Reza Mirkarimi's Today

Iran's submission for this year's Best Foreign Film at the Academy awards is Reza Mirkarimi's Today. As one of the country's most remarkably consistent filmmakers, his films have twice been submitted for Oscar consideration – though not his best, breakout feature, Under the Moonlight. He had no luck with So Far, So Close and his second chance, A Cube of Sugar, was taken away from him after Iran took back its submission as a result of a boycott. 

Today tells the story of a taxi driver, Younes (played by legendary actor, Parviz Parastuyi), who forms a mysterious relationship with one of his passengers, an injured, pregnant woman. A subtle, slow narrative with a taciturn protagonist typical of Mirkarimi's characters, the film gradually builds momentum toward a richly moving finale that works both within the emotional scope of the film and the grander, allegorical meanings that critics have ascribed to it. It is one of the strongest films of the year. 

I saw the film at TIFF and discussed it on the Hello Cinema Podcast – which, as you already know, I co-host with Tina Hassannia about Iranian cinema. I also had the pleasure of interviewing the director during the festival. I have written about the film twice this week: a transcript of my conversation with Mirkarimi is up at Hello Cinema; a short column about the film's Oscar chances is at The Film Experience. Be sure to give both of them a read!

Amir Sat on a Branch Reflecting on TIFF

*This column was originally published at The Film Experience.

Joshua Oppenheimer's The Look of Silence

You may have noticed that after a few years of covering the festival to various degrees for The Film Experience, I was completely absent from this space for the past ten days, mostly because of a personal decision to enjoy the films without sweating over writing. TIFF is a big festival, maybe the most frantic and hectic in the world, with more choices than one can physically experience over ten days. Nathaniel and I shared so few films from the program’s sprawling lineup, we could have each written about every single thing we saw and you’d never know we attended the same festival. It’s this overwhelming scale that made me want to take a break from reporting, and yet, I feel unsure about how that affected my festival experience.

Writing about films for me is a passion born out of the necessity to articulate my thoughts on the things I watch. Maybe that process of writing makes the films more memorable? Isn’t it so that writing, even about bad films, makes us appreciate good cinema all the more? Without recording my memories, details about this year’s films have fled my mind quicker than ever. My feelings about some of them have been diluted a bit, too. There is something missing, even though I had the best festival experience of my life, meeting more people than ever and watching some terrific films. Maybe this pessimism is just a withdrawal symptom. Let’s stay positive!

As has become something of an unplanned tradition for me – with precedents including Oslo, August 31st and Closed Curtain – my favorite film of the festival came my way on the last day. The Look of Silence, Joshua Oppenheimer’s follow-up to The Act of Killing is a remarkable achievement, one that I dare say, with festival hyperbole now fully behind me, is one of the best documentary films ever made. Where the original film shocked its audience with both the viciousness of the story and the inventiveness of its approach, this sequel of sorts is rather more formally straightforward. Turning his camera 180º to focus on the victims of the Indonesian massacre of the 1960s, Oppenheimer examines unhealed wounds and social and familial fractures that are still silenced decades on. The Look of Silence is no less brutal than its predecessor, yet, its emotional punch comes not by shock, but from the force of personal traumas visible in the victims’ silent looks.

Iran will not defend its Oscar statue

I had the first episode of my new series on Iranian cinema all edited and ready to post, but it feels strange to write about Iranian cinema today and ignore the big news. The Iranian government has decided to boycott the Oscars in an act of protest to the release of Innocenceof Muslims.

It’s painful, to be honest; particularly because it had been announced earlier that Reza Mirkarimi’s A Cube of Sugar was going to be Iran’s representative in the category this year. It’s a gentle, thoughtful film by one of the greatest directors of Iranian cinema's new generation. I’ve always rooted for his success since his exquisite first feature, Under the Moonlight, and I’d have loved to see him take another stab at this. (Iran’s 2005 submission was Mirkarimi’s best work to date, So Close, So Far, which is criminally overlooked on the international scene.) This of course comes on the back of the country's first win for Asghar Farhadi’s A Separation, so Iran becomes one of only a handful of countries not to attempt to defend its statue. (Film Actually’s Shane pointed me to South Africa and Bosnia who didn’t submit films after Tsotsi and No Man’s Land, respectively. If you know of more examples let me know in the comments.)

Reza Kianian in A Cube of Sugar

Mirkarimi and his film aside, I just can’t see how the decision to boycott the Oscars helps any of parties involved. Why deprive the Iranian film community of the chance to show its best work on the world’s greatest stage? It doesn’t seem like a trade off, just a lose-lose situation. If the reason for this boycott is that Iranians feel insulted by Innocence of Muslims, wouldn’t a worthy film in response send a better message to the world than simply boycotting the Oscars and leaving the scene altogether? And in any case, Innocent of Muslims is absolutely asinine but responding to it at all, whether in the form of a boycott or more aggressively, with riots and violence and shootings and killings as we've seen in other Muslim countries in the aftermath of its "release" is even more...stupid. If you don’t like the film, don’t watch it and move on. This type of reactionary approach only validates it. Besides, I can guarantee you that before the ceremony is even held, barely anyone will remember the name of this "film".

As for A Cube of Sugar – which, by the way, stars my favourite Iranian actor of all time, Reza Kianian - well, it was not A Separation, but it had a decent shot, believe it or not. It’s exactly the type of film that older voters in this category welcome with open arms and it’s a heck of lot of better than some of the recent winners. But alas, Iranians will have to wait another year.