Two years ago, the famous Iranian director Asghar Farhadi, who has won two Oscars, was accused by his students of plagiarizing the script of his work "A Hero". This became a hot topic in the world of film circles and his personal reputation was also seriously damaged. influence, and no new work has been released since then. Recently, the Iranian court finally made a final ruling that all plagiarism accusations were not established, and Farhadi was cleared of charges.
On July 14, 2021 local time, director Asfa Farhadi attended the press conference for the film "A Hero" in the main competition of the 74th Cannes Film Festival. Visual China Map
Back in July 2021, Farhadi participated in the main competition section of the Cannes Film Festival with his new work "A Hero" and finally won a jury award. In September of that year, his student Azadeh Masihzadeh accused the teacher’s new work on personal social media of actually stealing her 2018 documentary “All Winners, All Losers” ), demanding a public apology from Farhadi and compensation for losses.
"A Hero" poster
Farhadi denied the relevant accusations and took the other party to court for defamation of reputation. The latter also countersued, accusing the famous director of infringing on intellectual property rights and plagiarizing other people's works. For a time, this matter became a hot news topic for movie fans around the world. There were even false news such as ""A Hero" was found guilty of plagiarism" and "Farhadi may be imprisoned for plagiarism".
This week, the Iranian court made a final ruling, recognizing the opinions of multiple copyright law experts from the University of Tehran, rejecting Mahizadeh's infringement accusations, and completely clearing Farhadi's name.
The movie "A Hero" tells the story of the protagonist Raheem who was arrested and imprisoned due to debt. However, while he was out on parole, he accidentally picked up a handbag containing gold coins and decided to return it to the owner. As a result, he encountered a series of unexpected encounters. . According to Mahizadeh, in 2014, she participated in a film production workshop hosted by Farhadi and completed the filming of the documentary "All Winners, All Losers" under his guidance. The film tells a true story that happened in her hometown of Shiraz: a single father was serving time in prison for debt. During his parole period, he picked up a wallet and returned it to the owner with good intentions, but it led to a series of unexpected consequences.
Asfa Farhadi (left) and Azadeh Mahizadeh during a filmmaking workshop
In 2018, the documentary All Winners, All Losers won the Special Jury Prize at the Shiraz Art Film Festival. In August 2019, Mahizadeh, at Farhadi's request, signed a statement stating that the creative idea of the film belonged to Farhadi. Afterwards, she said that the reason why she did that was purely due to pressure. Before choosing to go to court, both parties also tried to resolve the conflict through negotiation. Farhadi offered to compensate her US$1,600 and thanked her in the end credits; Mahizadeh asked to participate in the movie's box office profits and wrote in the opening credits that "One Hero" is adapted from "All Winners, All Losers" 》. Ultimately, the two sides failed to reach an agreed solution.
Mahizadeh on the set of "All Winners, All Losers"
In November 2021, Farhadi took the lead in submitting a criminal complaint to the Tehran Culture and Media Court, accusing Mahizad of defaming his reputation and spreading false information. Not long after, the latter filed a countersuit, accusing Farhadi of plagiarizing ideas, stealing intellectual property and "attempting to obtain illegal gains through fraud or abuse of privileges."
During the preliminary hearing of the case in 2022, Mahizadeh presented evidence, compared the specific contents of the two films with each other, and pointed out a total of 56 similarities. In addition, a classmate who also participated in the workshop also testified in court to support Mahizadeh's statement, but several other classmates also signed to support Farhadi's statement.
Against this background, in March 2022, the judge of the Tehran Culture and Media Court in charge of the case concluded that Mahizadeh's complaint was reasonable and Farhadi must formally accept the judgement, thus rejecting Farhadi's defamation of reputation. , Spread false information and complain. Because of unfamiliarity and misunderstanding about Iran's judicial system, a few Hollywood media misunderstood that Farhadi had been convicted. By the end of 2022, the subjects of the documentary "All Winners, All Losers" also filed a lawsuit with the Shiraz District Court, accusing Farhadi of defaming his reputation and leaking personal information, and emphasized that he had already exclusively authorized Mahizadeh to Capture his life story. The complaint was dismissed by the court and the case failed to be successfully filed.
Now, copyright law experts and art experts hired by the Tehran court have unanimously concluded that the plagiarism accusation is "completely unfounded" after comparing the two works and reviewing several hours of video recordings of the interactions between teachers and students in the filmmaking workshop. "According to", and emphasized that this social story had been widely reported in Iranian news media and social networks before the two filmed the work, and "real events and news reports are part of the public domain, and the right to use them is not allowed by anyone." The monopoly should allow everyone to get inspiration from real events or news to create movies or other works of art."
In addition, the judgment also pointed out that the concept, story presentation, structure, characterization, performance and other creative elements of "A Hero" are significantly different from the documentary "All Winners, All Losers" and even real events and their news reports are different and therefore there is no copyright infringement.
In the past few years, since the news of plagiarism broke, Farhadi himself has always maintained his innocence and emphasized that "A Hero" was partly inspired by the drama master Brecht's work "The Life of Galileo" and partly inspired by real people. thing. “I often read such stories in newspapers and magazines. They are ordinary people, but because of some selfless acts of kindness, they suddenly make the headlines and become the object of public attention. However, the popularity cannot last for a few days, and soon these People will become anonymous again. What interests me is the ups and downs of their lives in a short period of time. There are generally some things in common with these stories. The inspiration for "A Hero" did not come from a specific news item. But when I wrote the script, I did have these real events that I had read in mind," Farhadi once told the media.
