In the cinema, realism is both an aesthetic and a political idea. And like all such contested ideas its meaning is somewhat slippery. Soviet cinema of the 1920s, the documentary movement of the 1980s, Italy and India's post-war neo-realist schools, 1950s working-class films from England, the international efforts of cinema verite in the 1960s, today's Dogme 95 films from Denmark and the neo-neorealism of Iranian cinema: all these march under tile banner of realism. What this diverse array of film-making ideas and practices also shares is an antagonism for American politics and an aesthetic rejection of Hollywood.
The latest realist school, from Iran, has dominated tile world of the film festival and cimematheque throughout the 1990s. Abbas Kiarostami's existentialist exploration A Taste of Gheny (1996) topped many critics' 10-best lists of the decade and often was accompanied by up to five other Iranian Films. Iran is a country of approximately 60 million, many of whose films are made tinder the auspices of the Institute for tile Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults. It is also a nation whose Ministry of Culture doubles as the Ministry of Islamic Guidance. Given these conditions, it is perhaps surprising that Iranian films are so highly regarded in the West. In part this success has to do with the high estimation granted to films that provide alternatives to Hollywood. The allegorical feel of many of the Films also leaves ample room for interpretation about what the films are saying about Iran and the rest of the world.
Iran has always had a healthy Film industry but since its Islamic revolution in 1979 culture has become a much-vaunted part of state policy. Iran has strict regulations on foreign film imports and has boosted state support for both production and consumption of the arts. Interestingly, the Films that are celebrated at Cannes are not always the same as those that draw tile crowds at home. The international hit, A Taste of Cherry, for example, was watched by only about 75,000 people in Iran. Similarly, Jafar Panahi's newest film, The Circle (2000), currently distributed in 32 countries, was removed from Tehran's annual Fajr Film Festival last year and is currently banned from domestic release because of sexual content..
n The Circle, Panahi has matte what some consider to he the most explicitly feminist critique of the Islamic state so far. Using a circular structure of overlapping stories, the Film follows a day in the life of three women recently released from prison. Although we are never told their crimes, we are given a clear picture of tile repressed nature of women's lives as they are subject to male authority for everything from buying a bus ticket to having an abortion. When even a cigarette is an all-but-forbidden pleasure, it wouldn't be that hard to transgress the rules. The film begins with a family's panic and disappointment at the birth of a baby girl and ends with tile fugitive women back in prison. Ironically, the jail cell is no more repressive than the rest of society (the hospital, tile street, the home). In fact, in the dim jail cell, the women are actually afforded some freedom from the prying eyes that control their behaviour the rest of tile time.
Panahi is one of several high-profile Iranian directors working in close conjunction with one another. He began his Film career as the assistant to Iran's biggest director, Abbas Kiarostami, who also wrote the script for his award-winning debut, The White Balloon (1995).
Do Iranian films support the Iranian revolution or suhvert it? Does the enthusiastic global reception by cinephiles and critics come as a response to the Films, or to what is seen as a critical commentary on the politics of the Iranian state? What's clear is that a certain combination of state funding and state censorship has combined to produce a school of film-making that explores the contemporary situation of life in Iran. At the same time, it also challenges viewers to think about both how the world and the cinema might be different.
Why does a democracy like India having so many layers in the social system and the largest viewing not channelize our sentiments through cinema .The films of shahrukh khan or akshay kumar ontinue to remain meagre show of indian opulence but fail to carry the rich heritage or the vast variation of the indian dialect.The bollywood film industry continues to remain a brand factory.An outlet for filling jars and limousines but not fulfilling the heart of a common indian.
Director: Abbas Kiarostami
ReplyDeleteKiarostami's films generally contemplate the question of cinema and its relation to everyday life and fiction. "Close-up" raises this question emphatically by following a character who, in his real life, has impersonated the populist filmmaker Mohsen Makhmalbaf.
Many of Kiarostami's other films, such as "Through the Olive Trees," "And Life Goes On," and "The Wind Will Carry Us" place the process of filmmaking in the context of exoticized, fantastical, primitive villages, where representational power-dynamics between the urban/rural and national/global are worked through.
Recommended films:
"Close-up" (1990)
"Through the Olive Trees" (1994)
"And Life Goes On" (1992)
"Taste of Cherry" (1997)
"The Wind Will Carry Us" (1999)
"Ten" (2002)
Director: Mohsen Makhmalbaf
Makhmalbaf is a filmmaker who blossomed after the Islamic Revolution, using the camera as a tool for social criticism. His films, such as "Time of Innocence," then went on to reflect on the role of, and the fascination with, film in Iran in the 1980s and early '90s. His later films formulate the question of the national in cinema's relation to indigenous arts and crafts.
Recommended films:
"The Cyclist" (1988)
"Gabbeh" (1996)
"The Silence" (1998)
"Time of Innocence/Bread and Flower" (1996)
Director: Bahram Bayzaie
Bahram Bayzaie's films can be characterized as works that attempt to shape a new cinematic language in the national context. His films draw on tropes in the national and indigenous arts to give shape to the new Post-Revolutionary cinema. He was one of the first filmmakers who paid specific attention to the role and the condition of Iranian women in relation to the cinematic medium. He is known for using women in powerful leading roles.
Recommended films:
"Bashu, The Little Stranger" (1986)
"The Travelers" (1992)
"Rabid Dogs" (2001)
Director: Majid Majidi
Majidi's films deal with the plight of the poor and the conditions of foreign laborers in Iran. He is acclaimed as a master of color and light.
Recommended films:
"Baran" (2001)
"The Color of Paradise" (1999)
Director: Rakhshan Bani-Etemad
Bani-Etemad is a documentary filmmaker who has taken up fiction film since the Islamic Revolution. Her films often deal with taboo topics: love triangles ("Nargess"), May-December relationships ("The Blue Veiled") and social and economic corruption in urban settings ("Under the Skin of the City").
Recommended films:
"Nargess" (1992)
"The Blue Veiled" (1995)
"Under the Skin of the City" (2001)
Director: Tahmineh Milani
Milani is an avowed feminist who focuses on the conditions of urban women and their everyday struggles at home, in the context of patriarchy and in the realm of politics.
Recommended films:
"Two Women" (1998)
"The Hidden Half" (2001)
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Audio & Video
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Get It Together
"Get It Together" is a video created by students and produced by Duke faculty member John Jackson exploring how young people of all races are transforming their community to protect the environment.
video Click here to view an excerpt of the film.
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Spotlight
___ Top Ten Iranian Films
Negar Mottahedeh's top choices for Iranian films.
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