not sure i would go so far as to call him a great actor, though he does do a good line in strained smiling
― StillAdvance, Monday, 16 November 2015 12:28 (eight years ago) link
With the first quote you pulled out - its in the way you come across as wanting a film to break ground as almost a seismic shift in the way things are done. Funny because these are certainly not normal films where you can demand that kind of expectation. otoh its arguable that the specific contraints imposed on Panahi pushed him to make choices and film subjects in a way he wouldn't have done.
(There is an aside for thinking around other directors and the ways in which they dodged the censor (Tarkovsky in the Soviet Union) but it needs more thinking/fleshing out.)
Did you or did you not expect more? So is it an 'amusing, charming' film that is worthless at the same time? I'm confused. Can you think more about what you are typing before you do? I know you don't have to.
― xyzzzz__, Monday, 16 November 2015 12:41 (eight years ago) link
"otoh its arguable that the specific contraints imposed on Panahi pushed him to make choices and film subjects in a way he wouldn't have done." this is obvious but I think the results have given some highs and very different colours and moods: Closed Curtain, which has this darkness to it, where Panahi is dabbling in a form of destruction.
Quite shocking to go from that to the comic in Taxi
― xyzzzz__, Monday, 16 November 2015 12:52 (eight years ago) link
A bit late to the party, but some thoughts:
The switch from Closed Curtain to Taxi is indeed quite big, but it's also quite logical. In Closed Curtain Panahi not only depicts his suicidal thoughts, he also wins over them, and leave them in the seaside villa, while he himself drives off. So the next film opens with him more cheerful, in another car!
The lawyer at the end says that the regime is jailing people, not to punish those specific people, but to make all of Iran feel like a prison. Well, Panahi responds, not just by turning his Taxi into a place of free discussion, but also by turning all of Teheran into a playground through cinematography. At times the spiritual equivalent of this film is more something like Playtime. As in the scene where the niece is trying to film the wedding couple, while the beggar walks around as well, that's just marvelous choreography.
I don't think there's anything particularly seismic about these three films, Panahi is working in a typical Iranian form that he himself helped define. He talks in This Is Not a Film about The Mirror, about the moment of 'throwing off the cast'. Well, the new thing about these films is that Panahi is also, through circumstances, forced to throw down the gauntlet. Not so much in This is Not a Film, that's still an attempt to create art within the limitations. These other two films are fighting films, though. And while they're techniques are wellknown, from Panahi and Makhmalbaf and others, Panahi now uses them differently, and creates new things with them.
I consider this trilogy to be the most important thing in world cinema this decade. I quite simply love it. It's not a complete statement, it's a discussion, with himself, his filmmaking and now the rest of his country. There are things that might not be true, that Panahi later discards. But this discussion is so so important, in a world where questions of free speech, censorship and art continue to be important. And Taxi Teheran responds with the most triumphant and warm voice to all the inhibitions put in his way.
― Frederik B, Tuesday, 17 November 2015 16:03 (eight years ago) link
And while they're techniques are wellknown, from Panahi and Makhmalbaf and others, Panahi now uses them differently, and creates new things with them.
That's it - definitely a shift. Again all through a partic set of circumstances that meant he had to use techniques there are well-known in different ways.
Is this a trilogy? Just get a sense of Panahi carrying on in whatever way he can. Closed Curtain felt like it was filmed a particularly depressing time.
― xyzzzz__, Tuesday, 17 November 2015 16:30 (eight years ago) link
Wishful thinking... I so want the ban to be lifted so he'll only make three films this way.
― Frederik B, Tuesday, 17 November 2015 16:34 (eight years ago) link
http://www.asia.si.edu/events/films.asp
20th anniversary Iranian film fest in W. DC and Maryland started last weekend and goes through spring. Old and newer films include: The Cow; The President; Taxi; Avalanche; Wolkaan; Monir; Melbourne; 316; Atomic Heart
― curmudgeon, Wednesday, 6 January 2016 16:48 (eight years ago) link
http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/artsdesk/general/2016/01/14/exile-censorship-and-pink-floyd-a-qa-with-curator-tom-vick-on-the-iranian-film-festival/
TV: I would say that this year's batch is quite varied. Films like Avalanche and Melbourne are typical of the style many people associate with Iranian cinema, but Taxi, 316, and Atomic Heart, for instance, take more experimental approaches. The first two comment in different ways on censorship in Iran. Atomic Heart (whose title comes from an obscure Pink Floyd album) shows a side of Iranian life most Americans wouldn't be familiar with. The two films made by Iranians living abroad (Bahar Noorizadeh and Mohsen Makhmalbaf) both reflect on their makers' exile.
― curmudgeon, Friday, 15 January 2016 14:50 (eight years ago) link
Saw Makhmalbaf's "The President" at a packed National Gallery of Art in W. DC showing Sunday (people sitting in the aisles; many DC area living Iranian families). Big 500 seat theatre too.
I thought it was very impressive. Good blend of satire and seriousness in this tale of a dictator.
― curmudgeon, Tuesday, 19 January 2016 15:57 (eight years ago) link
You can see "The President" in Boston tonight, as part of the MFA's end of January Iranian Film Fest
http://www.mfa.org/programs/series/the-boston-festival-of-films-from-iran
― curmudgeon, Thursday, 21 January 2016 17:58 (eight years ago) link
It's showing in Copenhagen as well this week. Think I'll go tomorrow.
― Frederik B, Thursday, 21 January 2016 22:38 (eight years ago) link
The President sneaking into one New York theater today for a week
― we can be heroes just for about 3.6 seconds (Dr Morbius), Friday, 3 June 2016 20:12 (eight years ago) link
its brilliant i think. underrated, actually.
― StillAdvance, Saturday, 4 June 2016 08:06 (eight years ago) link
hafta say i thought it was a misfire, kinda hated the moppet (American child actors really are the best)
some good scenes of course, mostly in the last third
― we can be heroes just for about 3.6 seconds (Dr Morbius), Friday, 10 June 2016 15:28 (seven years ago) link
I liked it. Thought the kid was kinda universal in some ways
― curmudgeon, Friday, 10 June 2016 16:07 (seven years ago) link
ICA in London are doing a makhmalbaf season. 35mm prints of salaam cinema and moment of innocence (only ever seen them on dvd so hoping to make it), and digital screenings of some of his more recent stuff - i dont know much about the gardener or daddys school but they sound interesting (though as they are only about an hour long, would have been nice to have had them as a double bill).
https://www.ica.org.uk/whats-on/season/mohsen-makhmalbaf-focus
― StillAdvance, Monday, 1 August 2016 10:22 (seven years ago) link
Iranian Film Fest has been going on in DC area (continues to March 1). Lots of Kiarostami. Plus I saw this:
Reza Dormishian’s latest, Lantouri, is a harrowing, suspenseful effort about the relationship between a criminal rehabilitation activist and a troubled member of a cold-blooded gang of thieves who falls in love with her. Some scenes that graphically invoke the legal concept of “an eye for an eye” are gruesome, while others, employing a range of speakers, will test the viewer’s ability to read subtitles quickly. Reportedly influenced by Jean-Luc Godard and Iranian documentaries, Dormishian’s confrontational work addresses women’s and human rights and questions how far the notion of forgiveness should go
and this:
For longtime followers of Iranian cinema, brilliant actress Leila Hatami needs no introduction. Feted with awards around the world for her performances in such films as Leila and A Separation, she is one of Iran’s most recognizable and compelling performers. In Soheil Beiraghi’s debut, she plays the force-of-nature queen of Tehran’s underground, a ruthless and enigmatic fixer, staying one step ahead of the law as she forges passports, moves illicit booze, and effortlessly emasculates a musical protégé. Me (aka I) is an eye-opening depiction of Tehran’s surprisingly robust underworld. (Soheil Beiraghi, 2016, Persian and English with subtitles, 84 minutes
― curmudgeon, Thursday, 23 February 2017 18:44 (seven years ago) link
Wonder if I should see "Taste of Cherry" Saturday? It seems to be a hate or love it effort.
― curmudgeon, Thursday, 23 February 2017 18:49 (seven years ago) link
Only one way to find out! :) I loved it, personally, and think it's one of his best.
Great bill, this festival.
― Le Bateau Ivre, Thursday, 23 February 2017 18:58 (seven years ago) link
Taste of Cherry is awesome
― pointless rock guitar (Michael B), Thursday, 23 February 2017 19:03 (seven years ago) link
The Saless retro looks like a must
― xyzzzz__, Friday, 20 October 2017 13:46 (six years ago) link
Don't know him at all, and neither does anyone in my Letterboxd feed except Jonathan Rosenbaum. So retro here should follow.
― ice cream social justice (Dr Morbius), Friday, 20 October 2017 14:09 (six years ago) link
Still Life was incredible, given a one-off broadcast on TV here many years ago.
Don't know anything else so it'll be a discovery.
― xyzzzz__, Friday, 20 October 2017 14:40 (six years ago) link
https://www.freersackler.si.edu/events/films/#/?i=2
Annual Iranian Film Festival going on in DC for free. I saw Oscar nominated Film “Breath.” A sad touching effort about a young girl and her family in late 1970s end of Shah era Iran.
― curmudgeon, Saturday, 27 January 2018 16:15 (six years ago) link
Kiarostami's final film "24 Frames" , made in the last 3 years before his death in 2016, is, uh, something. He took a photo of a Pieter Bruegel the Elder's 1565 painting The Hunters in the Snow and 23 of his own photos (many of them of snow-covered fields, or waves crashing on the shore) and imagined what happened before and after. He via computer tools added 4 minutes or so of action to each of the 24 shots. Some are wearying and repetitious with little happening, but others are special.
― curmudgeon, Monday, 29 January 2018 15:16 (six years ago) link
I keep missing Fest films... Maybe I can make it this weekend
― curmudgeon, Friday, 9 February 2018 17:38 (six years ago) link
Two years later the 25th anniversary DC Film Festival of Iranian Films is virtual and free, but you have to live in the DC area to see the movies through February 7th.
I liked Bandar Band and Dance with Me.
https://washingtoncitypaper.com/article/507554/city-lights-the-25th-dc-festival-of-films-from-iran-goes-on-virtually/
― curmudgeon, Thursday, 4 February 2021 01:13 (three years ago) link
Come back other ilxor fans of Iranian film
― curmudgeon, Thursday, 4 February 2021 05:05 (three years ago) link
I tried, but can't watch the films outside DC/Maryland/Virginia.
― Adoration of the Mogwai (Deflatormouse), Friday, 5 February 2021 01:55 (three years ago) link
Is the entire thread about Abbas Kiarostami and Jafar Panahi
― Adoration of the Mogwai (Deflatormouse), Friday, 5 February 2021 02:00 (three years ago) link
Well, ok. I took my mom to see Closed Curtain at IFC years ago and she complained the entire time that it was insufferably boring and repeatedly urged me to walk out with her.
― Adoration of the Mogwai (Deflatormouse), Friday, 5 February 2021 02:07 (three years ago) link
Oh well. I think the DC Film Fest offerings may also be available for viewers in Houston, Texas and Boston, Mass via museums there. Bandar Band , although flawed, is worth seeing as is Dance w/ Me.
I still have lots of old Iranian new wave films to see.
― curmudgeon, Saturday, 6 February 2021 20:40 (three years ago) link
Just watched Crimson Gold as it was expiring from Criterion and really glad I did. Here is some discussion, including a great Morbius take:Briefly talk about what you've seen recentlyIs the entire thread about Abbas Kiarostami and Jafar PanahiSo it would seem. Apologies for continuing the trend.
― Gary Gets His Tonsure Out (James Redd and the Blecchs), Tuesday, 1 March 2022 18:50 (two years ago) link
Really enjoyed this, and impressed by implicit political implications, although also, there are a lot of times and places in which you really, really wouldn't want to call the cops, no matter what:The Salesman (Persian: فروشنده, romanized: Forušande, released in France as Le Client) is a 2016 drama film written and directed by Asghar Farhadi and starring Taraneh Alidoosti and Shahab Hosseini. It is about a married couple who perform Arthur Miller's 1949 play Death of a Salesman on stage. When the wife is assaulted, her husband attempts to determine the identity of the attacker, while she struggles to cope with post-trauma stress. Farhadi chose Miller's play as his story within a story based on shared themes. A co-production between Iran and France, the film was shot in Tehran, beginning in 2015.
The film premiered in competition in the 2016 Cannes Film Festival, where it won two awards—Best Screenplay for Farhadi and Best Actor for Hosseini. The Salesman was very well-received by film critics, who mainly praised Farhadi's direction and writing, and won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. However, Farhadi did not attend the 89th Academy Awards ceremony in protest of the U.S. Executive Order 13769.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Salesman_(2016_film)
― dow, Tuesday, 1 March 2022 21:18 (two years ago) link
implicit implications OK!
― dow, Tuesday, 1 March 2022 21:19 (two years ago) link
Been meaning to watch that one. Recently watched this Israeli Apple TV+ production called Tehran, in which the Iranian characters are pretty sympathetic so now have been inspired to (re)watch some actual Iranian movies.
― Gary Gets His Tonsure Out (James Redd and the Blecchs), Tuesday, 1 March 2022 21:24 (two years ago) link
Tbh I kind of got used to Athens doubling as Tehran so interesting to see how the real place looks. Which is not totally different.
― Gary Gets His Tonsure Out (James Redd and the Blecchs), Tuesday, 1 March 2022 21:25 (two years ago) link
― Wile E. Is President (James Redd and the Blecchs), Wednesday, 4 May 2022 01:18 (two years ago) link
Lots about Farhadi upthread already.
― Wile E. Is President (James Redd and the Blecchs), Wednesday, 4 May 2022 01:20 (two years ago) link
Anyway, HIT THE ROAD lived up to its trailer and poster.
― Wile E. Is President (James Redd and the Blecchs), Thursday, 5 May 2022 11:08 (two years ago) link
Watched About Elly and The Salesman over the weekend. I suppose either The Hero or Fireworks Wednesday is next.
― Don't Renege On (Our Dub) (James Redd and the Blecchs), Monday, 16 May 2022 16:19 (two years ago) link
I have lots of catching up to do
― curmudgeon, Tuesday, 17 May 2022 13:16 (two years ago) link
The Hero another nail-biter.
― Apollo and the Aqueducts (James Redd and the Blecchs), Sunday, 22 May 2022 20:27 (two years ago) link
And there’s a story behind the story: https://www.indiewire.com/2022/04/asghar-farhadi-found-guilty-plagiarism-a-hero-1234714331/
― Apollo and the Aqueducts (James Redd and the Blecchs), Sunday, 22 May 2022 20:36 (two years ago) link
https://www.vulture.com/2022/04/asghar-farhadi-sued-plagiarism-a-hero.html
Masihzadeh claimed Farhadi made her sign a document in 2019, before he began production on A Hero, stating that he owned the idea for All Winners, All Losers, which she did “under great pressure.” Farhadi’s lawyer does not dispute the document, saying it clarified that “he was the one who proposed the idea and the plot of the documentary.” His lawyer said he researched the story on his own, based on media coverage; Masihzadeh claims there was little coverage of the incident that inspired her documentary. Relatedly, Farhadi claimed the main character of A Hero, Rahim, is dissimilar to the real-life subject of All Winners, All Losers. One former student from 2011 additionally told The Hollywood Reporter he believed Farhadi made a film based off one of his projects, but did not plan to sue because he “is a genius filmmaker.”
― Apollo and the Aqueducts (James Redd and the Blecchs), Monday, 23 May 2022 14:33 (two years ago) link
An interview with Farhadi also on Vulture links to this interesting article: https://www.latimes.com/local/great-reads/la-me-c1-tarof-20150706-story.html
― Apollo and the Aqueducts (James Redd and the Blecchs), Monday, 23 May 2022 14:44 (two years ago) link
It seems that the star of About Elly, Golshifteh Farahani, is mostly making films in exile in France these days, including a really terrible love triangle thing I recently tried to watch called Two Friends directed by Alfred's crush Louis Garrel.
― Apollo and the Aqueducts (James Redd and the Blecchs), Monday, 23 May 2022 15:23 (two years ago) link
Not the same film, butNever Coming to a Theater Near You - Arthouse Cinema 2016
Louis Garrel's directorial debut may be the worst feature i've endured in the last several years― we can be heroes just for about 3.6 seconds (Dr Morbius), Monday, March 7, 2016 2:18 PM (six years ago)
― Apollo and the Aqueducts (James Redd and the Blecchs), Monday, 23 May 2022 15:25 (two years ago) link
Think my take on Farhadi is close to Bilge Ebiri’s.
― Apollo and the Aqueducts (James Redd and the Blecchs), Tuesday, 24 May 2022 01:43 (two years ago) link
really liked About Elly
― Dan S, Tuesday, 24 May 2022 01:53 (two years ago) link