Iranian cinema giant Bahram Beyzai dies at the age of 87

Many tributes have been shared for Bahram Beyzai, a giant of Iranian cinema and theater, who died at the age of 87 in the United States.

The front pages of Iranian newspapers mourn his loss, with opposition voices and those who fondly remember the Shah’s era also paying tribute to Beyzai.

Prince Reza Pahlavi, exiled son of the last Shah of Iran, described his death as “a great loss for the art and culture of our country”.

Although Beyzai’s later films were banned in the 1980s by the Islamic regime that toppled the Shah, a number of senior officials in the current government have also paid tribute to his contribution to Iranian culture.

Several current Iranian filmmakers have acknowledged their debt to him, notably Jaafar Panahi – whose latest film won the top prize at this year’s Cannes Film Festival – saying he taught them “to resist forgetting.”

Beyzai has avoided direct political references in his work, both as a playwright and director, and has always stated that he tries not to trade in overt messages.

But his work over several decades brings historical, even mythical, figures into conflict with oppressive religious and political systems.

Coming from a family of famous poets, Beyzai was imbued from birth with the deepest traditions of Persian culture.

He first became known as a playwright, drawing on Persian legends and rituals.

Always passionate about cinema, he began directing films in the 1970s.

He has established himself as one of the key figures of the new wave of Iranian cinema.

Its most productive period straddled the era of the Shah and then that of the Islamic theocratic forces that deposed him – both systems always ready to detect hidden messages that could be interpreted as dissent.

As Jaafar Panahi said in his tribute: “Beyzai did not take the easy way out. He endured years of exclusion, imposed silence and distance, but he did not abandon his language and his beliefs.”

A few years after the Iranian Revolution, he produced what many consider his masterpiece, Bashu, the Little Stranger, about a little boy who tries to take refuge from the Iran-Iraq War.

It was banned in Iran – like other films he made at that time – but was later voted by film critics as the greatest Iranian film of all time.

The film was screened in a restored version at the Venice Film Festival this year, winning the Best Film award in the classics section.

Beyzai eventually left Iran in 2010 and spent his final years in the United States where he taught Iranian culture.

Although he left his homeland, his wife, actress Mozhdeh Shamsai, said that just hearing the word Iran would still bring tears to his eyes – and he still held out hope for a new culture and a future for his homeland.