"The
Day My Aunt Was Ill"
(Rouzi Keh Khalam Mariz Bood)
Scriptwriter & Director: Hana Makhmalbaf
Camera: Maysam Makhmalbaf
Editor: Mohsen Makhmalbaf
Cast: Sara Saghari Saz , Zahra Saghari Saz , Abolfazle Saghari Saz, Asghar Meshkini, Mahbobeh Meshkini
Production: Makhmalbaf Film House
IRAN, Betacam, 24.30 Mins.Transfer to 35mm
For more information regarding this film please go to :
Makhmalbaf Website
When Hana’s aunt goes to the hospital to have a nose job, grandpa comes to take care of the kids. The kids go play in the alley, but to be on the safe side, grandpa suggest they’d come back home. They accept to return home on the one condition that they would be allowed to use the video camera to make a movie…
BIOGRAPHY:
Mohsen Makhmalbaf
Born into a poor family in Tehran on May 29, 1957. He began to support his single mother since he was 8 and by the time he turned 17, he had worked as bellboy, plain worker and anything else he could find in the 13 jobs he went through.
A lower-class youngster in the poor southern districts of Tehran, Mohsen formed an under-ground Islamic militia group since he was 15 and by the time he was 17, he was shot and arrested while attempting to disarm a policeman. Expecting to remain in prison for much longer, he was released from prison shortly after the revolution in 1979. The 4˝-year incarceration helped him to educate himself in various fields and gain focus on his outlooks on life and the Iranian society. This intellectual renaissance led him to distance himself from politics and find better satisfaction in Literature and the arts, especially Cinema. At this stage in his life, he strongly believed that the Iranian society suffers more from Cultural poverty than anything else.
Mohsen Makhmalbaf became a writer and filmmaker of the post-revolutionary Iran. His literary activities included research into the arts, novels, short stories and screenplays that were published in more than 20 books in Farsi, English, French, Italian, Arabic, Urdu, Kurdish and Turkish. He wrote, directed, edited and mainly produced 20 feature and short length films as well as writing screenplays and editing films for various other Iranian filmmakers. His films attended international film festivals throughout the world more than 1000 times and earned several awards from them. Mohsen Makhmalbaf has also been the subject of many films and books that were made about him and his life.
Since 1996, he temporarily abandoned his filmmaking career to teach. He formed the Makhmalbaf Film House in which he taught film to a select group of pupils including his own three children. He is currently conducting research for his upcoming film after 4 years of cinematic silence.
FESTIVALS:
- The 50th Locarno International Film Festival, Switzerland 1997.
- The 10th Tokyo International Film Festival, Japan 1997.
- Hanover International Film Festival, Germany 1997.
- The 27th Rotterdam International Film Festival, The Netherlands, 1998.
- The 1st Thessaloniki International Documentary Film Festival, Greece 1999.
- The 12th Singapore International Film Festival, 1999-2000.
- The 5th Pusan International Film Festival, 2000.
- Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, USA, 2000.
- Moscow International Film Festival, Russia, 2001.
- Goldon Rooster and 100 Flowers International Film Festival, China, 2001.