Winner of the Palme d'Or trophy at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival for his film «It Was Just an Accident», Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi returned to Iran immediately after the 2026 Oscar awards gala in Los Angeles, proceeding despite ongoing legal procedures and his public criticism of the suppression of pro-democracy protests in January. [1]
Panahi had not made any public appearance in Iran since his arrival, remaining apparently free despite having been sentenced to imprisonment. [1]
The Iranian court rejected Panahi's appeal in June against a one-year prison sentence, and his lawyer specified last week that the director was subsequently sentenced to over five years in detention, with the charges described as vague. Photo sources published by the Iranian news agency ISNA and by Mediafax show Panahi present at the funeral of former Iranian international footballer Hamid Alidoosti. In the respective image, the director wearing his sunglasses is embracing well-known actor Peyman Maadi, standing beside him throughout the funeral ceremony. [1]
According to Mediafax, ISNA reported that Jafar Panahi returned to Iran on March 30, during a period when conflicts in the Middle East were already active, following the outbreak of war at the end of February through Israeli-American attacks on Iran. [1]
The 66-year-old director has a history of detention: he was incarcerated for 86 days in 2010, and later for seven months between 2022 and 2023, gaining freedom as a result of his hunger strikes. A prominent figure of the Iranian New Wave cinema, Panahi won the Golden Bear at Berlinale in 2015 for the film «Taxi», the Palme d'Or at Cannes 2025 for «It Was Just an Accident» (made clandestinely), and the Golden Lion at Venice in 2020 with «The Circle». [1]
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