d probably have to go to prison straight away.
Since 22-year-old Mahsa Jina Amini’s death and 2022’s eruption of the “Woman Life Freedom” movement, describe repression faced by artists and protesters in Iran?
It began a long time ago. Perhaps with the beginning of the Islamic Republic, with many artists being forced into exile, and many of them never being unable to continue, many artists being killed. You can say a theocracy has a religious problem when it comes to art. Artists have been trying to keep working for decades and navigate a way in this new world, but not everyone manages to comply with censorship or not resist openly to censorship. Those who do face a quite harsh reality.
…Whenever a significant protest movement takes off, the state immediately reveals its violent face, and we’ve seen this clearly since 2022 with this last [link] in the chain of the struggle for women’s rights in Iran, the “Woman Life Freedom” movement, where the state, with no qualms, showed itself as it is, killed many protesters and sent huge numbers of people to jail. It revealed itself as a totally inhumane entity.
In “Fig,” you dramatize the harsh crackdown on the “Jina Revolution.” After Iman is promoted to inspector, his co-worker, Ghaderi, urges him to agree to a captive’s death sentence – even though Iman hasn’t even read the case files.
Today the same reality is unfolding in front of our eyes. In Tehran, six young men have been sentenced to death and the judge is refusing to sign their execution order. It’s very unfortunate that my inspiration should be based on real stories from my society.
The question of the film is: What characteristic do these people who collaborate with the system have? What enables them to do so?
How were you able to clandestinely make Fig in such a rigidly controlled police state?
Every time they sent me to prison, I learned new tricks how to better circumvent them. To such an extent that perhaps our job as filmmakers, as a cast and crew, is very similar to that of gangsters. Albeit we are the “gangsters of culture.”
To make underground films you always have to follow quite strict protocol… In this film, we decided to stick to three main principles: To have a very small cast and crew; use very limited and light equipment; and I should direct remotely at a distance from set.
Tell us why you fled Iran and about your escape?
The last time I was in prison I knew I probably was going to be sentenced to a long prison sentence. I reflected a lot upon what it meant to be a filmmaker in prison. I thought yes, you might still be a filmmaker, but you’ve really turned into a victim of censorship and the fact is you really can’t get anything done in prison.
I realized I had so many ideas I wanted to get done, were I to receive an eight-year prison sentence, I should leave the country. You always think of the negative aspects of prison, but this last time I was in prison it had some positive aspects. I got to know people who told me were you ever to decide to leave Iran illegally let us know, we can help you. That’s what I did, they enabled me to leave Iran and reach safety.
I left Iran on foot through the mountains… I contacted the German consul since my family had been based in Germany for a long time. Once they ascertained my identity, they helped me get to Germany.
What’s your cast/crew’s current status?
A few days before news of the film got out the young actresses were able to leave the country. Then once they knew about the film, [authorities] exerted a huge amount of pressure on the cast and crew inside the country, which means they interrogated everyone multiple times, prevented everyone from leaving the country, banned people from working. They increased the pressure, so my main collaborators would request me to withdraw the film from main competition at Cannes.
Then, the pressure decreased a little bit. However, we are currently being investigated and some of us will be judged in absentia inside the country on three charges: Act against national security; Propaganda against the regime; and spreading corruption and prostitution on Earth.
“Fig” is more than a portrait of one family. How is “Fig” a microcosm?
A family, as the most specific, small unit of a society, can represent at times society on a wider scale. I was very keen for the film to start out as a family drama. Then expand, change gears and become a film where this family drama is projected against a background of the history of Iran.
Footage of demonstrations is intercut throughout “Fig.”
Footage from the protests is real, it’s documentary, it’s footage taken from protesters themselves, because in Iran, due to censorship and repression, journalists are not allowed to document protests. So, it falls upon protesters themselves, who have been documenting protests for a long time. At this time in history, they use mobile phones to capture footage, which they then circulate online. I was making a film about a family that had become trapped within an apartment so it became very important to show what was happening outside on the streets.
In “Fig”’s finale, Iman drives the family to his childhood home near ruins in the remote countryside. Does this symbolize regime apparatchiks like Iman are out of touch, stuck in the past?
It certainly shows there’s this ongoing battle between the young and older generation that relates to tradition and modernity.
What’s next?
I’m a filmmaker, so naturally I think about making films. I’m currently very busy with all the travel, accompanying the film around the world. I cannot wait to sit down at my table and decide which film to get started on.
“The Seed of the Sacred Fig” is 168-minutes-long with English subtitles and theatrically opened Nov. 27. (Originally published by Truthdig Nov. 26. See a link to the extended version of the interview.)
Ed Rampell is a film historian and critic based in Los Angeles. Rampell is the author of “Progressive Hollywood, A People’s Film History of the United States” and he co-authored “The Hawaii Movie and Television Book,” now in its third edition.
From The Progressive Populist, January 1-15, 2025
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