Author: Bijan Tehrani

Letters to Father Jacob is story of Leila, a life sentence prisoner who has just been pardoned. When she is released from prison, she is offered a job at a secluded rectory and she moves there against her will. Leila is used to taking care only of herself, so trouble is to be expected when she starts working as the personal assistant for Jacob, the blind priest living in the rectory. Every day the mail man brings letters from people asking for help from Father Jacob. Answering the letters is Jacob’s life mission, while Leila thinks it’s pointless.Leila has already…

After the Black Tie Awards Gala of the Palm Springs International Film Festival, I interviewed Darryl Macdonald, the director of the festival, about the event and the upcoming festival in January 2010. It is our strong belief at Cinema Without Borders that the Palm Spring International Film Festival is among the best film festivals of the world in regards to the introduction of international cinema.At the Palm Springs International Film Festival, Cinema Without Borders offers its Bridging The Borders Award to the best international film which helps bring the people of our world closer together. Bijan Tehrani: Please tell us…

A love story of survival, SAMSON & DELILAH is a coming-of-age story of two 14 year-olds from a sleepy Aboriginal community who escape their lives to discover the world outside. “Samson and Delilah” triumphed at the recent Australian Film Industry Awards. The film won Best Film, Best Direction, Best Original Screenplay and Marissa Gibson and Rowan McNamara jointly won Best Young Talent.The film is Warwick Thornton’s his feature debut, and is considered to be a major breakthrough in Australian cinema in a local industry dominated by non-indigenous filmmakers; some have said that “Samson & Delilah” it is “the first Australian…

“Delhi-6” (the zip code for the medieval heart of Old Delhi) is the story of an American-born Indian, Roshan, who takes his ailing grandmother back to her neighborhood in Delhi to spend her last days. Roshan falls in love with a beautiful local girl and finds himself at the cross roads of ethnic and religious conflict. Director Mehra’s third film blends themes from classic Hindi cinema with those of the modern day emigration and grapples with a host of issues: caste differences, superstition, communal rift and middle class dreams. The story is told against the backdrop of the ancient walled…

Abner Meecham, an aging Tennessee farmer discarded to a nursing facility by his lawyer son, flees the old folks’ home and catches a ride back to his country farm to live out his days in peace. Upon his return, he discovers that his son has leased the farm to Abner’s old enemy and his white trash family. Not one to suffer fools or go down easy, Abner moves into the old tenant shack on the property and declares that he won’t leave until the farm is returned to his possession. But Lonzo Choat, the new tenant, has no intention to…

In every corner of the world, there’s one question that can never be definitively answered, yet stirs up equal parts passion, curiosity, self-reflection and often wild imagination: “What is God?” Filmmaker Peter Rodger explores this profound, age-old query in the provocative non-fiction feature “Oh My God?”This visual odyssey travels the globe with a revealing lens examining the idea of God through the minds and eyes of various religions and cultures, everyday people, spiritual leaders and celebrities. His goal: to give the viewer the personal, visceral experience of some kind of reasonable, meaningful definition of one of the most used–some might…

Growing up in Dayton, Ohio Curtiss I Cook wanted to do and did one thing: Act. His first brush with the stage was at the age of 10, in an elementary school production of A Raisin in the sun. This experience led to countless high school plays, a career at the famed Dayton Contemporary Dance Company and a full scholarship to Mount View Theatre School in London, where he truly honed his craft.Curtiss’ resume boasts three Broadway shows, countless national tours, spots on Law & Order, the Sopranos, Rescue Me and numerous commercials. In a PSA for TVBoss.org, an unforgettable…

Stephane Herry, CEO of GigaTribe, enjoys working in various environments in different professions. He started working as an IT consultant helping big companies organize their business software architecture. He then joined the video game industry as a project manager for one of the first multiplayer online games. Working for Totem Entertainment, an online software editor, he worked in different jobs, from organizing manager to executive director. In 2005, he co-founded GigaTribe with Alexis Leseigneur, a very talented technical director. GigaTribe is a software community used by more than 1 million people to share files privately over the Internet.Bijan Tehrani: How…

The documentary film NoBody’s Perfect follows Niko von Glasow as he looks for eleven people who are prepared to pose naked for a book of photos. They all are born disabled – like he is – due to the disastrous side-effects of Thalidomide. With a darkly humorous touch, and no deference to political correctness, NoBody’s Perfect explores the specific problems which these twelve extraordinary people have faced during childhood, adolescence and adulthood, and shows them reacting with curiosity, enthusiasm or horror towards the project. As the film approaches the photo shoot, von Glasow completes the picture with scenes showing his…

In 1974, a hot headed 19-year-old named Michael Peterson (Tom Hardy, in a blazing, transformative performance) decided he wanted to make a name for himself and so, with a homemade sawed-off shotgun and a head full of dreams he attempted to rob a post office. After making off with only 26.18 (British Pounds), he was swiftly apprehended and originally sentenced to seven years in jail, Peterson has subsequently been behind bars for 34 years, 30 of which have been spent in solitary confinement. During that time, Michael Petersen, the boy, faded away and ‘Charles Bronson,’ his superstar alter ego, took…