The final plans had been made. The next day, Kaveh Tehrani and his crew were to shoot a big scene for the film “Listen here!” during the Pride parade 2022. Several cameras were to capture the huge procession of rainbow-clad and happy people through Oslo’s streets. The scene was to be a key turning point in the film. But, on a June night, before the big party day, dramatic messages started ticking on Kaveh’s phone. They came from his gay brother Nicholay. He was afraid of his friends, who had gone to the queer gathering place London Pub. They reported shooting and chaos. After little sleep and much fear, Kaveh awoke to a country in shock. Two people were killed and 21 injured in the terrorist attack on the pubs Per på kørnket and London Pub. Keive was considered a possible target, and the Pride parade was canceled due to security concerns. The motivation to complete the film became even stronger. – If this film can speak to that hatred, give us hope and make us lower our shoulders just a little, then that’s incredibly good, he says. BLOMSTERHAV: Pride flags and flowers at the scene of the terrorist attack in Oslo on 25 June 2022. Photo: Simon Skjelvik Brandseth / news The day he got everything The bearded man bounces up the stairs in the apartment building and opens the door to the “studio”, which is clearly a euphemism for something between an office and a man cave. Kaveh Tehrani lies down on the floor and stretches out her legs while her back rests against a cardboard box. Around him, he has a 12 square meter rolled-up Persian carpet, TV and a well-stocked DVD collection. Ever since he became interested in film in his teens, the goal has been to get to where he is now: with directorial responsibility for an all-night cinema film. To all intents and purposes, it opened the Film Festival in Haugesund and won one of the main prizes. The dramatic comedy “Listen here!” is the film version of Gulraiz Sharif’s novel – one of the biggest Norwegian literary sensations in recent years. The book was the most borrowed book at Oslo’s Deichman library in 2021 and has been printed in an insane 40,000 copies. Photo: Motlys/Cappelen Damm news wrote in its review that it is almost impossible to write so entertainingly about complex topics such as prejudice, integration and gender correction. The story is told through the Norwegian-Pakistani 13-year-old Mahmoud. He has to be a Norwegian guide for his uncle Ji, who is visiting from Pakistan. At the same time, there is drama and a bad atmosphere when little brother Ali, aged nine, finds out that he is actually a girl. Kaveh Tehrani was very deeply moved by reading the book. He thought that the family in Groruddalen was portrayed with high energy, warmth, politically incorrect humor and a fantastic slant on Norwegians. OSLO EAST: Mohammed Ahmed from Drammen plays the role of Mahmoud from Groruddalen, who experiences an unusual summer. Photo: Motlys Then he heard by chance that the production company Motlys had won a bidding round for the film rights to the book. Fortunately, this was one of those days where Kaveh thought he could do absolutely anything. – I called them and said: “Hey, I wonder if you’re thinking about me.” And then they said: “Yes, we are thinking of you and wondering if this is something we should have talked about together.” Norwegian-Iranian Kaveh is open that the film should ideally have been made by a Norwegian director with a Pakistani background who speaks Urdu. – Nevertheless, there are many things I recognize in my background. Quick Lunch and Pakistani aunt Kaveh Tehrani’s almost 45-year existence on this earth is a tangible result of the students Farshad from Iran and Mette from Norway meeting and falling in love in England in the early 1970s. Kaveh was born in Tehran, before the election fell on the slightly less lively city of Tønsberg. Kaveh grew up as the eldest of three brothers. Eventually the parents divorced, and the children alternated between Oslo and Tønsberg. Growing up as half-Iranian in what Kaveh calls a “homogeneous white, petty-bourgeois and snobbish city” in the 1980s was not all luxury. – There weren’t that many people who looked like me. People related to me in a way that made me realize I was different. GATHERING: The Tehrani siblings and dad gathered in the garden. From left: Nicholay, Kaveh and André. Front: Camilla Øgreid Tehrani. His father Farshad died in 2014. Photo: Privat He was not the most confident teenager. Then something clicked into place when he went with his father to Iran as a 14-year-old to meet his relatives. – It was a very strong experience. It was insanely nice, he says and gets a little crack in his voice. – So I probably grew up with a lack of belonging. I think maybe you didn’t have a language for it in the same way then as we do now. The film interest was born by studying the covers in the Kanal 1 video app at Tolvsrødsenteret. The mother had a skepticism about visual culture (and voted against the housing association getting cable TV), so there was no question of buying a VHS player so that he could actually rent and watch these films. After studying film, working in commercials and directing music videos, Kaveh received an Amanda Award for the dark short film comedy “1994”. The fictional documentary is about an Iranian family that moves to Lillehammer ahead of the Winter Olympics. They are well received, but after the games, when the cameras are turned off, they face cold shoulders in the local community. He has also been praised for the satirical short film “The Manchador”, which is a kick against the hijab mandate in Iran. He has long been frustrated that minorities are poorly represented in Norwegian film, and is a strong supporter of quotas and recruitment. – Music and TV have come much further there. But film is … well … it just has to stop going so slowly. Stories about minorities with different perspectives on Norwegians and their life in Norway here and now are incredibly important. It can’t just be the white middle class who make films, he says. – Young people with a multicultural background should see the film at the cinema and recognize themselves? – I hope that people with a Pakistani background will go and see the film, be proud of it, laugh and laugh. It’s unusual to see a Norwegian-Pakistani family solving their problems instead of creating them, you know? It has been important to him not to simply reproduce ideas about what minorities are like, and that it should only be about crime, drugs, gangs and a culture of honour. NORWAY FRIEND: In this scene from the film, a wide-eyed and enthusiastic Uncle Ji is visiting from Pakistan and takes a selfie with Ali and Mahmoud at the Opera. Photo: Motlys I “Listen here!” are declarations of love for Norway in the form of Quick Lunch after walks and tributes to parental leave for fathers. But it is also a kick to Norwegians’ view of Muslims. Kaveh had a desire to create a balanced account between the various cultural starting points. – Like when Mahmoud says: “Pakistani aunties are the best in the world.” They are for life. Not like in Norway, where families split up after five minutes.” It has been important to highlight positive things about Pakistani culture that Norwegian Pakistanis are proud of, he says. A film about a Norwegian-Pakistani family in Groruddalen could very well be a contribution to learning from each other. But for Kaveh, it’s human contact that counts. – To meet to talk and do things together, share experiences and understand each other. The narratives peddled in the news media, with violence, machetes and radical Islam, only lead to people meeting each other with sickly high shoulders. Somewhat jokingly, he thinks it is more useful for Norwegian youth to go to camp school to Pakistan, Somalia and Poland than to Gudbrandsdalen. – I think that Norwegian 15-16-year-olds would have really benefited from it, both to learn and to have a cool experience, he says. LUNCH HUNTING: Kaveh Tehrani in the Pakistani food shop Madina Sweets in Tøyengata in Oslo, where one of the scenes in “Hør her’a!” was recorded. Photo: Javier Auris / news A difficult conversation In the film, 13-year-old Mahmoud is an entertaining and brutally honest guide and door-opener to Pakistani culture, whether it concerns pop music, food, views of ethnic Norwegians or complicated family relationships. At the same time that Kaveh Tehrani seeks a good mood, the film (or the book) does not shy away from the bad. There are heartbreaking scenes when Ali wants to be a girl while the father snaps and says: “I didn’t come to Norway for my son to be born a daughter.” Kaveh says that gender fluidity is less controversial than homosexuality in Pakistani culture. Nevertheless, he believes it would be quite difficult to discover that one was “born in the wrong body” in a Norwegian-Pakistani family. – I think at the same time that the whole scale is there. There are people who manage to deal with this in a way that helps the children to find out who they want to be. There are also those who click, like Papa Shahbaz in the film. I also believe that this whole spectrum is found in Norwegian families. – Would it have been possible to make the same film, but that Ali – instead of wanting to be a girl – stood out as gay? – That… I think would have been difficult. It would have worked, but then there are other issues. Islam really has a gigantic problem with homosexuality. – Can it change? – It is very difficult to say. Those changes must come from within. There are enormous divisions in many of the Muslim countries, between the collective and traditional on the one hand and individualism on the other. You just have to hope that it goes the right way, says Kaveh. He believes it is incredibly important that all cultures are open about problems, strange feelings and mental health. The point of the film is primarily to create a portrait of a character who is in a major upheaval, and with whom we can identify. – I hope that the film can contribute to more transparency, and that those who are in something like this can see themselves represented on the screen with a positive designation. DEBRIF: Mahmoud’s father and uncle, played by Manish Sharma and Asim Chaudhry, talk about the difficulty when the family has been turned upside down. Photo: Motlys Hope in the dark When Kaveh Tehrani woke up on 25 June last year, his brother’s friends were physically unharmed and safe. A shocked film crew met in the morning in a park on Tøyen to talk. The important scene to be shot is about Alia having a life revelation in the meeting with the celebration of diversity and tolerance. With the parade cancelled, the scene had to be resolved in another way. The solution was to bring in extras to play dancing and pride flag waving people on their way to the parade. The sequence was shorter than planned, but at the same time important, because it is cut straight from there to a scene in the mosque. At the same time, the film crew got an even stronger feeling that they were making something important. In the subtitles, they have chosen to dedicate the film to the memory of the victims of the terrorist attack, which PST believes is motivated by extreme Islamism. – It is absolutely terrible that people can bring themselves to do something like that. That radicalization and alienation can lead to such violence and such hatred is unbelievably crazy. Everyone should be safe in Oslo, and the fact that many people are aware that they are not in 2023 is completely absurd. PRIDE: Liza Haider from Jessheim plays the role of Ali, who feels like the girl Alia. Photo: Motlys Despite the grim attack last summer, Kaveh Tehrani sees the direction we are moving in. He sees young people as significantly more colorblind than people his own age. He is also delighted that the film will now be shown to school classes across the country. – Norway has become a more open society, a country where people from different backgrounds have different experiences, jobs, educations, and that these lives mix. I don’t think Norway is as divided as the media says. “Listen here!” has a cinema premiere across the country on Friday 15 September. Read news Filmpolitiet’s review here. Hey! Do you have any thoughts on this matter that you’d like to share – or ideas for other stories we should tell? Feel free to send me an email! The rest of news Kultur’s long readings can be found here. Did you get these with you?
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Kaveh Tehrani had to drop scenes in the film “Listen here!” when the terror struck – Culture
