Jafar Panahi, still in the viewfinder of the Iranian authorities, continues yet, armed with only courage to tell the reality of his country. His new film “Taxi Tehran” (Golden Bear last Berlin festival) on Wednesday in theaters, is a wonder where the intensity of critical equaled the devastating humor and intelligence the staging.
Since 2010 and his imprisonment following the demonstrations that followed the re-election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Jafar Panahi was sentenced to no longer make films, not to give interviews to the foreign press and not to leave the country. Under penalty of twenty years ‘imprisonment for each offense.
Supported by the international community of film and thereby benefiting from a relative media, the director, with the means at hand, n’ has not waived his job and secretly made films that provide information about his fate, and especially that of Iranian society.
Turn on the street
After “This n is not a film “in 2011, fully staged in the apartment where he was recorded, and” Closed Curtain “(unpublished in France),” Taxi Tehran “is the third film shot and interpreted by Jafar Panahi since his ban of exercise. And the first he realizes outdoor since 2010.
“Taxi Tehran,” Panahi, lead actor of his film pretends to have recycled taxi driver and his hosts several vehicle Customer: DVD seller, a lawyer, a teacher, a wounded man and his girlfriend, two old ladies … A kind of sample of the population of Tehran, which, in the car, away from eavesdroppers evokes daily life in Iran, without taboos.
Most customers recognize the filmmaker and are surprised to see this new business practice. Surprisingly pretends, for “Taxi Tehran” – no suspense – is in no way a documentary from life but a “docudrama” where every scene makes sense, even if the filmmaker never departed from his humor and its irony.
The art of discretion
In one of the most powerful scenes in the film, Panahi abandons its customers and joined his niece at the exit of his school. The latter, the hardened character says the filmmaker she has to work on a script as part of school activities. And script must of course comply with a set of specifications. Doxas absolute respect for Islamic and forbidden to indulge in “black realism” (sic)
During the time of the dialogue between the girl and filmmaker, the camera lingers out of the cab and in the depth of field, reveals a kid who dig in trash, and then steals money to a young married couple. A “black realism” to the tune of children in some way. And demonstrating by example that if censorship can ban “show”, it does not prevent the actual living life, far from the versions and official images.
To make this film every way extraordinary, Jafar Panahi, forced and coerced, had to ensure never be spotted. With its small camera hidden in the recesses of his car, the filmmaker paced fortnight Tehran discreetly, accompanied only by a few close, actors and technicians, taking care not to give clues on the fact that was running.
The result is a wonderfully inventive and insolence. A film which Panahi call on his countrymen (including lawyer and human rights Nasrin Sotoudeh, also prohibited from practicing his profession since 2011), evokes his creator threatened status (the end of the film is chilling in this regard), and cites his previous fictions, all engaged with the reality of a country that is no gift to his freedom-loving artists.
An old story
Jafar Panahi knows whereof he speaks. Since its inception, there twenty years, he has always had trouble with censorship. And his constant interest in the plight of women in Iran (appearance again essential in “Taxi Tehran”) is not there for nothing.
“The White Balloon”, his first film 1995 price of gold camera at Cannes, the filmmaker was tracking a kid (a kind of big sister’s little girl “Taxi Tehran”) who wanted to buy a goldfish, but lost the ticket bank needed his acquisition. Result: a fable about the obstinacy praised the courage of women in a favorable context nothing in their development. Iranian censorship are then saw the fire. This would not last
“The Circle” in 2001, Jafar Panahi, a maternity in a prison cell, filming Iranian confronted with banned. Prostitute, a single mother , pregnant girl who seeks an abortion … The filmmaker, freedom of movement at the time, evoked this hot film, censorship had initially refused the scenario. He explained:
“After nine months of standoff with authorities, we finally gave me permission to film. I started shooting immediately realized the parallel each night. Two days after the end of filming, I had completed assembly. I worked in the emergency because I knew it was possible for someone to come any time to stop the film. “
Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival,” The Circle “will never emerge in Iranian cinema and the official press reproach Jafar Panahi (among others) have tight the hand of a woman at the time of receiving the prize.
Litany of censorship
“Offside” in 2006 (Silver Bear at the Berlin Festival ), Panahi aggravates his “case” following closer teenage football fan who, disguised as a boy is trying to break into a stage where the Iranian team plays a crucial match to qualify for the Cup of the world. Result: a pro-feminist rant in the local context. And a film banned from broadcasting in Iran, it is obvious alas.
Nine years later, the filmmaker, faced significant challenges body and soul, has lost none of his talent, one of the most valuable in contemporary cinema. He proves it in this “Taxi Tehran” astounding audacity. At the final hour, no generic, but a short text Panahi:
“The Ministry of Islamic Guidance valid generic distributable movies. To my regret, this film does not so generic. I express my gratitude to all those who supported me. Without their valuable contributions, this film would not have emerged. “
With the fame of its author and award won in Berlin,” Taxi Tehran “will be out in cinemas in more than thirty countries. Jafar Panahi, he still lives under threat in Iran.
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