The 16th Fajr International Film Festival () held 1–11 February 1998 in Tehran, Iran.
The Glass Agency (Ebrahim Hatamikia, 1998) was the festival's best film in "Competition of Iranian Cinema" and The Promise (Luc Dardenne and Jean-Pierre Dardenne, 1996) —a Belgian film— was the festival's best film in "Competition of International Cinema".
The Glass Agency won a record-tying nine awards including Best Film, Best Director and Best Screenplay.
Selection committee
Majid Nadiri, festival's public relations officer, was announced the selection committee members on 3 January as below: Parvaneh Massoumi, actress Mohammad-Reza Honarmand, director , director , producer , producer
Juries
Competition of Iranian Cinema
Ezatollah Entezami, Actor
Kiumars Pourahmad, director
, director
Fereshteh Taerpour, producer
Majid Majidi, director
Competition of International Cinema
Abbas Kiarostami, Iranian director
, Italian producer
Jean-Michel Frodon, French film critic
Tadao Sato, Japanese film critic
Sandip Ray, Indian director
Competition of Iranian Cinema
Awards and nominations of the Competition of Iranian Cinema sections are below:
Audience Choice
Competition
Non-nomination Crystal Simorgh
Films with multiple nominations and awards
The following 10 films received multiple nominations:
The following 3 films received multiple awards:
Competition of International Cinema
Non-nomination Crystal Simorgh
Additional Honorary Diploma
Best Cinematography: Mahmoud Kalari – The Pear Tree (Iran) Best Costume Design: and – (Iran)
Non-competitive sections
The festival's other sidebar sections included tributes to Anthony Quinn and Ezzatolah Entezami, retrospectives of the works of three directors —Fred Zinnemann, Krzysztof Kieślowski and Ebrahim Hatamikia— , screening of the selected works for which Ennio Morricone had composed the music, "Festival of Festivals", and special screenings.
Facing Mirrors
Retrospective of the Fred Zinnemann's career highlights: The Men (1950) High Noon (1952) Behold a Pale Horse (1964) A Man for All Seasons (1966) The Day of the Jackal (1973) Julia (1977)
Retrospective of the Krzysztof Kieślowski's career highlights: Personnel (1975 TV film) The Calm (1976) Camera Buff (1979) Short Working Day (1981) Dekalog (1988 TV series): 1, 8 and 10 episodes A Short Film About Killing (1988)
The Green Narrative
Retrospective of the Ebrahim Hatamikia's career highlights: Identity (1987) The Scout (1989) The Immigrant (1990) (1992) From Karkheh to Rhein (1993) (1994) The Scent of Joseph's Shirt (1996) Minoo Watchtower (1996) The Glass Agency (1998)
For All Seasons
Tribute to the Anthony Quinn by screening of 14 films of his career.
Tribute to the Ezzatolah Entezami by his career highlights: The Cow (Dariush Mehrjui, 1969) Hajji Washington (Ali Hatami, 1982) Kamalolmolk (Ali Hatami, 1985) The Lodgers (Dariush Mehrjui, 1987) (Masoud Jafari Jozani, 1987) Grand Cinema (, 1989) Once Upon a Time, Cinema (Mohsen Makhmalbaf, 1992) (, 1992) (Behrouz Afkhami, 1994) (Rakhshan Bani-Etemad, 1995)
Once Upon a Time
Tribute the Ennio Morricone by his career highlights: A Fistful of Dollars (Sergio Leone, 1964) The Hawks and the Sparrows (Pier Paolo Pasolini, 1966) My Name Is Nobody (Tonino Valerii, 1973) Last Days of Mussolini (Carlo Lizzani, 1974) Todo modo (Elio Petri, 1976) The Desert of the Tartars (Valerio Zurlini, 1976) Casualties of War (Brian De Palma, 1989) The Escort (Ricky Tognazzi, 1993) The Long Silence (Margarethe von Trotta, 1993) A Pure Formality (Giuseppe Tornatore, 1994)
Ceremony information
63 films were requested to participate in the festival which 22 of them were approved for the "Competition of Iranian Cinema" section. For the first time, FIFF had had opening ceremony that took place on 31 January 1998, at the City Theater in Tehran, Iran. Also for the first time, press conference for each film of the competitive sections was held at the . elimination of the "Debut Films" section is another feature of festival's this edition.