The director of Nasim Saba, the Iranian distributor of the film, said that was shocked by the promptness of the Screening Council, an Iranian organization which determines when movies premiere and how long the films remain on screen.
“Ticket sales for ‘Tehran 2121’ (an animation by Bahram Azimi) declined at the box office, so the Screening Council decided to replace it with ‘The Queen’ a week sooner,” Nasim Saba Director Saeid Sadi said in a press release on Tuesday.
Director Mohammad-Ali Bashe-Ahangar has said that the decision to premiere the film a week sooner than scheduled will affect the film at the box office.
“So far, no commercial or advertising materials have been prepared for the film,” Bashe-Ahangar told the Persian service of FNA.
The story of “The Queen” is set in the southwestern Iranian city of Abadan during the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war. An Iranian soldier hides in the Abadan Oil Refinery to reconnoiter the Iraqi forces.
The film brought the best director award at the Iranian Film Critics and Screenwriters Guild Celebration for Bashe-Ahangar in January 2013.
It received 14 nominations in various categories at the 30th Fajr International Film Festival in Tehran in February 2012. However it did not win any awards.
Certain people criticized the film and consider it “anti-war” due to the fact that the film challenges Iran’s official outlook on the Iran-Iraq war.
“I love Iran and I have no plans for subversion,” Bashe-Ahangar previously said in an interview.
He added that some people dislike the film since it portrays a certain approach to war, which they still want to understand. Consequently, they label the film “anti-war”.
The Iranian premiere of “The Queen” had previously been postponed indefinitely in December 2012.
MMS/YAW
MNA
MNA
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