A ceremony to honor noted Iranian actor Jamshid Mashayekhi was held at the Artists’ House on December 5.
According to ISNA, the event, titled ’50 Years of Amiable Shadow’, was attended by famous Iranian artists including Ezzatollah Entezami, Hamid Samandarian, Aydin Aghdashlou, Mohammad Ali Keshavarz and Davoud Rashidi.
Speaking at the ceremony, Entezami said that has enjoyed the company of Mashayekhi, Ali Nassirian and Keshavarz, three noted actors, in his life.
“We had friendly relations and worked together in our first feature film ’Cow’ directed by Darioush Mehrjoei,“ he said.
“I have always been interested in Mashayekhi’s acting,“ he said, complaining the ceremony should have been held earlier than this.
He presented a plaque of honor to Mashayekhi on behalf of Iranian cineastes.
Samandarian, for his part, described Mashayekhi as ’the treasure of Iranian theater’ and said that he has been one the heavyweights of Iran’s theater in the past 50 years who greatly adored his work.
Aghdashlou called Mashayekhi a ’living myth’ of Iranian cinema industry and commended him on his creativity and sincerity in his profession.
Davoud Rashidi also presented the plaque of Iran’s Stage Actors Association and hoped that he will continue his work for many years to come.
Another plaque was also presented to Mashayekhi by Keshavarz on behalf of Tehran Mayor Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf.
The program ended with the screening a 70-minute film on Mashayekhi and the singing of the anthem ’O, Iran’ by the audience.
The ceremony was sponsored by Cinema House, Theater House, Association of Cinema Actors, Artists’ House, Institute of City Image, Tehran Municipality’s Cultural Artistic Organization and Chehreh Azad Cultural Artistic Company.

Iranian documentary ’Herat’, directed by Sepideh Farsi, won the UNESCO Award at the 48th edition of Festival dei Popoli, which was held from November 16-22 in Florence, Italy.
The film was also screened in the First Pocket Film Festival, which ends today in Yokohama, Japan, reported ISNA.
The festival features movies taken entirely by cellphone cameras.
Meanwhile, an Iranian film ’As Easy as ABC’, directed by Karim Azimi, received the grand prize of the Seventh Baku International Film Festival in Azerbaijan Republic.
The film is also due to be screened at the International Ukraine Film Festival in May 2008.

Noted Iranian film director Abbas Kiarostami was conferred an honorary doctorate by Toulouse University in France on Saturday in recognition of his contribution to the cinema industry.
According to ISNA, the university organized a ten-day ceremony to commemorate Kiarostami earlier this year in which it screened some of his films.
’Tazieh’, a film by Kiarostami, was shown at the Toulouse National Theater and a panel discussion was also held with the participation of Kiarostami.
During the commemoration ceremony, which was sponsored by the city’s Research Center of Broadcasting Department, his films ’Report’, ’Where Is Friend’s House’, ’Passenger’, ’First Graders’, ’Life Goes On’, ’Wind Will Carry Us’, ’Two Solutions for a Problem’, ’Taste of Cherry’, ’Ten’ were screened in TNT Hall.

Head of Islamic Culture and Relations Organization will leave for Russia on Monday to discuss ways of expanding cultural ties between the two countries.
According to Fars news agency, Mehdi Mostafavi, who will lead a delegation, is scheduled to meet the head of the Federal Agency on Culture and Cinematography, Michael Shvidkoy, to discuss avenues for bolstering bilateral cooperation.
The two sides intend to sign a three-year cooperation program (2008-2010) which is seen as significant in broadening bilateral ties.

Ludwig Wittgenstein

Persian translations of three books by Ludwig Wittgenstein, the noted German philosopher, including ’On Certainty’, ’Blue Book’ and ’Leaves’ will be reviewed in a meeting at Book City on Tuesday.
According to Fars news agency, the books were translated by Malek Hosseini who will present a paper on Wittgenstein’s works in the same gathering.
Ludwig Josef Johann Wittgenstein (1889-1951) was a 20th century philosopher of Austrian origin, who worked primarily in the foundations of logic, the philosophy of mathematics, the philosophy of mind, and the philosophy of language. His influence has been wide-ranging and he is regarded by some as the most important philosopher since Immanuel Kant.
All those interested can attend the event.

The 10th International Students Puppet Show opened on Friday with the participation of 25 groups in the stage section and eight groups in street section.
According to Fars news agency, six plays from Russia, Italy and Indonesia will be performed in the stage section while five and 20 plays will be staged in the competition section respectively.
Street section of the event will feature ’Master Bunch’ directed by Conrad Fredric from Britain and ’Struggle Between Monkey and Lion’ from Indonesia in addition to six street performances from Iranian universities.
Entries for the stage section will be performed in Farabi Hall, Cinema and Theater Faculty and Tehran University while street plays will be brought to stage in city’s gardens, Artists’ House, Soureh University, Daneshjou Park, Fine Arts Campus and University Students Cultural Complex.

Oliver Stone

A spokesman for Oliver Stone said today that the Oscar-winning director has no plans at the moment to visit Tehran to produce a documentary on President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
According to MNA, quoting Los Angeles Times, Steven Rubenstein, president of Rubenstein Communications added despite recent reports suggesting that he could soon be traveling to the Iranian capital for a project, Stone is thinking about other projects now.
He further said that Stone is ready to make a film on the Iranian president but not presently. Last summer, Stone applied for permission to travel to Iran, but his request was rejected by Iranian officials.
The project has been variously referred to in the Iranian media as ’Ahmadinejad’s Adventures’ or ’The Truth About Ahmadinejad’.
However, a director, Ali Reza Sajjadpour had earlier announced a probable visit by Stone to Tehran to study conditions for making a documentary on Ahmadinejad.

Iranian Winners in the First Asia-Pacific Screen Awards will be honored today in a ceremony at Cinema House’s auditorium.
The awarding ceremony of the First Asia-Pacific Screen Awards (APSA) was held on November 13 in Queensland, Australia, said Public Relations Office of Cinema House, reported MNA.
Iranian films, ’Night Bus’ directed by Kioumars Pourahmad and ’Mainline’ co-directed by Rakhshan Bani-Etemad and Mohsen Abdolvahab, received The Jury Grand Prize and The Best Achievement in Directing, respectively.
The Best Picture Award also went to ’Those Three’ by Naqi Nemati.
APSA was held in collaboration with UNESCO and FIAPF (the International Federation of Film Producers Associations).

Names of groups and instrumentalists participating in the international section of 23rd Fajr Music Festival have been announced.
The festival’s executive director, Ali Torabi told ISNA that the French group ’Duet’ will perform in Niavaran Cultural Complex and Vahdat Hall during the event on December 21-22.
India Group will also present programs in the same venues on December 22-23 while several groups from Turkey will perform on the fourth and fifth days of the festival in Bahman and Niavaran cultural complexes. A music band from Azerbaijan Republic will also take part in the international section with several programs to be performed in the same venues during December 26-27.
A Dutch group will perform in Vahdat Hall on December 26.
The other participating group is from Albania. It will present local poetry and music during December 27-28. The group includes six instrumentalists as well as a vocalist.

Two Iranian photographers were awarded at the First Halic International Festival in Istanbul, Turkey.
Alireza Attariani and Hamed Niroumand were among 17 Iranian photographers whose works were featured at the event, reported akasee.com.
Other Iranian photographers participating in the event include Ebrahim Bahrami, Hossein Fatemi, Masoumeh Mashhadi and Qadir Vaqari. The festival was organized by Istanbul University of Fine Arts and Halic University in Istanbul under the auspices of International Association of photography (FIAP).