Cinema Review

Riveting portrayal of Iranian society – Panahi’s Crimson Gold

By

Bhawani Cheerath Rajagopalan

When two well known Iranian filmmakers come together the result is a portrayal of reality in a very measured, discreet manner. Jafar Panahi as the film’s director and Abbas Kiarostami as scenarist have unspooled for us a facet of Iranian life which one would not have given thought to, because the geography is more talked about for its fundamentalism, bigoted leadership, and isolation from the world’s political proscenium.

A film made in 2003, it was screened by a film society which had a day long festival with the theme, ‘Films that were banned by governments’. Yol the Turkish film by Yilmaz Guney, The Hidden Half by Tahmineh Milani, the woman filmmaker from Iran, and of course,  Panahi’s Crimson Gold  were chosen thus.

Iranian films have been made under the most trying circumstances. But the land has produced brilliant directors, both men and women. The narrative style adopted by most of them is unusual, but the stories they tell are of human plight.   

Crimson Gold was not released in Iran because it was considered ‘dark’. The ‘dark’ was all about the human condition. It is a jewellery shop heist that kick-starts the film. The attacker shoots himself too. Then it’s time to retrace the events that had led up to this point.

Hussein works for a pizza delivery counter. His encounters with the points of delivery are eye openers to a society where the chasm is growing between the very rich and the poor. A large number of the middle class had fled the country in the aftermath of the Revolution.

The pizza delivery man is also a war veteran. He is bulky, has a dull expression and there is reference to his medication which is taking its toll on his health. Betrothed to fellow delivery boy Ali’s sister Hussein visits the jewellery shop one day, only to be shown the door and directed to the less classy downtown shops.

It is on Hussein’s delivery trips that we get glimpses of the contemporary Iran. The restrictions on the freedom of movement of young men and women, the shortages in the country, and the opulence that exists alongside the privations faced by many citizens, we learn of this from the interactions Hussein has on his errands.

A candid and glaring statement is made by the young man who orders pizzas for his girlfriend. She with her friend has left the premises before the pizzas arrive. So the host does the next best thing; he asks Hussein to share the pizza. Like a soliloquy the man narrates his life’s graph and the futility of living in Iran. He was a child when the family migrated to the West. His parents wanted him to return to the homeland and he too desired to be back. But, he returns to a land where he feels like an alien, cut off from the mainstream and stifled by the ostentatious life gifted to him.

Hussein is asked to enjoy the comforts. He wanders in and out of large spaces, each nook talking money and enjoys a dip in the pool.  The disparity is there for

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