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Iranian directorial duo Maryam Moghaddam and Behtash Sanaeeha have been given a 14-month suspended jail sentence by an Iranian court on charges that include alleged production of obscene content pertaining to their film “My Favourite Cake.”
The tender rom-com — which follows a 70-year-old woman named Mahin who decides to revitalize her love life and also appears unveiled in the film — launched from the Berlin Film Festival in 2024 and has since sold widely, giving audiences a glimpse of a rarely seen aspect of Iranian society.
After months of interrogations and continuous travel bans over the past two years — which prevented them from attending Berlin – Moghaddam and Sanaeeha had been charged with making a film labeled as “obscene” and “offending public morality.” They were also accused of “propaganda against the regime” and other charges claiming the film was “unlawfully” screened without the Iranian authorities’ permits for distribution.
The 14-month sentence, which has been suspended for five years, comes after the global film community rallied in support of the directors with a petition whose signatories included Mohammad Rasoulof — director of the Oscar-nominated feature “The Seed of the Sacred Fig,” who in May fled from Iran to avoid prosecution related to that film — as well as Pedro Almodóvar, Juliette Binoche and Hiam Abbas, among many others.
The petition, launched by the International Coalition for Filmmakers at Risk (ICFR), may have helped get their prison sentence suspended.
The Iranian court also convicted “My Favourite Cake” producer Gholamreza Mousavi to the same sentence as the directors, which also includes a fine of 400 million Iranian Rials ($9,400).
