cinema trust Mohammad Taghizadeh wrote in Etemad newspaper: Cinema is a popular art and its fans do not know geography, neither general nor specific, neither educated nor illiterate. Therefore, it is not out of place if the world’s attention is directed to cinema to such an extent that even political, historical and philosophical protocols and thoughts are expressed and narrated in the medium of cinema. But in the meantime, the position and standards of this medium should not be confused or misused.
Cinema is different from statements, slogans, and rhetoric, and the instrumental use of this medium, due to its wide reach and large audience, is not only incorrect, but will soon be rejected and become its opposite. Its recent examples can be seen and traced both in the organic and customized cinema of these years of Iranian cinema, as well as political and sometimes festival films. There are so many organ movies that, in the name of values and even religious and belief norms, turned against themselves and caused laughter and ridicule of the audience due to not observing the dramatic principles. In the meantime, many filmmakers, especially outside of Iran, started making works under the pretext of telling the truth and even revealing, which not only became history, but also their sloganeering and customized function were recognized and rejected by the audience very soon.
Daneh Anjir Maabed was screened at the 77th Cannes Film Festival and won a special prize from the jury of this festival. An award with this title was unprecedented, but due to the courage and artistic courage of the filmmaker in portraying the social situation of the Iranian society, it was appreciated and praised and received positive reviews. However, some clear and obvious flaws in the film caused a great distance between this film and the selected works of the Cannes Film Festival and even damaged the validity of this award and the festival to some extent. What are these basic and clear flaws that have damaged the dignity and quality of this film to such an extent?
1- Ropes and long and boring story
Even though we see 160 and 180-minute films being produced in today’s cinema, and this has become one of the global film norms, it goes without saying that the film itself, its story and atmosphere must also have the capacity of this time and dramatic tension. In Dane Anjir Abad, we see a kind of careless long-winded talk that discourages the general and special audience from continuing with the film. At the beginning, the film introduces the different characters of a family, from Sana and Rezvan (daughters) to Najmeh and Iman (husband and wife), but this introduction is somewhat drawn out and delays the milestones. After getting to know this family of 4 and their uninvited guest who is Rezvan’s friend, the film narrates the story of the riots of 1401 under the pretext of paying attention to the society and updating the atmosphere, and at once shows the viral videos of the police dealing with the people at that time. And somehow he forgets what the main goal and strategy of the film was and enters a quasi-documentary atmosphere as if the main goal of the filmmaker was to represent the events of 1401, but the technical and structural question is whether this representation should not be done with the background and so To determine its dramatic function? Is spending carelessly paying for a social movement that many people don’t have the ability or courage to pay for, count as value and privilege, and should the principles of cinema be taken into account? This is where the non-cinematic and political motives for the creators come into play, because the film won an award in a festival like Cannes despite many bugs and problems, and the suspicions of the acceptance of this film in the festival and the praise of the film are strengthened because of the political and not necessarily cinematic sequences.
The narrative path of the film does not end here and after 80 minutes of the film and showing and introducing the family and portraying contemporary Iranian society with or without excuses, the issue of missing the father’s gun becomes the key theme of the film, as if we are witnessing a new film that lasts 80 minutes. Its beginning will not have much impact on watching it. In other words, if we summarize the first 80 minutes of the movie by introducing the entire family and the urban and social atmosphere, the movie starts from the 80th minute and the father of the family’s gun, Iman, is lost!
From the 80th minute onwards, a new form of the long story of the movie “Dane Anjir Maabed” begins. After the loss of a personal weapon, the father faces the questioning of his colleague and is afraid of the legal and professional consequences of this incident, and everyone finds their sorrow. it puts This is where we witness the strange change of Iman’s character from a family-friendly, kind and calm father to a real monster who is ready to impose any pressure on his family and daughters because of the missing gun. I wish Rasoulov would have explained as a screenwriter. What happens and what individual or collective action occurs in Iman who is willing to hand over his daughters and wife to the interrogator, imprison them and in short do any brutality and aggression to get hold of the missing weapon. This is where the thematic and non-cinematic motives open up to the script and the type of action of Danh Anjir Maabad characters and its characterization is faced with ambiguity and problems.
2- A slogan-like and statement-like atmosphere
One of the serious harms of Rasoulof’s cinema in all his works is being stuck in extreme thematicism, which loses the ability to get out neither in the moment nor in the entirety of the work, as if for Rasoulof, cinema is not a means of entertainment and even having a message and theme, but It is a political tribune that tends to incorporate and express its political and social themes and beliefs in any way, the result is that even the general audience is fed up with this volume and low level of thematization and although it is possible with They are not satisfied with this naked and careless expression.
In Dane Anjir Abad, this thematization and making a statement of the film can be well traced both at the micro level and momentary dialogues and at the macro level and overall narrative and the main intention of the filmmaker. Consider the picture that is installed on the wall in Iman’s father’s house and is related to his family pilgrimage, under this excuse and in the most rhetorical way possible, the conflict between the old and the new generation and deep concepts such as faith (expressed as submission to God) which is supposed to show us some of the heart beliefs of Iman and Najmeh’s family. The tailor’s erotic conversations with the girls about the school coat are among the other dialogues that are supposed to show social anomalies in the worst possible way. This is where the filmmaker’s approach becomes not as a tool to reflect the society, but as a tool to show blackness in contemporary Iran. This approach has become such that some experts have introduced Rasoulov as a filmmaker not in confrontation with the Iranian government, but in criticizing and destroying the Iranian people!
Many times in the first half of the film, Sana and Rezvan criticize the dealings of the government and the national media with the people, and in the meantime, Najmeh, as the wife of one of the members of the Iranian regime, is supposed to support and cover up the government’s political actions and events. A look that is repeated many times by these three people, but it is not clear how at the end of the film, Najmeh faints in another direction with this ideological and supportive look and stands to face her husband, will there be a disturbance in Najmeh’s beliefs in the meantime? Whether or not he reveals his true self in the face of a monster named Iman, it is not clear!
On a larger level, this slogan-like and statement-like look can be recognized in different dimensions, for example, the nature of the political events in the first half of the film is not clear, and we witness the complete oblivion of these events in the second half of the film, after the issue of missing weapons, until this suspicion It should appear to the audience that Rasoulov has sewn a suit for buttons, because the theme and idea are everything to him and he tells stories for it, while the principles of photo dramatization are this rule and he emphasizes that the theme, message and content of the disturbance Narration and transfer from the lower layers of the story to the audience.
3- Symbolisms and metaphors of the filmmaker
A significant part of the atmosphere of Rasoulof’s films and especially the film Dane Anjir Maabd is related to symbolism and metaphorical atmosphere. Ironically, this arrangement of the filmmaker is liked by many fans of the film and they call it one of its artistic and literary advantages, and on the one hand it has become a credit for the film, but what is clear is how dramatic the function of this symbolism is. and to what extent has it been able to help in better understanding and sustainability?
The gun is the first tool and one of the most symbolic elements of the film, which causes many changes in the characters and the direction of the drama. Iman, as the father of the family, got a job promotion by taking a gun, and its loss is considered the beginning of his troubles, but the symbolic part of the story is related to the confrontation of the family in the second half, where the women of the film confront the father of the family, and a kind of metaphorical view about Women’s protests, women’s movement, life, freedom and the destruction of the father of the family as a symbol of sovereignty. The chases in the final part of the film are also largely reminiscent of the chases related to the 1401 riots, and Sana’s success and confrontation as the youngest member of the female family in the story, refers to the success of the young generation of Iranian women known as anti.
The names of the characters in Dane Anjir Maabed are another metaphorical part of the film: Iman, Najmeh, Rezvan and Sana are all Arabic names and in some way religious and traditional. Sana means praise, while the outburst at the end of the film was done by this character. Rezvan, in the Persian translation of Behesht, is a character whose family’s hell and the confrontation of the members becomes possible with the arrival of his friend, and Najmeh, as one of the most religious names in the film, which is the name of the mother of one of the imams and means star, initially has a star-like role for faith, and in In the end, he gets up to face him. Iman is the name of the father of the family, whose philosophical meaning is clearly expressed in a part of the film from the language of one of the characters: confirmation and belief of the heart. The character of Iman, contrary to his name, becomes an aggressive, wild and unreliable person who is not only a safe and secure place for the family, but also alarming and annoying to the point where it can be concluded that the names of the characters are in a way opposite to their meaning in the film. they find
However, there are many questions regarding the motivations and actions of the characters, which definitely makes one leg of the film’s characterization lame and somehow loose. For example, until the end of the film, a very simple but important question remains, why did Sana use her father’s gun? What was his motivation for doing this? Was the filmmaker’s desire to prolong the drama and show the next events necessary for this action, or did Sana give an explanation somewhere in the film or a motivation from Dochterjovan about this important, but unprovoked action?
The presence of women without hijab and showing pictures of the husband and wife’s bed and the bathroom, which is always mentioned as one of the red lines of Iranian cinema and even one of the reasons for the failure of family dramas, has been shown many times in this film, and even in this representation, there is a kind of exaggeration. because there were more than 10 scenes related to bed, bath and face touching and shaving of a man’s head by a woman, which did not have a special dramatic function and is only a kind of no to the censorship system and apparent restrictions in Iranian cinema. Nevertheless, the performance of the film’s acting group in different parts of the film is unbelievable, the highlight of which is the ups and downs and effective performance of Soheila Golestani as the mother of the family and the character of Najmeh. Mehsa Rostami in the role of Rezvan and Setara Maleki in the role of Sana also had good performances and it seems that they were able to get a passing grade in their initial experiences. It seems that some doubts about the character of these people are related to the incomplete characterization in the script, and the actors and their management have done their job well.