But before I get into the stomach-churning details of the Hollywood Left’s shattered moral compass vis-a-vis directors Polanski and Panahi and other Iranian film artists, I would like to take a moment to honor more of the true heroes who have spoken out loudly on Mr. Panahi’s behalf and signed petitions for his release. The National Society of Film Critics. The Boston, L. A. and  Toronto Film Critics Associations. Arin Paul of the New York Times. Filmmaker Ken Loach. Rutger Wolfson, director of the Rotterdam Film Festival. German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle. Human Rights Watch. French Minister of Culture Frederic Mitterand. Iranhumanrights.org. The list really is long.

Of course, noticeably absent from those petitioning and publicly calling for the release of Mr. Panahi from his unjust tomb-like captivity in Tehran are all of the prominent Hollywood A-List petitioners for Polanski. So Mr. Polanski’s arrest for child rape is worthy of international pressure and outrage, but famed director Jafar Panahi being tossed into a crypt in Tehran on “unspecified charges” is not? Welcome to Lefty Hollywood. And it only gets worse. The most tragic case of Jafar Panahi is yet one more sorry, perplexing and infuriating chapter in leftist Hollywood’s incredible blind side to any human rights violations in Iran, never mind only those perpetrated against Iranian filmmakers today.

Gay rights zero Sean Penn’s PR jaunt for the Mad Mullahs in Tehran in 2005, praising the Islamists even as then president-elect Mahmoud “No Gays in Iran” Ahmadinejad was jacking up the regime’s barbaric anti-gay pogrom. The sordid and embarrassing Team Oscar trip to Iran in March 2009, in which actress Annette Bening praised the regime’s women’s rights record even as Roxana Saberi rotted in Evin prison across town, and as Iranian-American filmmaker Esha Momeni awaited an Islamist kangaroo court for the crime of filming a women’s rights documentary. She awaits trial still.

The Academy’s posting of the self-aggrandizing Road to Isfahan promo last summer, with no mention that many of the Iranian filmmakers featured in it had been blacklisted by the regime. In essence, the Academy profited from their McCarthyite misery. AMPAS knew, in the same way that you now know. I told them. The Academy’s emailed response? They don’t get into politics, don’t you know. Same with the AMPAS Iran film seminar in L.A. last October. Two blacklisted Iranian film artists, including renowned actress Fatemeh Motamed-Aria, were barred from leaving Iran to attend.

The show went on, the blacklisted whitewashed from the Academy’s program in Orwellian fashion. Also noticeably absent from Hollywood’s list of cause celebres’ is renowned Iranian director and President of the Asian Film Academy Mohsen Makhmalbaf, who now serves as official spokesman for Mir Hussein Mousavi and the Greens outside Iran. Who in Hollywood has invited Mr. Makhmalbaf to speak on the plight of the Greens and Iranian film artists? None I can find. How can you explain any of this to where it makes any sense at all? Why not any peep out of Hollywood on Iran at all?

Theo Van Gogh

Is it the Islamist Fear Factor? Are they just too enamored of blood-drenched dictators like Chavez, Castro and Ahmadinejad that they can’t find it within themselves to say a bad word about them? Or is it just plain endemic Hollywood racism? Polanski is white, after all. Panahi and most Iranians are not. I’d like to believe that, but I don’t really. I just believe leftist Hollywood is so morally corrupt that child rape and cop killing are morally defensible, yet dissent in a fascist dictatorship is not. Perhaps if Mr. Panahi had drugged and raped a tween, he would be getting the rabid and unqualified support of the lefty Hollywood establishment today. How I only wish to God that were a sick joke.

For those of you who do still have some shred of morality and human decency left in your souls (unlike some people), here are two petitions for the release of entombed director Jafar Panahi. One is at Facebook, the other at Petitions Online. Thank you, on behalf of Mr. Panahi and his family. And thanks to the many worldwide voices who have NOT remained silent in the face of this abomination of justice for a cutting-edge director, whose only crime is being cutting-edge in a fascist dictatorship where such innovation is rewarded with the death of a thousand cuts. I can think of many lefty Hollywood film types more deserving of that fate than the brave Jafar Panahi.

Here’s an idea. Why don’t we petition the Iranian government and work out a trade? They send us Jafar Panahi and all their blacklisted film artists, and we send them all the signatories to Roman Polanski’s petition. Let’s Make a Deal! And no, I’m not joking. I would make that trade in a heartbeat. I am at my wit’s end with Lefty Hollywood, people. For over a year now I have been pressing the case of Iranian film artists, and they were all just as dead silent on the subject then as they are toward Jafar Panahi and other persecuted filmmakers in Iran today, some of whom they once called friend.

I have even tried to shame them into action. But how do you shame the shameless? How do you explain morality to moral reprobates who equivocate the drugging and anal rape of a child? Who believe critics of dictator Hugo Chavez should be thrown in jail? Who believe that we were as racist and terrorist as the genocidal Imperial Japanese in the Pacific War? Who believe America is evil and everything it stands for sucks, even as they lead lives of freedom and luxury not possible anywhere else on earth? What happened to the Hollywood heroes of old who made fun of fascist dictators, often at risk to their own lives, instead of jaunting off to run PR campaigns for them?

Maybe it’s time for a new and revolutionary tack, people. Maybe it’s time to found a new Hollywood built on the principles of the old. The Hollywood in which the brave Victor Laszlo was a hero, not the murderous Che Guevara. In which America’s greatness and heroism was praised, not vilified. In which the American people were enlightened with great film stories that made them proud to be Americans, not browbeat with leftist anti-American propaganda. There is a great hunger in America for that brand of storytelling in film. A market of hundreds of millions just waiting to be tapped.

A huge undertaking, no doubt. But nowhere near the task faced by our Founding Fathers, and look at the miracles that ragtag band of rebels wrought. We Americans can do anything we put our minds to. But that is a piece for another time. For now, forget those useless leftist Hollywood idiots. We can deal with them later. Right now, Jafar Panahi and his family need each of us to speak out on his behalf. His life is hanging in the balance. Please sign the petitions at Facebook and Petitions Online linked above. As I have said in Part One, concerted voices raised in outrage have saved lives in Iran before, and can do so again. To save one life is to save the world entire. That is all that matters now. Hollywood lefties can go fuck themselves. History and their silence will damn them for all time.

Jafar Panahi

“Every possible way has been used for breaking his spirit. He is deprived of his basic and legal rights. Can all of this be called anything but torture? Does a regime have the right to treat one of its artistic elite so shamefully and inhumanely on the basis of a film that has not yet been made?”  -  Taherah Saeedi, wife of renowned Iranian New Wave filmmaker Jafar Panahi, on her husband’s arrest and imprisonment in Tehran.

On September 27, 2009, famed Hollywood film director Roman Polanski was arrested on arrival at Zurich Airport by Swiss authorities on a 31-year-old L.A. warrant for the 1977 drugging and raping of 13-year-old Samantha Geimer, now 45. A huge swath of the liberal leftist Hollywood establishment wasted no time in leaping into action over the Swiss authorities’ dismaying breach of social justice and inhuman treatment vis-a-vis director/child rapist Polanski. Over 100 well-known filmmakers and A-list celebrities signed a petition of outrage demanding Mr. Polanski’s immediate release.

Now, many of we mere mortals may not agree with the leftist Hollywood establishment’s unqualified support of Mr. Polanski given his crimes. Most Americans, and even most French, decidedly did not. The New York Times called the French divided on the issue, as they only supported Mr. Polanski’s extradition by a 70% margin. Larger point being, it is comforting to know that even for admitted child rapists, the leftist Hollywood establishment will always be there to raise a staunch defense of their film industry paisans in the face of rank injustice and gross violations of their basic human rights.

You might think that anyway. Perhaps that’s even what they want you to think. But then there’s the story of Jafar Panahi, the cutting-edge Iranian New Wave film director who has consistently pushed the envelope of Iranian film, all in the face of perhaps the worst censorship on earth as dictated by the Islamist regime’s Ministry of Islamic Culture and Guidance. And outside of child rape, directors Panahi and Polanski have a lot in common. Both have won the Golden Lion at Venice and the Silver Bear in Berlin, and have been showered with many other international awards and accolades for their cutting-edge films. And both have presided over prestigious international film festival juries.

Yet somehow that keen leftist Hollywood sense of moral outrage regarding the mistreatment of renowned film directors is curiously nonexistent with respect to the nightmarish situation now being endured by director Panahi and his family. The contrast is actually quite stark. As Polanski awaits a decision on his extradition from the luxury of house arrest at his ski chalet in Gstaad (where he was also allowed to wrap post-production on his latest film, The Ghost Writer), his Hollywood friends and admirers like Ewan MacGregor continue to speak out on his behalf, believing the drugging and anal rape of tween Samantha Geimer a bygone best forgotten.

Meanwhile, the 49-year-old Jafar Panahi is imprisoned in Tehran in what can only be called a crypt as the Islamist authorities attempt to break his spirit. Though they may not succeed on that front (and have not to date), they may yet break his body. His health has deteriorated in prison, and he is at great risk of a heart attack and premature death. His crime? Supporting the Green Revolution and planning a film on it. Mr. Panahi was first arrested last July as he and others laid flowers at the graves of Neda Soltan and other victims of the regime’s brutal post-election crackdown. He was released a few hours later, but continued to speak out on behalf of Mousavi and the Greens at great risk to himself. Like a dark Shakespearean tragedy, the outcome was inevitable.

On March 2, 2010, Iranian security forces conducted a sweep of Mr. Panahi’s residence in Tehran, arresting Jafar, his wife, his daughter and fifteen dinner guests present at the time. They also ransacked his home and seized many personal belongings.  His wife and family went a month not knowing Jafar’s location or condition. Finally Jafar’s wife, Taherah Saeedi, was allowed to visit him in solitary confinement, where she found Jafar pale and weak. An attending physician told her Jafar had twice experienced severe chest spasms and was at risk of a major heart attack. That is the situation Mr. Panahi and his family endure today. A tragic outcome is all but a foregone conclusion.

Fortunately, many prominent voices in film around the world are speaking out loudly on Mr. Panahi’s behalf, even a few in Hollywood. Veteran actor Brian Cox, to his great credit, has not only signed onto a petition demanding Mr. Panahi’s release, he even added an eloquent statement and the prestige of his C.B.E on Mr. Panahi’s behalf. American filmmakers William Farley, Rob Nilsson, Tristam Powell, film critic Jonathan Rosenbaum and countless others from around the world have also signed on, as well as the Sarajevo Film Festival, the European Film Academy, Berlinale, APSA, NetPac and many others. Even fifty Iranian filmmakers have stuck their own necks out in protest. In fact, outside of the United States, unqualified support for Mr. Panahi’s release is near-universal.

And then there’s Hollywood. So where are all the big Tinseltown A-list names who couldn’t rush to Roman Polanski’s defense and sign a petition demanding his release fast enough? The Woody Allens? The Michael Manns? The Taylor Hackfords? The Martin Scorseses? Where is Whoopi Goldberg arguing on The View that laying flowers at the grave of Neda Soltan wasn’t “crime-crime“? Where is the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences? Or even one American film festival?

It’s not like they don’t know. Variety and WSJ entertainment writer Anthony Kaufman blitzed the industry in late March through emails, Twitter and Facebook, and has received only one response and petition signature to date, from writer-producer James Schamus. So here we are, over a month into renowned director Jafar Panahi’s interment in a crypt in Evin prison without charge, and with absolutely no support from the same A-listers who had a petition out on Polanski within 24 hours of his arrest. Mr. Kaufman wishes the industry were less apathetic, but I have a different word in mind.

Disgusting! And if you’re not as disgusted over this pathetic and inexcusable situation as I am yet, it gets a lot worse in Part Two. Keep a barf bag handy. You’re going to need it. In the meantime, please sign on to the petitions for Jafar Panahi’s release at Facebook and Petitions Online. It was concerted voices raised in outrage that freed Tahmineh Milani, Mehrnoushe Solouki and Roxana Saberi. They may yet again. Feel free to give AMPAS a heads up as well. They’ve done this before. And they have a lot to redeem themselves for regarding Iranian film artists. More on that in Part Two.

Set in 1986 Iran – the Islamic Republic of Iran – Stoning is a gut-wrenching film with haunting music.  Nowrasteh’s movie, set to open June 26, is based on a book about the crime by French-Iranian journalist Freidoune Sahebjam. 

The film opens with Freidoune (James Caviezel) breaking down in his car on his way to the border.  Spending unwanted hours in a small village, he is approached by Zahra (Shohreh Aghdashloo), a woman the villagers try to shoo away as they call her crazy.  But Zahra has a terrible secret.  She does all she can to get word to the journalist about a terrible injustice committed in the village the previous day when her niece, Soraya M. (Mozhan Marnò), falsely accused of adultery by her cheating husband, Ali (Navid Negahban), was stoned to death per Islamic law. 

Stoning’s premise, repeated with numbing regularity around the world today, is made all the more pressing by the masses of Iranians protesting in the streets today while the brutal Basij militia tries to beat them into submission.  But it’s one thing for a stoning of an accused “adulteress” to occur in Somalia, and quite another for it to happen in the soon-to-be-nuclear-armed Islamic Republic of Iran.  If a nation thinks nothing of stoning women to death for the “crime” of adultery while killing peaceful protesters, it takes no imagination to think of what they will do when in possession of a nuclear bomb.  

The film is tightly put together and the acting is natural and intense.  The actors mostly speak Farsi throughout the film, but they communicate volumes, relegating the captions to a supporting role.  Nowrasteh effortlessly allows his film to unfold.  He gradually builds tension, while adding depth to the main characters’ soul.  The end is inevitable as it is jarring, with the males of the village engaging in the collective guilt of the stoning while most of the women watch and wail.  The act of stoning takes away the village’s “dishonor” one stone at a time, according to the mullah. 

It is no small task to adapt a book to the screen, especially a book of the intensity of Sahebjam’s work, but Betsy Giffen Nowrasteh and Cyrus Nowrasteh have done the job with the precision of a brain surgeon.  The husband and wife team add nothing more than needed, while everything needed remains.   

Lastly, a note about John Debney’s music: it is beyond superb.  With a cast and crew of Iranian expatriates making a film about life in the Islamic Republic of Iran, Nowrasteh could have easily settled for a selection of traditional Persian folk music.  This would have been true to form, but likely would have missed the opportunity to tightly tailor the music to the requirements of film while appealing to wider audiences.  It is interesting to see that Debney worked on “Passion of the Christ” (for which Debney was nominated for an Academy Award) along with Caviezel five years ago.  Clearly Debney has developed a talent for producing Mideast-themed music for the big screen. 

Cyrus Nowrasteh’s “The Stoning of Soraya M.” could not have come at a better time for the world.  While Iranians struggle to transcend tyranny and most Americans, including our President, remain rooted in inaction, Stoning proves that Hollywood’s capacity to combat evil is still intact.