Reza Allamehzadeh

Reza Allamehzadeh (Persian: رضا علامه‌زاده) is an Iranian-born Dutch filmmaker, film critic and writer who lives in the Netherlands. He is primarily known for his films about refugees, such as The Guests of Hotel Astoria (1988), and the documentary Holy Crime (1994), about the murder of opposition figures in Europe by the Islamic regime in Iran.Allamehzadeh was born in 1943 in Sari, Mazandaran province, Iran. He studied film directing at “Tehran Academy of Film and Television” in 1966–1969. Along with filmmaking, he writes and publishes children's books, novels and short stories. He teaches film and TV courses in various universities including Hollins University in Virginia (US), Leeds Metropolitan University (UK) and International R/TV Training Center in the Netherlands, where he has been living since 1983.Allamehzadeh has been one of the advocates of Kurdish cinema. He is native in Persian and fluent in English and to some extent Dutch and Spanish.

After fleeing to Europe where he still resides, Allamehzadeh has been making a number of films.

Reza Allamehzadeh was banned from entering Iran at the time of writing Iranian Taboo; recruited the help of friends who secretly shot inside Iran to investigate the centuries-old ban on the Baha'i Faith. All of the sequences in Iran were shot undercover by the filmmaker's local connections. In the film, he focuses his attention on the history of persecution faced by Iran's Bahá’í minority, puzzling over the fact that even those Iranians who believe Bahá’ís should be granted their rights often choose to remain silent about the matter — hence the film's title. "Despite being barred from entering my hometown, I was able to film deep within Iran with the help of dedicated friends who risked their lives to capture the material I needed," Mr. Allamehzadeh stated.