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IranFilm in Iran: The Magazine and the Movies‘… there are two arenas—cinema and soccer—that while not completelyimpervious to the political torrents have a greater margin of immunity.’BY HOUSHANG GOLMAKANISome imagine Iran as a desert withblack mounds, caravans of camels,men with harems, and oil wells.They might be surprised to learn thatin this country we have three dailiesand two weeklies about cinema andmore than 10 film monthly magazines,almanacs, quarterly periodicals, onequarterly in English about Iraniancinema, and dozens of books on thesubject published each year.Why is so much written about film?Perhaps because each year more than100 feature-length films and 2,000short films and documentaries aremade in Iran. Hundreds of TV showsand films are produced for 10 staterunbroadcast channels. (Iran doesnot have private radio and TV.) Hundredsof students attend four publicfilm colleges, and more private filmacademies are scattered throughoutIran. A government-owned firm andprivate companies also make filmsfor release in shops and video clubs.What’s written gets consumed by manyviewers of international films, whichshow up quickly for black market saleon city sidewalks.Reporting on political matters is arisky business. Journalists have grownaccustomed to the shutting down ofpublications, having to move and startnew ones. Under such circumstances,there are two arenas—cinema andsoccer—that, while not completelyimpervious to the political torrents,have a greater margin of immunity.Film—The MagazineThe first film publication in Iran waspublished in 1930. By the time of theIslamic Revolution in 1979, there wereabout 30 publications, the majority ofwhich had very short life spans. Duringthe early years of the revolution—whenAccompanying Golmakani’s words are covers of Film.politics pervaded everything—theproduction and showing of films wasstill unorganized, there were no filmpublications, and the Iranian pressrarely paid attention to cinema.In 1981, a few friends and I decidedto start a monthly film magazine; byJune 1982, our first issue of Film waspublished with reviews of some of thebetter films being released in hundredsof video clubs in Iran. By choosing tofeature film criticism—with the approachof critiquing the better filmsand excluding the weaker ones—Filmhas deeply influenced filmmakers, governmentofficials overseeing cinema,and created a more serious generationof viewers. Many young Iranian filmmakerstell us that theylearned about cinemafrom reading Film duringtheir childhood andadolescence. At leastit can be claimed thatduring the years of war,political upheaval, socialdespair, and dearthof film showings, Filmkept love for cinemaalive.Now 27 years old,Film is Iran’s longestlastingpublicationabout cinema. Throughthe years we’ve increasedthe number ofpages, and since 1986we have published seasonalspecial editions,including “Iranian FilmYearbook,” added in1991. Two years later,we were publishing aquarterly periodical inEnglish.As happens everywhere,the biggest quarrelsthat happen with the film industryare about criticism—Film twice facedboycotts by Iran’s Film ProducersUnion. But this is not the only problem.In the 1980’s, when Film was Iran’sonly magazine about cinema, officialsin charge of cinema were opposed tothe stardom of popular actors. Theyfelt directors and screenwriters shouldbe the stars, which is contrary to thegeneral nature of cinema and the tasteof cinemagoers who identify with filmsthrough their actors. Yet, in Iran, filmpublications, until midway throughthe 1990’s, had to be cautious aboutframing issues relating to actors.In these same years, restrictions onthe showing of foreign films meant26 Nieman Reports | Summer 2009