Mini biography

Farrokh Ghaffari (1921, Teheran, Iran - 2006, Paris, France)

Born in Tehran in 1921, he left Iran for Belgium after he finished middle school.

Shortly afterwards he went to France and studied French literature at the University of Grenoble.

Ghaffari returned home in 1941 and established the National Film Center of Iran in 1950.

Ghaffari's debut film "South of the City" (1958), which took a critical look at the impoverished south side of Tehran, was banned, but it was renamed "Competition in the City" several years later and was screened.

His "Night of the Hunchback" (1964), an adaptation of a story from "The Thousand and One Nights", inspired a serious movement toward literature in Iranian cinema.

With the help of Iranian actor/director Jalal Moqaddam, he wrote the screenplay which focused on the bitter political and social atmosphere dominating Iran in the 1960s.

Ghaffari gave up filmmaking after that movie and devoted himself to research on Iranian cinema and some administrative duties at Iranian state TV before the victory of the Islamic Revolution in 1979.

Ghaffari left Iran for France before the revolution and never returned home.

Along with Ebrahim Golestan and Fereidun Rahnama, he is regarded as one of the founders of Iran's intellectual new wave cinema.

Filmography

1958: South of the City
1959: Who is the Bride?
1964: Night of the Hunchback
1975: Zanburak

Director - Selected filmography

1. The Falconet | Zanburak (1975)
   
2. Night of the Hunchback | Shab-e Ghouzi | Nuit de bossu (1965)
   
3. South of the City | Jonoub-e Shahr (1958)