Reza Mirkarimi was born on January 27, 1967 in Tehran where he graduated from the Fine Arts University in Graphic Arts. His Cinema activities started from 1987 with a short film named ‘For Him’ (16mm Camera) and with a series of shorts followed by two TV series aimed at young people. His 1999 first feature, The Child and The Soldier’, has won several national and international awards, including the ‘Golden Butterfly’ at the 1999 Isfahan International Children and Youth Film Festival, Iran and the ‘Montgolfiere d’Argent’ at the Festival of 3 Continents, Nantes, France in 2000, as well the “Golden Shoe” at the ‘Children and Teenagers Film Festival’ in Zelin, Croatia in 2001. ‘The Child and The Soldier’, was released in France in 2001. In 2000 his second feature ‘Under the Moonlight’, dealing with social and religious issues won the Best Feature Award at the 40th Critics’ Week at the 2001 Cannes International Film Festival. The film also won the Best Director’s Award as well as the Special Jury Prize at the Tokyo IFF in 2001, and the Golden Peacock Award at the International Film Festival of India. His fourth and fifth feature films,So Close So Far (2005) and As Simple as That (2007), won the Golden George Award for the Best Picture at the 30th and the 38th Moscow International Film Festival respectively. He also contributes to young Iranian directors by producing their films. He has produced Don’t be Tired in 2012 and Voice of Silence in 2013.His latest film, Castle of Dreams (2019), won big at the Shanghai International Film Festival, receiving three awards for Best Picture, Best Director and Best Actor. Mirkarimi has so far won seven Golden Simorgh awards at the Fajr Film Festival. Three of his films have been presented by Iran for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar: ‘ So Close, So Far’, ‘A Cube of Sugar’ and ‘Today’. He has also sat on several international film festival juries, including Black Nights Film Festival (Estonia), Tokyo International Elm Festival (Japan), Carthage Film Festival (Tunisia), Bogota International Film Festival (Colombia), Golden Apricot — Yerevan International Film Festival (Armenia) and as jury president at the 39th Moscow International Film Festival. He has also served as managing director of KHANEH CINEMA (Iranian Alliance of Motion Picture Guilds). Reza Mirkarimi was director of Fajr International Film Festival from 2016 to 2019.