Farhadi at Rio Film Festival: Hollywood films like 'Argo' cast Americans as saviours

Mixed · 2Twice Oscar-winning Iranian filmmaker Asghar Farhadi, at the Rio Film Festival in Brazil to present "Parallel Tales", criticised Hollywood's portrayal of foreign cultures in a public conversation. 1 2 Mixed · 2Asked about "Argo" winning Best Picture a year after his film "A Separation" won the Oscar for best international/foreign-language film, Farhadi said he saw it when it came out and felt it was a "Hollywood thing"; the moderator said the film portrays Iran "like you're in hell". 1 2 Left · 1Farhadi said such films "are not deep" and are made for money, and that "it's always a white guy from the United States saving others", asking: "Who asked you to come and save us?" 1

Mixed · 2He said the problem is that Hollywood and some people in the United States "look at the world from up to down", and that even well-meant attitudes assume others should become like them, which he said he does not want. 1 2 Left · 1Farhadi also said Americans claim to "have democracy" but do not: "You don't have democracy. It's a lie." He cited research visits to San Francisco prisoners, saying the "real America" was there, among Black and foreign-born inmates. 1 Mixed · 2"Argo" is loosely based on a true story in which Ben Affleck's character, a CIA exfiltration specialist, poses as a film producer to rescue six Americans in Tehran; Fox noted the real Tony Mendez was of Mexican descent, while Variety described Affleck's character as Latino. 1 2

Left · 1Farhadi said media and cinema do not give a complete picture of ordinary life, that mainstream coverage of Iran rests on "very simple knowledge", and that a single narrative makes people ready to accept that others are "the enemy". He said his films "A Hero" and "Parallel Tales" concern how people see and are seen by others. 1 Left · 1Variety also reported that he tries not to address politics directly in his films, that his next film will be in Farsi and not directly about the current war in Iran or the Palestine conflict, and that "Parallel Tales" was moved from the US to France because its "DNA" was "more European than American". 1 Right · 1Fox News Digital said it asked representatives for Farhadi and Affleck for comment. Media Research Center president David Bozell responded that America "was asked to save the world, and we did, not once, but twice" and suggested Hollywood makes such films "for a reason". 2