Juliette Binoche was reduced to tears on Tuesday when she was told that Jafar Panahi, a jailed filmmaker, was on hunger strike.
The Oscar winning actress was at the Cannes Film Festival to promote her latest movie Certified Copy when she was told the news by a reporter.
Breaking down in tears she was unable to give a response to events but her director Abbas Kiarostami gave his own opinion on the matter.
He told the reporter: "The fact that a filmmaker has been imprisoned is itself intolerable. If the Iranian government continues to refuse to release Jafar, then we need explanations.
"Jafar Panahi was inclined to make his films under clandestine, illegal circumstances, but that's not his responsibility alone.
"The responsibility is that of the authorities who prevent him from carrying out his profession. When a filmmaker, an artist, is imprisoned it is art as a whole that is attacked, and it is against this that we should react."
Jafar Panahi was arrested in March for "making a film against the regime and it was about the events that followed election."
Tagged in Cannes Film Festival Juliette Binoche