According to the news agency Online news Glavizh Naderi wrote in Sazendagi newspaper: The documentary “Anti-Hero” directed by Aref Afshar was finally able to receive permission to participate in the 18th Truth Cinema Festival this year. This is despite the fact that this documentary, which is a product of the Oj media cultural organization, was not allowed to be screened in the Haqit Cinema Festival last year and in the previous government, which by the way was also the secretary of Mohammad Hamidi Moghadam. During that period, the documentary maker was told to make some corrections in his documentary, but after these audits, he was told that the film should not be released at all. Of course, Afshar emphasized in an interview that the Cinema Organization and Center for the Development of Documentary and Experimental Cinema had no problem with the screening of his film in the festival and that an institution higher than the Cinema Organization prevented the screening of this film during that period.
Until today, Afshar has shown that he is interested in challenging and sensitive issues, and in his own words, he is one of those seventies who seeks answers to his questions from influential people in the post-revolution era. In fact, documentary films like “Anti-Hero” are the products of today’s youth, who have close and distant relations with the revolution, and how the Islamic Republic system was formed and continued, has created many questions in their minds. These questions remain unanswered for them and they are trying to discover the answers to their questions and solve the contradictions in their minds. Afshar says: “As a young man from the seventies, I have many unanswered questions about the Islamic revolution and Iran’s history in my mind, and this is not unique to me, and many young people were also faced with the same unanswered questions, and somewhere we should go.” These questions should be answered. During school and university, no one gave us an answer, and with these kinds of documentaries, we can answer these dualities that exist in the history of the Islamic Revolution.”
Sadegh Khalkhali was one of the famous and controversial personalities after the revolution and the 60s, who has no equal in many of his actions until today. The appearance of such a personality in the noisy period after the revolution is the result of the space and atmosphere of that period. As soon as the atmosphere becomes calmer and more logical, such people who make the best use of that chaotic and dusty situation to implement their thoughts and agendas, are gradually left aside and removed over time. Because as the dust settles and the situation becomes clear, the decisions become more logical and the way is closed to the extremisms and arbitrary actions of people like Khalkhali.
The documentary “Anti-Hero” tries to depict Khalkhali’s actions in the first months and years after the revolution. The documentary starts from the beginning with images from one or two days after the mob set fire to the neighborhood of Shahranu, which faced the anger and concern of the people, and then goes to the conversation with people such as Ali Akbar Natiq Nouri, Mohammad Atrianfar, Mohsen Rafiqdoost, Mohammad Soheri. , Mustafa Pourmohammadi, the son of Ayatollah Taleghani, Mohsen Kangerlu, Fayaz Zahid and… Even though the filmmaker tries to have an unbiased narrative of that era, the arrangement and juxtaposition of the interviews and documentary archive images shows from the very beginning that the filmmaker’s task with his main subject is quite clear and he approached his subject with a clear position. And it is supposed to have a clear conclusion from the beginning. None of these negates the work of a documentary filmmaker, and every filmmaker starts making a documentary or fiction film with his own beliefs and concerns, but the approach of the filmmaker is so clear and definite from the very beginning that it shows that he has a certain understanding of Sadegh Khalkhali from the beginning and with Conversations with different figures confirm this approach. The filmmaker tries to explain the mission of finding Sadeq Khalkhali and how to carry out his mission. In one place, Atrianfar emphasizes that no decree was written by Imam Khomeini for Khalkhali and he considered himself the ruler of Sharia without having a decree from the Imam. The documentary maker goes on to discuss the events that happened during Khalkhali’s time and the numerous executions he carried out, and in this section, Pourmohammadi emphasizes that Khalkhali was quick to judge and executed many accused people with limited documents. Atrianfar mentions a number of SAVAK officers who could provide important information to the intelligence forces, but were executed by Khalkhali’s order. Here Naqbi is also accused of execution and Dr. Sheikh is mentioned who was the fifth best orthopedist in the world who luckily managed to stay away from Khalkhali’s eyes and not be executed. They say holy.
In fact, the people who talk about Khalkhali in this documentary have a common position, except for Hadi Ghaffari, whose pictures were taken from another documentary, and he did not agree to talk about Khalkhali in this documentary. Of course, after 46 years have passed since the revolution and the fate of Sadegh Khalkhali, and of course the public impression left of him, it is obvious that now there is no one who will speak in praise of this character, but the form of the conversations and their cuts show each other. It shows that the filmmaker wants to reach a specific conclusion and that is the condemnation of extremism and actions and executions that Khalkhali carried out during He did his presence in the judiciary. In addition to the archive images and the filmmaker’s cuts from the interviews, it is suggested to these images that Khalkhali was not unaffected in some of the assassinations of important personalities and that his opposition and resistance to such people led to these events. As Afshar emphasized in an interview with ISNA: “Our documentary film is about a historical duality, a duality between the thinking represented by Mr. Sadegh Khalkhali on the one hand and Shahid Beheshti on the other hand. After the victory of the Islamic revolution, these two thoughts meet in different issues, we tried to depict this contrast. In fact, our story begins 20 days before the victory of the Islamic Revolution and continues with the establishment of the Supreme Judicial Council and the Supreme Council of the Revolution until the year 1958, which is the peak of the confrontation between Martyr Beheshti and Martyr Qudousi with Mr. Khalkhali, and continues until the year 60. .
Although the documentary “Anti-Hero” has limited archival images and many conversations, this documentary is beyond the interest of the general viewer and cannot keep an ordinary viewer on their feet until the end, but it has a bold and daring look at one of the most important figures in the history of the revolution, and he accuses him in such a way that one or two of the interviewees of the documentary explicitly declare that with Khalkhali’s trial, his death sentence was issued
With all these factors, it seems that with the passing of nearly half a century since the last years of the 50s, it is possible to leave the judgment about the characters of the early years of the revolution to today’s youth. Those who seek to discover the truth and publish their documents and results from the facts they find. So how much better to support the publication of documentaries like “Anti-Hero” so that such works can be shown within our borders and in domestic festivals, before such subjects and people related to them become a source of judgment and rejection for some people on the other side of the water.
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