The need for connection and community is primal, as fundamental as the need for air, water, and food.

 

 By Hamideh Hosseini 

Representative of UNESCO Cluster Office in Tehran Esther Kuisch Laroche said that Iran is a wonderful place to celebrate World Day for Cultural Diversity for Dialogue and Development since there is a lot of cultural diversities within Iran.
She further told Iran Daily that the day is really a day for diversity, because we all have different cultures and backgrounds but we are united as humanities.
Such diversity is the beauty of Iran and any other country in the world, she said, today is really the day to showcase culture of different countries and places and different parts of Iran.
Asking about the purpose of such programs, she said that these events aim to learn more from each other and have greater understanding, more respect for each other and hopefully it will also lead to greater peace in the world.
Speaking about the quality of the ceremony, she expressed satisfaction about the event because everybody is learning from different cultures and traditions and they are having good time.
On the selection of 17 countries, she said that UNESCO invited all the embassies in Tehran to participate but due to the short deadlines only 17 embassies were able to attend.
UNESCO Tehran Cluster office celebrated the day on Tuesday with the participation of representatives from 17 countries including Austria, Cuba, Indonesia, Sweden, Uruguay and Kyrgyzstan. They staged performances of martial art and traditional music.
In her opening address, Kuisch Laroche said that celebrating cultural diversity means celebrating equitable exchange and dialogue between civilizations, cultures and peoples, as a prerequisite for constructing peace among nations.
“Our heritage is what gives us a sense of identity and belonging, and it’s what makes us proud of who we are,” she added.
Elsewhere in her remarks, the UNESCO representative in Tehran stated, “By celebrating cultural diversity, and seeking to learn about other people’s customs and traditions, we foster greater mutual understanding and harmony, and we come to realize that we are all united in our common humanity.”
The event, which included cultural performances and exhibitions from the provinces of Iran and countries around the world, was organized in cooperation with embassies in Tehran.
Hundreds of people from different nationalities and cultural backgrounds as well as the general public attended the celebration which took place at the Ivan Attar Auditorium of Sa’adabad Cultural and Historical Complex.
Rasht Municipality, a member of UNESCO’s Creative Cities Network for its gastronomy, hosted a food festival to showcase its culinary art.
In 2001, UNESCO adopted the Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity and in December 2002, the UN General Assembly, declared May 21 to be the “World Day for Cultural Diversity for Dialogue and Development”.

 

The Han Solo spinoff “Solo: A Star Wars Story” has touched down at the Cannes Film Festival, bringing its cast and a full-sized Chewbacca to the French Riviera extravaganza.
Director Ron Howard, wearing a hat that read “A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away,” introduced his cast Tuesday before the film’s international premiere at Cannes, AP reported.
Stars Alden Ehrenreich, Donald Glover, Emilia Clarke, Woody Harrelson and “Chewbacca” actor Joonas Suotamo posed for photographers to promote the biggest Hollywood blockbuster at this year’s festival.
“Solo” is the third “Star Wars” film to land at Cannes, following “Attack of the Clones” in 2002 and “Revenge of the Sith” in 2005.
It will be released in France on May 23, two days before its release in the United States.

 

Iranian animation ‘Bystander’, directed by Sheida Kashi, will compete in the Balkan Can Kino Film Festival in Greece.
‘Bystander’ is a cinematic depiction of society that does not accept differences and is heading for annihilation, reported ifilmtv.com.
It is about an old man who is living behind a window from where he sees a dark world and remembers his past when he was an active revolutionary.
The eight-minute animation recently won the second prize in the animation and experimental film section of the 21st Faludi International Youth Film Festival and Photo Competition in Hungary.
Launched in 2017, Balkan Can Kino is a space for new filmmakers and indie filmography. Its aim is to shift from the focus on Hollywood and European cinema, representing a wider variety of communities and cultures.
‘Bystander’ is to be screened at the festival on May 18, 2018.

 

South Korea and Japan are set to screen Iranian feature ‘Damascus Time’, made in three international languages, this summer.
The film’s international screening rights have been acquired by a number of countries, including South Korea and Japan, ifilmtv.com reported.
Ebrahim Hatamikia’s ‘Damascus Time’ focuses on security threats by terrorists when an Iranian plane, transporting humanitarian aid to Syria, is challenged in Damascus Airport.
Its cast includes popular Iranian actors such as Babak Hamidiyan and Hadi Hejazifar as well as a number of actors from Syria and Lebanon.
‘Damascus Time’ recently won some awards, including Crystal Simorghs for Best Director and Best Music Composition, in the last edition of Fajr Film Festival in Iran.
The film which went on the local screen some days prior to the Iranian New Year Norouz has bagged $3 million-plus in box office sales.
 

The Billy Wilder Theater in Los Angeles, California is hosting the UCLA Celebration of Iranian Cinema.
The theater has scheduled to screen ‘Negar’, directed by Rambod Javan, on May 18 followed by the acclaimed drama ‘Bashu, the Little Stranger’, directed by Bahram Beizaie, a day later.
UCLA Film and Television Archive, the internationally renowned visual arts organization, is holding the special event to celebrate Iranian cinema. The event began on April 28 and will continue until May 19.
The visual arts organization is focused on the preservation, study and appreciation of film and television, based at the University of California, Los Angeles.
‘Bashu, the Little Stranger’ (1985) will be screened on the last day of the event in Billy Wilder Theater in Los Angeles, California.
Writer-director Beizaie’s landmark film follows young refugee Bashu from his southern home where his family is killed in a bomb attack during the Iran-Iraq War to a northern Iranian village where he is reluctantly taken in by Naii (Susan Taslimi), a farmer’s wife with two children already whose husband is off looking for work, cinema.ucla.edu wrote.
What follows is a powerful, moving story of difference and acceptance in a country largely perceived as ethnically, linguistically and culturally monolithic.
Beizaie’s sensitivity to the plight of the displaced and the trauma of war makes this timeless work as relevant now as ever.
In 1990, the Los Angeles Times described the Beizaie’s masterpiece as “a pure joy in which there are absolutely no false moves and both laughter as well as tears. Every movement of the camera, its every placement, its every composition, indeed, every cut in the film is exactly right, serving unobtrusively to tell a story.”
The event has also screened ‘24 Frames’ by the late Iranian auteur Abbas Kiarostami which is a minimalist film triumph narrated through twenty-four hypnotizing frames.
Among the most prominent movies that went on the program’s screen are ‘Blockage’, directed by Mohsen Qaraei, ‘Boarding Pass’, directed by Mehdi Rahmani, and ‘Golden Time’, directed by Pourya Kakavand.
The screening list goes on with ‘The Home’, directed by Asghar Yousefinejad, ‘Israfil’, directed by Ida Panahandeh, and ‘No Date, No Signature’, directed by Vahid Jalilvand.
Honaronline.ir, Mehr News Agency contributed to the story.