At Cinehill in late July, Jafar Panahi seemed to step into a gentler world, far removed from the tension and scrutiny that so often frame his life and work. “I can almost say that at no festival across the five continents have I seen such an atmosphere and such an initiative as the one created here, in this kind of setting,” he noted.

The gathering honoured him with its Maverick Award, bestowed since 2008 upon filmmakers who swim against the current, hold fast to an ethical way of seeing the world and push the boundaries of what cinema can say. Alongside a retrospective of selected works, Cinehill screened his Palme d’Or-winning It Was Just an Accident [+leggi anche:
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intervista: Jafar Panahi
scheda film] – on the surface, a revenge-porn thriller tinged with comedy; at its core, a razor-sharp reflection on trauma and violence, and the fragile hope of banishing them.

Cineuropa: You have made films under constant censorship and legal restrictions. Even after receiving a prison sentence with a 20-year filmmaking ban, you continued. How?
Jafar Panahi: Normally, such a sentence would discourage you from continuing in your profession. My first thought was: “No, I must find a way.” I began with my friend, making This Is Not a Film, because they said I couldn’t make films – so we made one by that very title. We shot it entirely inside my home. Then, with Taxi, I thought: “If I can’t make films, maybe I could drive a taxi, but I’d have a camera in the car.” Later, I made a film outside Tehran, and I decided my next one should take place both inside and outside Iran.

I wanted to show young directors that it’s impossible to stop a filmmaker. With the smallest of tools, you can make a film. The seed we planted with This Is Not a Film began to grow. Today, many underground movies are being made. Young filmmakers no longer say, “It’s impossible,” but instead look for solutions. That’s the lesson I wanted to impart, to my son, my students and Iranian filmmakers.

You’ve won major prizes before, but winning the Palme d’Or in person must have felt different. What was that night like for you, and what did it mean to return home to Iran afterwards?
The night before the ceremony, I got a call from prison – a friend told me, “The comments you made after the first screening of your film gave us a lot of hope. There’s a really good atmosphere here now, and we’ve decided to do something tomorrow night when you win the prize.” I told him, “Look, there’s no guarantee I’ll win anything. The fact that the film is here is already valuable; you shouldn’t be thinking about prizes.” But he didn’t seem to listen to me. I barely slept. The next day, a massive power cut swept across the Côte d’Azur, just as we were out shopping for my daughter. Around 4 pm, we were invited to the closing ceremony, with no mention of awards. When I went into the hall, my mind was still on that phone call. I didn’t even notice what was happening until the very end, when they announced the prize. I froze in my seat. That moment wasn’t about me alone; it was about what it signalled to prisoners and to young filmmakers – that a certain kind of hope was possible.

The regime had tried to discredit the film from the start. Before Cannes, three actors and the cinematographer were summoned and threatened. During the festival, state TV aired reports calling the film worthless and the selection politically motivated. From the day I arrived, I said I would fly back the day after the closing, no matter what. I did. At the airport, the film community, friends from prison, families of prisoners, and ordinary people were waiting. If there is “change”, it isn’t because the regime created it; it’s because people’s fear of the regime’s restrictions has diminished.

And there’s an irony: when I was banned from leaving the country, my situation was in some ways better. After finishing a film and sending it out into the world, I had time to think about the next one. Now, I have to follow the movie from country to country to present it, so almost a year of my time disappears. Still, the welcome at home after Cannes told me that the effort matters; it renews the bond with the audience and reminds us that cinema can keep opening doors, even in a closed house.

Your Palme d’Or winner grew out of very personal circumstances. How did it first take shape?
When my circumstances changed, when I was taken somewhere else, it was natural that my subjects would come from there. I spent seven months in prison, speaking with other prisoners and listening to their stories. In a way, it was as if the Islamic Republic had handed me that film to make.

After I was released, it took time before I could return to those thoughts and let the idea take shape. I don’t make films for anyone else; I make them for myself first. I have to believe in my own film before I put my signature on it. Otherwise, like that first short I made, I will tear it up and throw it away.

Your cast mixes professional and non-professional actors. How do you work with them?
Most of the actors in this film came from underground cinema, and many were acting for the first time. With non-professionals, the main goal is to get them to be themselves, not to “act”. With professionals, the challenge is the opposite: they have to adapt to the rhythm and presence of non-professionals to blend in with the rest of the cast.

Here, the challenge was even greater. We sometimes had to deliberately push performances beyond a naturalistic register, into something more heightened. It was about finding the right balance between authenticity and intensity, so that the audience could feel the constant pressure under which these characters live.

As is often the case in your films, the ending leaves many questions open.
At the end, I let the audience decide whether the footsteps they hear are real or imagined. If they’re real, maybe a transformation has occurred and hope has been born. If they’re imagined, that’s another kind of ending. Whenever we can involve the audience’s imagination in cinema, we’ve essentially made a film together: the director plus the audience.