The last time the Opening Film was neither in English nor in French was for Pedro Almodóvar’s Bad Education in 2004.
This psychological thriller stars Penélope Cruz and Javier Bardem from Spain and Ricardo Darín from Argentina. As usual, Asghar Farhadi also surrounds himself with a first-class team: José Luis Alcaine on photography (a regular collaborator of Pedro Almodóvar, Carlos Saura and Bigas Luna), the costume designer Sonia Grande (Midnight in Paris by Woody Allen, The Others by Alejandro Amenábar), and Iranian editor Hayedeh Safiyari, continuing a long and fruitful collaboration with the director after working together on four of his feature films, including his two Oscar-winning films.
Over the past decade, Asghar Farhadi has quickly established himself as one of Iran’s most influential and internationally recognized filmmakers, both for his tense and carefully crafted scripts and for the virtuosity of his realism in directing. At the Berlinale, A Separation (2011) garnered the Golden Bear, as well as the Golden Globe, César, and Oscar for Best Foreign Film. Farhadi then entered the Official Selection at Cannes with The Past (2013, Best Actress for Bérénice Bejo) and The Salesman (2016, Best Screenplay and Best Actor for Shahab Hosseini), which also won an Oscar for Best Foreign Film.