According to a report from the French news service Agence France Press (AFP), advisors to Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad urged a visiting Hollywood delegation to apologize for “insults and slanders” about Iranians in films. “(Iranian) cinema officials will only have the right to have official sessions with… Hollywood movie makers when they apologize to the Iranians for their 30 years of insults and slanders,” Javad Shamaghdari, the art advisor to Iran’s president, said Saturday. “The Iranian people and our revolution has been repeatedly unjustly attacked by Hollywood.” He cited among the offending films 300, for showing Iranian ancestors as bloodthirsty, and The Wrestler , for a scene tearing up the Iranian flag. “We will believe Obama’s policy of change when we see change in Hollywood too, and if Hollywood wants to correct its behavior towards Iranian people and Islamic culture then they have to officially apologise,” Shamaghdari added. The visiting filmmakers are from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences, and include president Sid Ganis, former president Frank Pierson, actress Annette Bening, and producer Walter Horberg who were invited by the Iranian Alliance Of Motion Pictures to hold a series of workshop meetings in Tehran. An AMPAS rep told AFP it’s supposed to be a private initiative for educational and creative exchange without a political agenda. Guess it didn’t turn out that way.

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