Philmmaker Grows a Pear

On Sunday the UCLA Center for Near Eastern Studies hosted a sweet little Q&A with The Pear Tree director Dariush Mehrjui. He's got a Lou Reed-like allure to him. Complete with the shades, husky cigarettes-and-alcohol voice, and uber-cool demeanor for an old dude. He left Iran to study Philosophy at UCLA in the 1960s but ended up becoming an auteur after he returned to Tehran.

Mehrjui brought along an actress from that film, Golshifteh Farahani, up on the podium for the interview. She's in town because she's now broken through into Hollywood circles, by staring in the recent Ridley Scott film Body of Lies as Leonardo DiCaprio's love interest. Golshifteh had her first Hollywood red carpet experience for its premiere, which she mentioned at Sunday's event was her "avaleen baar keh rooeh farsheh qermez bedooneh hejab boodam". The breakthrough has Franco-Iranians contemplating what it all means.

Both Mehrjui and Farahani spoke clear and present English. (no pun intended) Near perfect, near eastern dialects. (no pun intended) For two individuals living in Iran their whole lives thats impressive, but these days not so surprising.

Oh, and I took a couple of shots of the evening with my cell phone, but the mobile shots look like shite. But maybe I'll making a movie out of them. An existential one. So there's one on your left.