Trailer for Rosewater Starring Gael Garcia Bernal

Posted on August 29, 2014

Here is the trailer for Rosewater which was written and directed by The Daily Show's Jon Stewart. The film is based on the true story of Canadian journalist Maziar Bahari who was imprisoned as a spy and tortured in Iran for 118 days.

Bahari was born in Iran but has Canadian citizenship. He was living in London in In 2009 when he was sent to Iran to cover the national elections for the BBC when the Arab Spring was in full swing and protesters lined the streets of Tehran. His footage was shown around the world and helped give insight as to what was really happening in the secretive country.

The authorities arrested Bahari and accused him of being a spy. They used his Facebook page and a comic appearance he made on The Daily Show Jon Stewart as "proof" that he was part of a media spy ring. When Bahari was eventually released after much campaigning by his then fiance and others, he wrote a book about his ordeal called Then They Came For Me: A Family’s Story Of Love, Captivity And Survival. He went back on The Daily Show to discuss the book and his imprisonment.

The name of the film comes from Bahari's description of his interrogator who always smelled of rosewater. The film stars Mexican actor Gael Garcia Bernal as Bahari. Stewart has gotten some grief for not casting an Iranian American actor, but Stewart says he knows Bahari and it was Garcia Bernal who nailed the audition. This was Stewart's first directing job and he said he relied on Garcia Bernal (who is also a director) for the complicated shoot in Jordan.

The film will be shown at the Toronto Film Festival and will premiere at the Telluride Film Festival. It will be released in theaters on November 7th. The trailer is excellent. Take a look:

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