november 13 - december 3, 1998

photo: LEILA

about the program

program notes and times

Note: all films are subtitled in English except as noted.

THE COW / GAAV (1969; 105m) This poetic tale begins with the murder of the most important citizen of an Iranian village: Mashadi Hasan's tenderly cherished cow-child. So traumatic is his loss, Hasan slowly becomes the beloved bovine and a suitable case for treatment. THE COW marked the world's discovery of an important new director (and Iranian cinema)--in the film's remote and desolate rural environs, we see a world that has thrived without change for a very long time.
Friday, November 13: 2 pm
Saturday, November 14: 4 pm
Sunday, November 15: 8 pm
Monday November 23: 2 and 6:15 pm

DEAD END /
BON-BAST
Parvid Sayyad, 1978; 82m
Adapting a plot from Chekov, DEAD END is the story of a young woman who entertains romantic fantasies that an acquaintance seeks her hand in marriage. When the man asks to visit her family, fulfillment of her fantasy seems within reach. However, things are not as they appear to be, and the true purpose of his visit turns her world upside-down. Mery Apik was awarded Best Actress prize at the 1977 Moscow Film Festival.
Friday, November 13: 4:10 pm
Saturday, November 14: 8:45 pm

LEILA
(1997; 110m)
Married to a man she loves passionately, Leila (who provides the film's voiceover narration) is heartbroken to discover she can't have children--though her husband doesn't believe that this will affect their happy lives together. But Leila's mother-in-law so desires a grandson that she insists that her son take a second, fertile wife, and perversely, it is Leila who must "interview" the candidates. Peter Keough writes that LEILA's "limpid performances [are] accented by unassumingly brilliant images--a single pearl from a broken necklace against blue tiles, the rustle of a wedding gown on a staircase--[Mehrjui] transforms a cultural anomaly into a universal tragedy."
Friday, November 13: 6:15 pm

THE PEAR TREE /
DERAKHT-E GOLABI
(1998; 96m)
In this poignant Iranian Remembrance of Things Past, a middle-aged poet and writer goes back to his birthplace, where a pear tree in the garden triggers a return to childhood and youthful love. As he recalls how a 14-year-old cousin inspired his adolescent self to creative, religious and erotic passion, Mahmoud brings his present life into new focus and learns the secret of the pear tree's failure to bear fruit.
Friday, November 13: 9 pm
Saturday, November 14: 6:15 pm
Wednesday, December 2: 4 and 8:20 pm
Thursday, December 3: 2 pm

DOWNPOUR / RAGBAR
Bahram Beyza'i, 1972; 130m
Mr. Hekmati, the new teacher in a school south of Tehran, is faced with disciplinary problems, and finally must expel one of his students. When the boy's sister 'Atefeh appears at the school to protest, a relationship begins to develop between her and the teacher. But complications are inevitable, as 'Atefeh is obligated to the local butcher, who has lent her family a house and hopes to marry her.
Monday, November 16: 2 and 6:40 pm

POSTMAN / POSTCHI
(1972; 110m, with German subtitles, simultaneous translation provided)
In this Venice Film Festival prize-winner, a good-natured fellow works to pay off his debts as a postman, a servant for a large property owner and a national lotto-player. Unfortunately impotent, he endures abuse from his beauteous wife and his co-workers--until his far-from-better-half starts an affair with his boss's nephew!
Monday, November 16: 4:30 and 9:10 pm

THE SCHOOL WE WENT TO /
MADRESEH-IE KE MIRAFTIM
(1980-89; 86m)
Kaveh Kamali goes to a school dominated by an authoritarian assistant principal who's more interested in money than education for kids. When the smalltime autocrat shuts down a play the kids want to put on, trouble ensues. With the encouragement of his literature instructor and an old librarian, Kaveh writes an article of protest for the school newspaper, which escalates the principal's outrage and cruelty.
Thursday, November 19: 4 pm

OK MISTER / OKEY MESTER
Parviz Kimiavi, 1978; 71m
In this hyperbolic comedy, a group of Westerners, travelling in a balloon, land in a remote Iranian village and try to Westernize the clueless villagers. In an apparent departure from the more serious tone of his previous films, director Kimaivi plays freely with elements of farce to create a scathing indictment of the consequences of forced modernization. OK MISTER's symbolism is insightful and sharp enough to shed light on the tortured postrevolutionary relations between Iran and the West. (The central character is played by Farrokh Ghaffari, a film historian and accomplished director of NIGHT OF THE HUNCHBACK, included in this series.)
With
BAMBOO FENCE, 1976; video, 42m:
Despite his father's objections, a young boy in a fishing village tries to keep a puppy. Wordless and flawless.
Thursday, November 19: 2 pm Thursday, November 26: 4 pm

THE MAY LADY /
BANOU-YE ORDIBEHESHT
Rakhshan Bani-Etemad, 1997; 95m
New York Premiere
In this fictional film diary, Iran's best-known female director (The Blue-Veiled) takes on another taboo, combatting the assumption that a "single" woman should remains forever celibate. Using voiceover narration, Bani-Etemad tells the story of Forough Kia*, a divorced documentary filmmaker, who refuses to surrender to her son's strong resistance to a new man in her life: "Why should the gift of motherhood deprive me of another gift--love?" Her hope is that life will imitate art, as she works to complete a documentary on the perfect mother. Critic Shahzad Rahmati writes that THE MAY LADY is "a film in praise of love...indubitably the best, the most perfect, and the most mature work of Rakhshan Bani-Etemad to date...." *Her name recalls Forough Farrokhzad, a gifted and brave Iranian poetess, who taught the women of her time--through her life and her poetry--to stand up for themselves as independent souls.
Friday, November 20: 2 and 6:15 pm
Saturday, November 21: 8:45 pm
Note: Immediately following the 6:15 pm, Friday, November 20th screening of THE MAY LADY, a panel discussion will be held on "Women and Film in Iran." Expected to appear on this panel, from Iran, are actresses Niki Karimi and Farima Farjami, director / screenwriter Tahmineh Milani, producer Fereshteh Taerpour, art director Malak Djahan Khazai and film editor Shirin Vahidi. The panel is presented in collaboration with Search for Common Ground.

THE CYCLE / DAYEREH MINA
(1978; 101m)
So powerful is the political metaphor that shapes Mehrjui's fifth film, THE CYCLE was kept from distribution for more than two years by the Shah's government. An innocent young man brings his sick father to the big city for medical treatment, only to slide slowly into corruption after becoming a dealer in one of Tehran's illicit blood-trafficking rings.
Saturday, November 21: 4 pm
Sunday, November 22: 4 and 8:45 pm

THE CUSTODIAN /
SARAY-DAR
Khosrow Haritash, 1976; 120m
Rhaman works as a custodian and attempts to ease the burdens of a large family by stealing from the company's safe. His pathetic, futile attempts to crack the safe are filmed by his son, an amateur filmmaker. When the film is broadcast on TV as a cinema vérité documentary, Rhaman loses his job, and his life begins to come apart at the seams.
Sat, Nov 21: 6 pm
Sun, Nov 22: 6 pm

THE TENANTS / EJAREH-NESHEENHA
(1992; 110m)
This barbed cinematic satire takes place in a claptrap apartment building in Tehran where the extremely unharmonious relations between landlords and tenants are meant to reflect larger national realities. As a nasty realtor works to evict the tenants from the disintegrating low-rise in order to sell it to German developers, the rentors band together and start repairing the wreck. "The ensuing slapstick," writes Rita Kemley in the Washington Post, "affords a mostly secular look at life in the Islamic republic....The actors, apparently disciples of Curly, Larry and Moe, give Westerners an altogether different view of the Iranian Everyman."
Monday, November 23: 4 and 8:15 pm

HAMOON
(1990; 130m)
"Masterly photography, precise editing, and a remarkable performance by Khosrow Shakibai in the leading role...." -- Houshang Golmakani, Cinemaya
Mehrjui describes HAMOON's "hero" as a "typical Iranian intellectual, caught in an emotional crisis...an embodiment of the collective consciousness of all those who are in crucial transition." During one day in the fraying life of Hamid Hamoon, we discover his much-loved wife is trying to divorce him, he can't quite come to any conclusions in his dissertation on the nature of love and faith, and neither flashbacks nor nightmares lend any clarity to his state of mind or soul. Hamoon is contemporary man, spindrift in a cultural whirlpool of art, religion, technology, his head a jumble of Old Testament stories, Kierkegaardian and Zen philosophy, folk wisdom, mysticism, abstract art, and more.
Wed, Nov 25: 2 and 6:30 pm
Thurs, Nov 26: 8:30 pm
Friday, November 20: 4 and 8:45 pm

THE MIRROR /
AYNEH
Jafar Panahi, 1997; 95m
New York Premiere
Just two years ago, Jafar Panahi enchanted international audiences with his remarkable debut film, The White Balloon. In that film, a little girl who dreamed of goldfish wended her way through city streets and a series of most enlightening encounters. THE MIRROR can be seen as Chapter Two in her odyssey, or perhaps Panahi's variation on a poetic theme. Here, a child (Mina Mohammad Khani) waits in vain for her mother to pick her up after school. Whether she tries to resolve the dilemma herself or asks for help from the adult world, this serious little girl confronts dead-ends. Finally, Mina has had it! Piers Handling of the Toronto International Film Festival writes: "How she rebels and who she rebels against is what turns this film into a masterpiece."
Wed, Nov 25: 4:30 and 9 pm;
Sun, Nov 29: 4:15 and 8:30 pm;
Mon, Nov 30: 4 and 8:15 pm

DASH AKOL
Mas'ud Kimia'i, 1971; 101m
Dash Akol is an honorable and highly respected man who has lost his family's wealth by helping his friends. He is also the executor of the estate of the late Haji Samad, whose daughter Marjan is the object of his secret love. When a suitor asks for her hand, however, Dash Akol considers it his duty to consent. Later, when he is attacked and mortally wounded, he confesses his love--via a most surprising medium.
Thursday, November 26: 2 and 6:30 pm

REQUIEM / MARSEYEH
Amir Naderi; 1978, on video; 107m
Training his camera on the lower strata of Iranian society, Naderi brings us the tough, realistic story of Nasrollah, an ex-convict. He returns to his mother's home in the slums of Tehran only to find that she has died. Nasrollah hits the streets looking for work, but finding none resumes his previous life as a street peddler. Temporarily finding a sense of community with two other peddlers, Nasrollah is left lonely and bitter by the death of one and departure of the other. (REQUIEM has no subtitles and little dialogue; simultaneous translation is provided. Anyone who viewed Amir Naderi's Water, Wind, Sand, screened in a previous Iranian program at the Walter Reade, will recall how powerfully this director visualizes his images.)
Sunday, November 29: 2 pm

THE WAITING
Amir Naderi, 1975; 50m
A teenage boy falls in love with the gentle hand of a girl offering him a bowl of ice water every day. The scorching heat of a provincial town reflects the burning obsession of the forlorn boy who lives an emotionally arid life with his aunt and her husband. The ritualistic mourning scene in the middle of this stunning featurette displays an early example of Naderi's sharp visual style and his keen sense of location. The film has virtually no dialogue. Amir Naderi's favorite film.
Sunday, November 29: 6:15 pm

STILL LIFE / TABI'AT-E BIJAAN
Sohrab Shahid Sales, 1974; 90m
An aging railworker, living a mononously quiet life with his wife, is asked to retire. The second of the two austere-looking, deliberately paced films Shaheed Saless made in Iran proved to be one of the turning points of Iranian cinema in the 70s.Winner of numerous prizes at the Berlin Film Festival in 1974, including the Silver Bear for Best Director, STILL LIFE examines the lot in life of an old man who guards a railroad crossing and his wife, who brings in a meager income weaving carpets. After 30 years in the same job, the man is forced into retirement by the arrival of the new guard. Finally, he is forced to a bleak epiphany of society's indifference to his fate.
Monday, November 30: 2 and 6:15 pm

A Tribute to Sohrab Shahid Saless (1944-1998)
A SPECIAL EVENT /
YEK ETEFAQ-E SADEH
Sohrab Shahid Saless, 1973; 86m
Mohammed, a 10-year-old boy, lives in a village at the edge of the Caspian Sea. His father, who fishes illegally, does not earn enough money to support his family and drinks away what little he makes. Mohammed's mother is gravely ill, but she still manages to take care of the household chores. At his militaristic school, Mohammed's situation is hopeless: he can't learn a thing in this depersonalized environment where every individual is a nobody. The special events in Mohammed's life include his mother's death, buying new clothes, and a visit from the school inspector. There is no exit for young Mohammed; he is destined to follow in his father's footsteps. Director Saless bravely details the familial, educational and social traps that break a free spirit who is destined to be a loser, boy and man.
Tues Dec 1: 4 and 8:15
Print courtesy of the National Film Archive of Iran

SARA (1994; 102m)
A powerful Iranian version of Ibsen's "A Doll's House": bank manager Hessam requires medical treatment in Switzerland and Sara must cover her husband's expenses from what he believes is her inheritance. In fact she has borrowed the money, and for years, she sneaks down to the basement nightly to create intricate embroidery, which she sells to repay her debt. Her marital happiness is destroyed when blackmail reveals the truth to intolerant Hessam. Giving a multi-layered performance as Sara, Niki Karimi shows a woman whose loving sacrifice results in a reappraisal of the significance of her life.
(1994; 102m)
Wed Dec 2: 2 and 6:15 pm
Thurs Dec 3: 4 pm