It is a prestigious award, the Fiesole Masters Film Award bestowed by the Municipality of the hillside town overlooking the city of Florence, in collaboration with the National Syndicate of Critici Cinematografici Italiani Group Toscano and the Fondazione Sistema Toscana, with the artistic direction of Massimo Tria. In past years, the "Maestro del cinema" award has gone to filmmakers such as Paolo Sorrentino, Giuseppe Tornatore and Terry Gilliam, not to mention past greats like Luchino Visconti, Orson Welles, Stanley Kubrick, Ingmar Bergman and Ken Loach.
This year's recipient is no stranger to the city of Florence having participated in the FILM Middle East NOW festival held there. The festival collaborated with the Regione Toscana, alongside the Fondazione CR Firenze and with the support of Villa San Michele, A Belmond Hotel, Florence.
Farhadi is seen above during that time, photographed with the festival's co-founder Lisa Chiari.
The award evening will be on Saturday, July 16 and will take place at the Teatro Romano di Fiesole, as a free to the public event. The festivities will kick off at 8.45 pm with a meeting with the director and the presentation of the monographic volume, the first dedicated to him in Italy. The ceremony will then take place at 10 pm and following the handing out of the award there will be the screening of Farhadi's Academy Award winning film A Separation.
During the month of July, Florence will continue to pay tribute to the great Iranian filmmaker with a retrospective of his work in the Piazzale degli Uffizi. Among some of the gems by Farhadi which will be screened in the open-air dramatic setting of the historic area in the centre of the city, will be The Salesman, his last oeuvre A Hero and his 2018 film Everybody Knows starring Penélope Cruz and Javier Bardem.
Anna Ravoni mayor of Fiesole, said: "I am happy to present the 2022 edition of the Fiesole Prize to the Masters of Cinema, which represents a milestone in the history of our event. In fact, with the exception of Akira Kurosawa in 1986, the Masters who have been on the stage of the Roman Theater of Fiesole up until now have all been either European or American. This year the Prize wanted to broaden its gaze, opening up to the Middle East and we can only be proud of this."
