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Jafar Panahi’s docu-fiction hybrid films, from This Is Not a Film to No Bears, were precipitated by his various arrests and imprisonments, allowing the Iranian auteur ample opportunity to contemplate the unending nightmare of being under threat from a regime that endeavored to stop him from making films altogether. It Was Just an Accident may boast a more polished and traditionally constructed narrative, but it’s no less a reflection of Panahi’s currently fractious relationship with his country. It’s also astutely aware of the physical and psychological scars that that result from living in a state of tyranny.

The film begins ominously with a family driving down a dark road,...

Every awards season brings national submission debates, but this year, France’s decision for its official entry in the international feature Oscar category has turned into a geopolitical and cinematic dilemma.

On one side is Richard Linklater’s “Nouvelle Vague,” a French-language homage to the cinematic movement that redefined global filmmaking, starring breakout Guillaume Marbeck and Zoey Deutch. On the other is “It Was Just an Accident,” Jafar Panahi’s quietly explosive French co-production — a film shot in exile and widely regarded as one of his boldest works yet.

France, which typically selects auteur-driven, culturally emblematic films, finds itself choosing between two unprecedented options: one from an American director (Linklater), the other from a revered Iranian filmmaker working under government restriction (Panahi). Further complicating matters, “Nouvelle Vague” is almost entirely in French, while “It Was Just an Accident” is in a mix of Farsi and Arabic. Both qualify under the Academy’s international feature guidelines.

It Was Just An Accident. Jafar Panahi: 'This is the kind of film you typically make once a regime is over, once a dictator is no longer there, when it's time to practically question, what do you do with the remnants of a certain regime?' Photo: Courtesy of Locarno Film Festival

Since it premiered at Cannes Film Festival and took home the Palme d’Or, Jafar Panahi’s It Was Just An Accident has been working its way around the festival circuit, with upcoming showings due in Toronto, New York and San Sebastian.

The drama charts what happens when a man (Vahid Mobasseri) stumbles across another man (Ebrahim Azizi...

La película de Jafar Panahi se proyectará en el Festival de San Sebastián. © Neon

Neon ha lanzado el primer tráiler de It Was Just An Accident (Un simple accidente en su título en español), la nueva película del cineasta iraní Jafar Panahi, que este año se alzó con la Palma de Oro en el Festival de Cannes.

It Was Just An Accident sigue a un grupo de antiguos presos que se topan con un hombre al que creen reconocer como el guardia que los torturó. Con el hombre cautivo, deben decidir si vengarse o no.

El elenco está formado por Vahid Mobasseri, Maryam Afshari, Ebrahim Azizi, Hadis Pakbaten, Majid Panahi,...

General audiences can now witness the trailer for It Was Just an Accident, the new Persian-language thriller from Iranian writer-director Jafar Panahi, ahead of its theatrical release in the U.S. on Oct. 15, 2025. The film follows a former political prisoner who sees an opportunity for revenge, but his mission spirals out of control when other characters become involved.

The cast includes Vahid Mobasseri, Mariam Afshari, Ebrahim Azizi, Hadis Pakbaten, Majid Panahi, and Mohamad Ali Elyasmehr. It Was Just an Accident won the prestigious Palme d'Or award at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival, marking it as an exciting release and a likely awards contender. Last year's Palme d'Or winner, Anora, notably went on to win the Oscar for Best Picture.

Now, Neon has released the first official trailer for It Was Just an Accident. It follows Vahid, a modest mechanic, who unexpectedly crosses paths with Eghbal, whom he believes to be the...

"I have a family too, I understand." Neon has debuted the official trailer for the acclaimed, award-winning new film from beloved Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi titled It Was Just an Accident. The first French title during its premiere at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival was Un Simple Accident, which translates to A Simple Accident, but they changed it for the release. It won the Palme d'Or in Cannes this year, though it's not my pick. The film explores political repression in Iran & morality. An accident while driving triggers a chain reaction of ever-growing problems. A man kidnaps another man he believes is the man who tortured him when was in prison. But he is unsure, so he finds more ex-prisoners who all end up in a van driving this guy around. From master filmmaker Jafar Panahi comes a searing moral thriller that engages with complex ideas about the uncertainty of the...

After taking the top prize at the Cannes Film Festival in May, Iranian auteur Jafar Panahi's revenge thriller It Was Just an Accident is set for a U.S. release on Oct. 15. Neon is distributing the film and released a new trailer that plays up its raft of strong reviews as well as its tense plot, which depicts the fallout of a traffic accident that spirals out of control.

Filmed in secret and without a permit in Panahi's native land, It Was Just an Accident stars Ebrahim Azizi as Eghbal, the driver in the aforementioned accident. During a nighttime drive with his wife and daughter, he's involved in a hit-and-run with a stray dog that forces him to take a detour to nearby garage. There he encounters another man, Vahid (Vahid Mobasseri), who comes to suspect that Eghbal is the responsible party for the traumatic abuse he experienced during a stint in prison.

When Jafar Panahi’s “It Was Just an Accident” debuted at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival, it was the culmination of a brutal journey. The Iranian filmmaker has been banned from filmmaking (though it seldom stopped him) and imprisoned multiple times for opposing his home country’s government, most recently in 2022, when he had to rely on others to read messages on his behalf at global film festivals that screened his film “No Bears.”

He was eventually released following a hunger strike in February 2023, and returned to work on a blistering moral dilemma film about an Iranian man who kidnaps the man who once tortured him in prison and, along with the man’s other victims, is forced to make a decision about whether or not to kill him.

“It Was Just an Accident” premiered to rave reviews and a Palme d’Or victory at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival, with critics...

Neon has released the trailer for Iranian auteur Jafar Panahi’s “It Was Just an Accident,” which won the Palme d’Or at this year’s Cannes Film Festival.

The first film from Panahi since his release from jail in Iran two years ago, “It Was Just an Accident” follows a group of former prisoners who encounter a man they think could be the guard who tortured them. With the man held captive, they must decide whether or not to enact revenge.

“When you spend eight hours a day blindfolded, seated in front of a wall, being interrogated by someone standing behind your back every day, you can’t stop wondering what kind of conversation you can have with this man,” Panahi told Variety in one of his first interviews following his 14-year ban on making movies, speaking to the press and traveling.

“It Was Just an Accident” stars Vahid Mobasseri,...

By Jean-Marc THÉROUANNE

Danaff is supported by the city of Da Nang, the Association for the Development of Vietnamese Cinema, the Vietnamese Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, and numerous partners including Netpac (Network for the Promotion of Asian Cinema).

The 106 films in the program were divided into several sections:

1. Asian Film Competition (14 films)

2. Vietnamese Film Competition (12 films)

3. Vietnamese Cinema Today (19 films)

4. Panorama of Asian Cinema (25 films)

5. Half a Century of Vietnamese War Cinema Since National Reunification (22 films)

6. Korean Cinema and Its Historical Footprints (14 films)

Asian Film Competition Jury : Minh Châu, Jang Joon Hwan, président, Martine Thérouanne, Shozo Ichiyama, Lorna Tee (crédit photo J-m Thérouanne)

Films In The Asian Competition

Stranger Eyes by Yeo Siew Hua (Singapore):

After their daughter disappears, a couple begins receiving videos of their private life, realizing their every moment is being recorded. This Singaporean film explores the omnipresence of surveillance in both public...

We are launching our Gold Derby predictions center event for Oscars 2026 nominations today! Even though Academy Awards nominees will not be announced for another six months, on Jan. 22, 2026, see how well you see into the future. Click here to jump in right away, helping us set the extremely early odds and rankings for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Original Screenplay, Best Actress, Best Actor, Best Supporting Actress, and Best Supporting Actor.

As we begin this new event, there are almost 50 contenders for Best Picture. Please keep in mind that we will update the predictions center weekly by adding, deleting, and changing movies, performers, and more. These updates will be made based on new information from the studios/campaigners provided to us. A movie and its contenders can only be added once it has a U.S. distributor and an approximate or firm release date in 2025. In a few months,...

It Was Just an Accident has received a release date in the middle of a competitive award season. Written and directed by Jafar Panahi, who has been imprisoned several times for being critical of the Iranian government and made the movie without permission from the Iranian authorities, the Persian-language film follows a minor traffic accident that sets in motion a series of escalating events.

The film stars Vahid Mobasseri, Mariam Afshari, Ebrahim Azizi, Hadis Pakbaten, Majid Panahi, and Mohamad Ali Elyasmehr. It premiered at the Cannes Film Festival this past May and won the Palme d'Or, setting it up for a likely awards season run.

Now, It Was Just an Accident has been set for a theatrical release in North America from Neon on October 15, according to Deadline. By releasing in the fall, the film is positioning itself for an awards season push.

What It Was Just An Accident's Release...

It Was Just An Accident Wins Big At Palme d’Or (Photo Credit – Instagram)

With the wrap of the 78th Cannes Film Festival, there is one particular movie that stood out. The movie being referred to here is none other than It Was Just an Accident. The tense, emotionally charged thriller won the Palme d’Or, the festival’s highest honor, making headlines across the globe. The film is directed by Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi, who has long been renowned for his bravery and defiance. And now his movie has joined the likes of Parasite and Pulp Fiction, cementing its place in cinematic history and going beyond mere critical acclaim.

What Is It Was Just An Accident About?

The movie, which is set in modern-day Iran, centers on Eghbal, a driver with a young daughter and a pregnant wife. The story kicks off when a late-night encounter turns into a nightmare.

Continuing its buying ways in Cannes, Mubi has acquired Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi’s It Was Just an Accident for Latin America, U.K., Ireland, Germany, Austria, Turkey and India.

The film premiered in competition at Cannes on Tuesday and earlier Neon picked up its North American rights. It Was Just an Accident marks Panahi’s first since being released from prison in Iran, and was inspired in part by his second incarceration in that country.

The film stars Mariam Afshari, Ebrahim Azizi, and Vahid Mobasseri, and focuses on a minor accident that sets in motion a series of escalating consequences that in turn illustrate the traumas suffered by political dissidents and other opponents of power.

It Was Just an Accident is a Les Films Pelléas and Jafar Panahi Production from Iran, France and Luxembourg. The deal was made between Mubi and mk2, who are handling international sales.

Also in Cannes,...

Neon has acquired North American distribution rights to Jafar Panahi’s Cannes Competition title It Was Just An Accident from mk2 Films,with Mubi taking rights to multiple international territories.

Mubi has bought the film for UK-Ireland, Germany, Latin America, Austria, Turkey and India.

It Was Just An Accident is Iranian auteur Panahi’s first film since his release from prison in Iran in February 2023 after seven months’ incarceration.

Inspired by his time in prison, the film follows a man, his heavily pregnant wife and their young daughter, as they get in a minor car accident and the chain of...

If you were handed over the man who destroyed your life and those of countless others––a psychopath who tortured, raped, and murdered in the name of a tyrannical system––what would you do? Would you exact revenge or do the impossible––forgive and set him free? It Was Just an Accident, Jafar Panahi’s first film since his release from prison in Iran, hinges on that excruciating dilemma. The story is easy enough to summarize; its emotional wallop defies facile description. In an unexpected stroke of luck, four Iranians who did time for protesting the regime manage to abduct the guard responsible for the unspeakable atrocities they suffered behind bars. Having knocked him unconscious, they shove him in a van and travel around, wondering what to do. The whole journey spans less than a day. By the time it wraps, Accident feels like content under pressure. Panahi welds scorching...

Neon has acquired the North American rights to Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi’s It Was Just An Accident, which premiered In competition at Cannes on Tuesday.

The film marks Panahi’s first since being released from prison in Iran, and was inspired in part by his second incarceration in that country. Neon, which also released Panahi’s The Year of the Everlasting Storm, plans a North American theatrical release for his latest work in 2025.

It Was Just An Accident stars Mariam Afshari, Ebrahim Azizi, and Vahid Mobasser, and focuses on a minor accident that sets in motion a series of escalating consequences that in turn illustrate the traumas suffered by political dissidents and other opponents of power.

The Golden Bear and Golden Lion winner this year brought to Cannes his first movie not to have been shot illegally since 2006 after his decades-long filmmaking and travel ban was finally lifted by the Iranian authorities,...

Neon has taken North American rights on revered Iranian auteur Jafar Panahi’s Cannes competition title “It Was Just an Accident,” which marks Panahi’s first film since being released from prison in Iran.

The film, starring Mariam Afshari, Ebrahim Azizi, and Vahid Mobasser, was greeted with a long standing ovation and is a Cannes standout title.

“It Was Just an Accident” centers around an outpouring of strong feelings by a group of former prisoners toward a torturous guard.

“When you spend eight hours a day blindfolded, seated in front of a wall, being interrogated by someone standing behind your back every day, you can’t stop wondering what kind of conversation you can have with this man,” Panahi told Variety in one of his first interviews following his 14-year ban on making movies, speaking to the press and traveling.

The film is produced by Jafar Panahi and Philippe Martin...

With a decades-long filmmaking and travel ban finally lifted by the Iranian authorities, award-winning auteur Jafar Panahi is attending Cannes for the first time since 2003, back when his thriller Crimson Gold won the Un Certain Regard prize. And yet the new movie he’s premiering in competition, It Was Just an Accident, is far from a concession to the ruling regime in Iran. If anything, it’s the opposite: a taut, intricately crafted drama about the traumas suffered by political dissidents and other opponents of power, whether they’re renowned directors like himself or just regular working-class citizens.

Putting aside the self-reflexive storytelling that has marked much of his work since he was first arrested in 2010, Panahi’s latest feature is a straightforward 24-hour narrative staged with his usual attention to realistic detail, and backed by a terrific ensemble cast. Subtly plotted like a good thriller, the movie slowly but...

Much-lauded Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi has done two unjustified stints in prison in Iran, but he always simply speaks the truth in his films. The most recent saw him get out in 2023 and he is now free to travel again, but the experience has affected him to the point his new film, It Was Just an Accident, deals in a fictional way with past wrongfully incarcerated working-class people seeking revenge against the guard who tortured and berated them. It had its world premiere today at the Cannes Film Festival, where it is playing in Competition. Panahi previously was in Competition in 2018 with 3 Faces, won the Camera d’Or for his first film The White Balloon in 1995 and won a Jury Prize in Un Certain Regard for Crimson Gold in 2003.

What might surprise audiences about It Was Just an Accident is the amount of humor the director has been able to pack in this film,...

Take heed: Jafar Panahi is no longer the filmmaker he once was, transforming from understated humanist (in films such as “The White Balloon” and “Offside”) to open critic of the Iranian regime, as revealed in his punchy new political thriller, “It Was Just an Accident.” The greatest irony of that change is that Panahi may never have become so explicitly defiant of his persecutors if the system itself had not tried to crack down as harshly as it did. Arrested multiple times for so-called propaganda and locked up on two occasions (released only after he went on hunger strike), Panahi can’t help making art, emerging fired up and ready to fight back.

The same is true for the five characters in “It Was Just an Accident,” who’ve assembled almost like the diamond thieves in “Reservoir Dogs” post-heist to point fingers and dispense justice. Strange as it may sound...

The first time that dissident Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi was imprisoned for his supposed crimes against the regime, he spent most of his time in solitary confinement, blindfolded whenever he was taken out to be interrogated. Deprived of the use of his eyes, Panahi focused all of his attention on his ears — he would obsessively listen for auditory clues around him, and fantasize about his captor’s identity based on the sound of his voice.

When Panahi was imprisoned again 12 years later, he was placed in the general population with 300 other prisoners, most of whom had opposed the government in one way or another, but few of whom agreed on the best tactic of doing so. The filmmaker was unnerved — and compelled — by the inevitability of those disagreements becoming even sharper between these people after they were released; some traumatized former detainees would simply try to get on with their lives,...

In Farshad Hashemi’s debut feature film, “Me, Maryam, The Children, and 26 Others,” a 30-something woman who has been away from any kind of social interaction is suddenly thrust into a whirlwind of constant commotion in her house—the very place she feels would protect her, takes away her sanity. Now, for someone who has chosen to live a solitary life, a commotion would mean something truly offputting. To some extent, Mahboube (played by Mahboube Gholami) – our protagonist is also disturbed. Still, once we start learning about her, and in turn live alongside her, the commotion gives us a sense of hope.

The reason why the aforementioned commotion happens in Mahboube’s life and her home is because she rents out her humble abode to a short film crew. Director Farshad Hashemi plays Farshad, the production assistant responsible for everything that the film needs and the one who often interacts...

It would be a mistake to take the synopsis for Abed Abest’s Killing the Eunuch Khan at face value. This is not a film about a serial killer in the generic sense of the word. Khan (Ebrahim Azizi) isn’t some cult leader à la Charles Manson sending his disciples into the world to murder people in his name. Nor is he a monster in the vein of Jigsaw, entrapping victims to do his dirty work in the hope that doing so will earn them their freedom. Khan doesn’t even appear onscreen until about a third of the way through, ushering in a fracturing of focus that moves our attention from a single vantage point towards an unexplainable overlapping of time and space. You must think bigger.

Who else can be considered a serial killer pulling strings of others to kill in their name? A better question might...