Berlin-based sales agency Films Boutique has acquired worldwide rights to Iranian filmmaker Mani Haghighi’s documentary “I Deserve a Lover Whose Every Rise Sets Fiery Dooms Raging Across the Skies,” which is set to premiere at the New York Film Festival.
Set between Tabriz and Tehran in the weeks between the 12-Day War and the subsequent U.S. and Israeli attacks on Iran, the documentary accompanies two artists whose lives have become inseparable from a vast private archive assembled over decades: photographs, documents, discarded objects, and traces of anonymous lives.
Working somewhere between collecting, hoarding, preservation and obsession, Nasser Bakhshi, a painter, conceptual artist, collector and curator, and his partner Roghayeh Najdi have created an improvised museum of neglected lives, one in which sex workers, young soldiers, child labourers and ordinary families emerge through abandoned albums, damaged belongings and fragments of memory left behind by history.
“Their sprawling collection of found art objects has helped preserve Iran’s contemporary history as an artistic and political act,” reads the logline. Films Boutique describes “I Deserve a Lover Whose Every Rise Sets Fiery Dooms Raging Across the Skies” as Haghighi’s “most formally inventive and culturally urgent documentary feature to date.”
“Mani’s new work blew us away, capturing the essence of collective preservation through a completely fresh artistic and cinematic approach,” Films Boutique CEO Jean-Christophe Simon told Variety. “Profiling a highly eccentric and deeply sympathetic couple of artists within a monumental archive, this film represents a profound exploration from an outstanding, fearless voice in world cinema, one that feels in dialogue with filmmakers from Bergman to Parajanov.
“We cannot wait to launch its international journey starting with its prestigious world premiere at the New York Film Festival.”
Haghighi expressed delight at re-teaming with the company. “I am absolutely thrilled to be working with Films Boutique once again. Their passion for bold cinema and their incredible dedication to filmmakers make them the perfect home for this film.
“I am delighted to put Nasser Bakhshi and Roghayeh Najdi’s incredible story in such able hands, and look forward to share, with the help of Films Boutique, this deeply personal film with global audiences.”
Haghighi previously worked with Films Boutique on his 2018 comedy and Berlin competition title “Pig” and 2022 thriller “Subtraction,” which premiered at Toronto.
A native of Tehran, the acclaimed director, screenwriter and actor has impressed with a cinematic style that “balances enigmatic storytelling, sociopolitical depth and formal experimentation,” Films Boutique noted.
