Mohammad Rasoulof, O Mipo to Receive Tokyo Film Festival’s Kurosawa Akira Award

Mohammad Rasoulof, the Iranian filmmaker who secretly left his country in 2024 after being sentenced to eight years in prison, will receive the Kurosawa Akira Award at the 39th Tokyo International Film Festival. He will share the honor with director O Mipo.

The two were chosen by a committee of filmmakers Yamada Yoji and Lee Sang-il, cinematographer Ashizawa Akiko and TIFF programming director Ichiyama Shozo. Capcom Co., Ltd. backed the award’s return in 2022, after it had gone 14 years without being presented. Last year it went to Lee and Chloé Zhao.

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Rasoulof won the Golden Bear at Berlin in 2020 for “There Is No Evil,” which later played at the 33rd TIFF. His “The Seed of the Sacred Fig” took the Special Jury Prize at Cannes in 2024, and as Germany’s entry it was later nominated for the Oscar for best international feature. He was still finishing that film when he had to flee Iran in secret, shortly before Cannes. He was jailed in 2010 while shooting a film and arrested again in 2022, then provisionally released after eight months. He has shot many of his films in secret and smuggled them abroad to screen.

The committee praised the “humanist perspective” of his recent work, “which portrays even those who perpetrate oppression as ordinary citizens.”

“Receiving the Kurosawa Award is a great honor for me,” Rasoulof said. “His films are profound explorations of the human condition and the moral choices we make in moments of crisis.”

O started out as a script supervisor after working at Obayashi Nobuhiko’s production company. She made her feature debut in 2006 with “The Sakais’ Happiness.” “The Light Shines Only There” (2014) won her best director at the Montreal World Film Festival and was Japan’s Oscar submission. “Being Good” (2015) was named best Asian film at the Moscow International Film Festival. After a nine-year gap in which she had two children, she came back with “Living in Two Worlds” (2024), which competed at Shanghai. Her latest, “How Dare You?” (2025), played in competition at Zlín.

O said getting the award on the 20th anniversary of her debut left her grateful and humbled. “Winning the Shindo Kaneto Award in 2010 provided me with the vital support to keep making films. Though my progress has been slow, reaching the Kurosawa Akira Award is a stroke of fortune that makes me truly savor what a happy cinematic journey I have had,” she said.

The festival will also show a selection of Kurosawa’s favorite films, along with two of his own. The lineup is Charles Chaplin’s “The Circus” (1928), 4K restorations of Kurosawa’s “Sanshiro Sugata” (1943) and “Ikiru” (1952), and Abbas Kiarostami’s “Where Is the Friend’s House?” (1987).

Isomura, who won the Japan Academy Film Prize for best supporting actor for “The Moon,” will serve as jury president of the Ethical Film Award. Three members of TIFF’s student PR team will sit on the jury with him. The prize was set up with Sumitomo Corporation in 2023 and highlights films dealing with the environment, poverty, discrimination and diversity. This year’s nominees are Brenda Lígia’s “Amadeo and the Hypothetical New World” (Brazil), Isabelle Stever’s “I Rarely Wake Up Dreaming” (Germany/Ukraine) and Vee Shi’s “Time and Tide” (Australia).

Isomura said watching things on a small screen can fool people into thinking they understand something right away, when real understanding of social issues comes from working toward the answers. “Cinema possesses the unique power to pause our hurried pace, allowing us to experience that very process through the lives and emotions of others,” he said.

Isomura also hosts the Shizuoka Film Festival in his hometown. His Netflix credits include “Alice in Borderland,” and Netflix will release his next project, “Did Someone Happen to Mention Me?” worldwide on Oct. 22. The Ethical Film Award will be presented on Nov. 2, along with a talk session with Isomura.

The festival runs Oct. 26–Nov. 4. Its TIFFCOM market takes place Oct. 28–30.