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A highlight of the Singapore International Film Festival was the large
selection—15 in total—of recent Iranian features and documentaries. This
included: The Wind Will Carry Us by Abbas Kiarostami (see link to
previous review below), Willow and Wind by Mohammad Ali Talebi,
from a script by Kiarostami, The Cart by Golam Reza Ramezani,
Birth of a Butterfly by Motjaba Raie and Sweet Agony by
Ali-Reza Davudnezhad.
There were also two movies by Mohsen Makhmalbaf— The Silence and
The Door —and films by his daughters— The Apple, an
outstanding work previously reviewed by WSWS (see link below), by
21-year-old Samira Makhmalbaf; and The Day The Aunt Fell Ill, a
short film by 11-year-old Hanna.
To fully appreciate Iranian films it is necessary to have some
understanding of the difficult conditions in which they have been
produced. In Iran virtually every aspect of film production and
distribution is under government control and has been for most of the
industry's history. The first decrees outlawing political films were
issued in 1950 and under Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, who came to power in
a CIA-organised military coup in 1953, films critical of the regime or
those with explicit references to poverty and the disadvantaged were
censored or banned outright.
Following the overthrow of the Shah in 1979, Ayatollah Ruhollah
Khomeini's Islamic regime tightened censorship and imposed strict
religious control over film content. Islamic fanatics torched many
cinemas, 2,000 films were cut or banned outright and some filmmakers were
indicted on charges of “corrupting the public”.
Under current law, films cannot directly criticise the government or
make political exposures of social conditions. Men and women cannot touch
each other in movies unless married or related and women must observe
Islamic dress codes. The Ministry of Islamic Culture and Guidance approves
all scripts and scrutinises cast and crew before issuing a production
permit for a film. On completion, the film must be submitted to the
censors and then, if it is approved, with or without cuts, the film is
subjected to a rating system that determines when and where it can be
shown. The government also has monopoly control on film stock and
equipment.
In the face of these harsh conditions, however, the most talented
Iranian filmmakers—Abbas Kiarostami and Mohsen Makhmalbaf in
particular—have maintained their artistic integrity and forged a
sophisticated cinematic style. These directors have challenged many
commonly held conceptions about cinema and, drawing on neo-realist
cinematic traditions, highlighted some of the social and political
contradictions of Iranian society today. Their work can be deeply symbolic
or, on other occasions, deceptively simple films dealing with
children.
Mohsen Makhmalbaf is one of the most popular and influential filmmakers
in Iran today. Born in Teheran in 1957, Makhmalbaf directed his first
film, Nassouh's Repentance, in 1982 and has maintained a steady
stream of movies averaging almost one a year for almost two decades. These
films have differed in content and style—dealing with the plight of the
urban poor, his experiences in jail, satires on the Iranian monarchy and
the media, and several ground breaking documentaries. Three of his films
have been banned in Iran: Time of Love (1990), Nights in
Zayandeh Roud (1991) and The Silence (1998).
His latest film, The Door, which was released in 1999, was one
of three short films screened at the Singapore Film Festival showcased
under the title Tales of Kish. The Greek Ship by Nasser
Taghavi, and The Ring by Abolfazl Jalili are the other two films in
this provocative collection of new cinema from Iran.
Originally conceived as a collection of six films with additional
contributions by Rakhshan Bani-Etemad, Bahram Beizai and veteran director
Dariush Mehrjui, last year's Cannes Film Festival Committee were so
impressed by the first three films that they decided to put them together
as a competition entry for their festival.
Tales of Kish, which has little dialogue, explores poverty and
isolation. Although the directors worked independently two of the films
have a common theme—that traditional methods of living for many are being
replaced by scavenging for survival amongst the waste products of the
global economy.
The first in the series, The Greek Ship, tells the story of two
men who collect cardboard containers—mainly video, sound system and
television set boxes—washed up on the island's shore, near a beached ship.
Hundreds of years ago the inhabitants of Kish, which is 15 kilometres off
the coast of Iran in the Persian Gulf, profited from trading ships passing
between Asia and Europe. Today the sea provides discarded cardboard
boxes.
The men dry out the boxes and use them to repair their meagre shacks.
The containers seem to offer a way out of the poverty afflicting the small
settlement. But this apparent good fortune is dashed when the wife of one
of the men is suddenly struck down by a strange psychological illness that
the village medicine man blames on the boxes. The woman is cured after an
exorcism, and an instruction is issued that the men must stop collecting
the floatsam. Her illness recurs, however, when the sea brings forward a
new harvest—this time hundreds of plastic bottles.
The Greek Ship has the pace and tone of an ancient fable. The
film provides no answers and it is not judgmental. But it evokes real
sympathy for those poor or primitive communities whose only connection
with modern civilisation is the debris washed up on the shore.
The Ring is about a young Kurdish man who has come to the island
of Kish seeking work. The young man has been accepted to study at
university but is unable to attend because his family cannot afford the
fees. One day his sister writes to tell him that she needs money for a
ring. The young man, who lives alone in a shack on the side of the road
near the coast, does not have a job but is determined to earn the
necessary money for her. The simple film, which has virtually no dialogue
or plot, documents his uncomplaining efforts to raise the money as he
sifts through the debris of modern civilisation. Daily life involves
selling a few fish to passing cars, collecting the mercury or lead from
expired batteries and scavenging whatever he can to keep body and soul
together—and pay for the ring.
The concluding film in the collection is Makhmalbaf's The Door.
It tells the story of an old man's attempt to put society and civilisation
behind him. The man wanders across the barren island carrying his only
possession, the front door of his house, on his back. Straggling along
behind him is his veiled daughter and her stubborn baby goat, and a
postman attempting to deliver mail to the door. The old man is crossing
the island to meet someone who has promised to buy the door. It is not
exactly clear why he has decided to take this course of action: perhaps he
hopes that by dispensing with all his worldly possessions he may achieve
peace and happiness. But when he arrives at the agreed destination, the
buyer, who has arrived by boat, refuses to purchase it. The film ends with
the old man walking into the sea unable to get rid of his last
possession.
This is a poetic film with striking cinematography as the characters
cross the desert sands like participants in a tightly choreographed
contemporary dance piece. As the old man attempts to escape civilisation
he still carries part of it on his back. The door is not just a piece of
wood but an address, somewhere to deliver mail, and a focus for other
social activities the old man wants to leave behind. The Door has a
timeless quality and makes clear that one cannot escape society, something
of its laws and social values will always remain.
The second Makhmalbaf film screened at Singapore was The Silence
(1998). This is an interesting film and like much of his previous work
combines symbolic imagery and social commentary with complex and often
dreamlike transitions between documentary reality and dramatic fiction.
The film, which is memorable for its intriguing story and audacious visual
beauty, is similar to Gabbeh, his 1996 film about nomadic tribe of
carpetweavers from southeastern Iran.
Set in Tajikistan, The Silence is about a 10-year-old blind boy,
Khorshid (Tahmineh Normatova), who works as a tuner of traditional musical
instruments. Hard times have fallen on the family: Khorshid's father has
moved to Russia and his mother, who attempts to sustain the family through
fishing, depends on the boy's salary to pay the rent. The landlord has
threatened to evict the family from their home unless the rent is paid
within a few days. Khorshid's mother tells the boy to ask for an advance
on his salary to pay the landlord, but like most children of his age,
Khorshid is easily distracted, often late for work and forgets to ask for
the advance.
Khorshid, whose name means sun, possesses an incredible capacity to
shrug off all problems. He is different to other children in that his
blindness has sensitised him to sound and other simple sensations of
everyday life. In fact, each new sound or sensation—the smell of fresh
bread, the texture of apples and cherries, the sound of a bee, the music
in a doorknock or a coppersmith's hammer—intoxicates him. Life for him is
a musical adventure.
As pressure mounts from the landlord and his mother Khorshid becomes
more and more preoccupied with the sounds around him. The landlord's knock
is transformed into the opening bars of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony and
Korshid begins to mentally incorporate all the other sounds he encounters
in daily life—at the bazaar, the musical instrument shop and the
coppersmiths—into a complex musical piece. As he passes the coppersmith he
tells the young workers they should beat the copper pots to the same
rhythm as the opening of Beethoven's great work. The film concludes with
Khorshid, although sacked from his job and facing real difficulties,
standing in the middle of the town bazaar conducting these sounds and
those who produce them.
Khorshid's musical abilities and tremendous artistic imagination—his
decision to bring together others making music in the bazaar—is one the
film's most evocative and inspiring moments. It points, not to a passive
acceptance of the incredible difficulties he confronts but a determination
to rise above this and create something that will change his life and
future for the better.
The Silence does not explain the fate of the young boy or his
family and this may indicate a somewhat uncritical approach by Makhmalbaf
to his subject. Although Makhmalbaf seems to be directing our attention to
a wider question— that serious difficulties will create a determination to
overcome these problems and release tremendous human resources—he does not
go beyond this general truth. Its interpretation is left completely
open.
The strength of the film lies in Makhmalbaf's exploration, done with
real sensitivity and warmth, of the creative imagination and amazing
potential of the 10-year-old boy—a child who has been forced to work and
therefore denied a real childhood.
The Silence is another important contribution to Makhmalbaf's
unique and provocative body of work and further evidence that he is
amongst the more thoughtful filmmakers in the world today. The next
article from the Singapore International Film Festival will be an
interview with Mohsen Makhmalbaf.