Question of the day: a custom content production device or cinema?

When a private investor steps back, state and quasi-state bodies fill the gap. A producer who wants to make a film must either partner with a star who works without pay, or turn to support from the Farabi Foundation and similar institutions.

Ambassador Arjan; Nihal Mousavi - Cinema producer and broadcaster Saeed Khani put numbers on the table in this week's program "Chirag" which, if heard from a non-cinema person, would seem exaggeration. He said:

"The cost of making a normal movie with two or three normal actors is 1 billion tomans a day, and if the film is assembled in the shortest time, for example, 40 days, the cost of making a movie is 40 billion tomans.

As a private sector producer, I can no longer make an independent film, I will go to Bahram Radan and we will work together as a co-producer, to whom I will not pay a salary.

I also get some help from Farabi, and I can no longer make a film like Raha and Two Lives, and practically we no longer have such a thing as independent cinema, and making an independent film has no economic justification!"

The importance of these words is not in their speaker. He is only the narrator of part of the reality that every private sector producer lives with.

The main question is what mechanism has brought cinema to the point where making movies for private capital is no longer economically justified.

The calculation is simple. A film that costs 40 billion tomans must return three times this amount from the box office, broadcast sales, and screening rights to break even.

But the Iranian box office works with a ticket price that is far behind the production cost. The number of salons is limited and there is no international market.

When costs are rising with the dollar and inflation, and revenue is stuck at a fixed ceiling, any private film is a gamble that's a foregone conclusion. A wise investor in such a market will invest his capital in real estate and currency, not in cinema.

In this impossible equation, the only thing that can reduce the risk is "face". The best-selling actor becomes the film's insurance, and the investor takes refuge in him to guarantee the return of the money. The result is that there is a rush to the faces, the salaries go up and the contribution of the script, director and other factors goes down.

When platforms and reality shows enter the competition and pay a billion for a few hours of being in front of the camera, the actor makes the most natural decision and sells his time expensively.

He cannot be blamed because he only responds to the prices set by the market. The problem is in the structure that has put all the risk on a few figures.

When the private investor leaves, government and quasi-government institutions fill the void. A producer who wants to make a film must either partner with a star who doesn't get paid, or seek the support of Farabi and institutions like that.

This alone is a situation worth considering: "independent" is not called someone who needs the approval of a star and the support of the government to make his film.

When the main source of funding is the government, the main source of approval is the government itself, and cinema is built not on the basis of daring and discovery, but on the basis of the ability to obtain permission and support. What remains are films that don't take risks, because no one takes risks.

The biggest victims of this situation are the films that don't get made: first films that don't get funding, scripts that don't find buyers because they don't have stars, and small experiences that used to make festivals.

Independent cinema was never alive at the box office. It was from a live director who made something new with minimal means. Today, the problem is not only expensive, this small and low-cost route is also closed, because the production structure has driven small producers and small capital out of the market.

You can't expect the market to fix itself. Transparency in sales and income, ticket price correction, direct and non-selective support of low-cost films, defining a clear mechanism for private investors and opening the way for international screening and sales are the minimum conditions without which any discussion about "cinema revival" is empty talk.

As long as cinema is stuck between the two poles of stars and the government, the rest of the participants in this industry, from writers and filmmakers to producers and young actors, etc., are just spectators of gradual death.

Saeed Khani may not have been accurate in saying "we don't have independent cinema anymore", but if we pay attention to the main content of his words, he raised a question that we all have to answer: