“In Search for Persian Leopard” won two more awards in Cinema Verite Documentary Film Festival in November in Iran, making it the most outstanding ever wildlife film in Iran. Attended by more than one hundred films produced by filmmakers on a variety of topics, including environment, ICS’ Fathollah Amiri received two prestigious awards for the “Best Long Documentary” and the “Best Environmental Documentary” in Tehran.
As approaching the Iranian Presidential election in 2013, he hoped that “Let’s cross finger that presidential candidates talk not only about politics or economy, but also environment” which was highly applauded by festival closing ceremony’s audience.
The leopard film features ICS’ research biologists field works for six years to study the endangered Persian leopard in high altitudes of Alborz, northern Iran. Last February, “In Search for Persian Leopard” won the most prestigious award of the Iranian cinema, “Crystal Simorgh” as the best documentary of year, a ranking which has never been achieved by a wildlife documentary in the country. It has been effective to spread the word among Iranian community with more than 50 times of national broadcasting from IRIB. ICS film crew is now running projects to feature brown bear and Asiatic cheetah which you can find more details on the relevant webpage.“