The Politics Of Iranian Cinema

Iran has undergone considerable social upheaval since the revolution and this has been reflected in its cinema. Drawing on first-hand interviews and detailed ethnographic research, this book explores how cinema is engaged in the dynamics of social change in contemporary Iran. The author not only discusses the practices of regulation and reception of films from major award winning directors but also important mainstream filmmakers such as Hatamikia and Tabizi. Contributing to ethnographic accounts of Iranian governance in the field of culture, the book reveals the complex behind-the-scenes negotiations between filmmakers and the authorities which constitute a major part of the workings of film censorship. The author traces the relationship of Iranian cinema to recent social/political movements in Iran, namely reformism and women’s movement, and shows how international acclaim has been instrumental in filmmakers’ engagement with matters of political importance in Iran. This book will be a valuable tool for courses on film and media studies, and will provide a significant insight into Iranian cultural politics for students of cultural studies and anthropology, Middle Eastern and Iranian studies.

Iran has undergone considerable social upheaval since the revolution and this has been reflected in its cinema. Drawing on first-hand interviews and detailed ethnographic research, this book explores how cinema is engaged in the dynamics of social change in contemporary Iran. The author not only discusses the practices of regulation and reception of films from major award winning directors but also important mainstream filmmakers such as Hatamikia and Tabizi. Contributing to ethnographic accounts of Iranian governance in the field of culture, the book reveals the complex behind-the-scenes negotiations between filmmakers and the authorities which constitute a major part of the workings of film censorship. The author traces the relationship of Iranian cinema to recent social/political movements in Iran, namely reformism and women’s movement, and shows how international acclaim has been instrumental in filmmakers’ engagement with matters of political importance in Iran. This book will be a valuable tool for courses on film and media studies, and will provide a significant insight into Iranian cultural politics for students of cultural studies and anthropology, Middle Eastern and Iranian studies.

Recent, post-revolutionary Iranian cinema has of course gained the attention of international audiences who have been struck by its powerful, poetic and often explicitly political explorations. Yet mainstream, pre-revolutionary Iranian cinema, with a history stretching back to the early twentieth century, has been perceived in the main as lacking in artistic merit and, crucially, as apolitical in content. This highly readable history of Iran as revealed through the full breadth of its cinema re-reads the films themselves to tell the full story of shifting political, economic and social situations. Sadr argues that embedded within even the seemingly least noteworthy of mainstream Iranian films, we find themes and characterisations which reveal the political contexts of their time and which express the ideological underpinnings of a society. Beginning with the introduction of cinema to Iran through the Iranian monarchy, the book covers the broad spectrum of Iran's cinema, offering vivid descriptions of all key films. "Iranian Cinema" looks at recurring themes and tropes, such as the rural versus the 'corrupt' city and, recently, the preponderance of images of childhood, and asks what these have revealed about Iranian society. The author brings the story up to date explaining Iranian filmmaking after the events of September 11, from Mohsen Makhmalbaf's astonishing Kandahar to Saddiq Barmak's angry work Osama, to explore this most recent and breathtaking revival in Iranian cinema.

It is nearly impossible to separate contemporary Iranian cinema from the Islamic revolution that transformed film production in the country in the late 1970s. As the aims of the revolution shifted and hardened once Khomeini took power and as an eight-year war with Iraq dragged on, Iranian filmmakers confronted new restrictions. In the 1990s, however, the Reformist Movement, led by Mohammad Khatami, and the film industry, developed an unlikely partnership that moved audiences away from revolutionary ideas and toward a discourse of reform. In Reform Cinema in Iran, Blake Atwood examines how new industrial and aesthetic practices created a distinct cultural and political style in Iranian film between 1989 and 2007. Atwood analyzes a range of popular, art, and documentary films. He provides new readings of internationally recognized films such as Abbas Kiarostami's Taste of Cherry (1997) and Mohsen Makhmalbaf's Time for Love (1990), as well as those by Rakhshan Bani, Masud Kiami, and other key Iranian directors. At the same time, he also considers how filmmakers and the film industry were affected by larger political and religious trends that took shape during Mohammad Khatami's presidency (1997-2005). Atwood analyzes political speeches, religious sermons, and newspaper editorials and pays close attention to technological developments, particularly the rise of video, to determine their role in democratizing filmmaking and realizing the goals of political reform. He concludes with a look at the legacy of reform cinema, including films produced under Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, whose neoconservative discourse rejected the policies of reform that preceded him.

Iranian films have been the subject of much critical and scholarly attention over the past several decades, and Iranian filmmakers are mainstays of international film festivals. Yet most of the attention has been focused on a small segment of Iranian film production: auteurist art cinema. Iranian Cinema in a Global Context, on the other hand, takes account of the wide range of Iranian cinema, from popular youth films to low budget underground films. The volume also reassesses the global circulation of Iranian art cinema, looking at its reception at international festivals, in university curricula, and at the Academy Awards. A final theme of the volume explores the intersection between politics and film, with essays on post-Khatami reform influences, representations of ineffective drug policies, and the representation of Jewish characters in Iranian film. Taken together, the essays in this volume present a new definition of the field of Iranian film studies, one that engages global media flows, transmedia interaction, and a heterogeneous Iranian national cinema.

This book examines transformations in the production and domestic and international reception of Iranian cinema between 2000 and 2013 through the intersection of the political markers – the presidential terms of Reformist president Mohammad Khatami and his successor, the conservative Mahmoud Ahmadinejad – and filmic markers, particularly Jafar Panahi’s The Circle (2000) and Asghar Farhadi’s About Elly (2009). Through extensive field and media research, the book considers the interaction of a range of factors including government policy, Iranian national cinema genres and categories, intended audience, funding source, and domestic and international reception, to demonstrate the interplay between filmmakers and the government over these two successive presidencies. While the impact of politics on Iranian filmmaking has been widely examined, this work argues for a more nuanced understanding of politics in and of the Iranian cinema than has generally been previously acknowledged. Drawing on both personal experience as a juror at the Fajr International Film festival and interviews with significant filmmakers, producers, actors and other industry insiders, including senior bureaucrats and politicians, the volume is a key resource for anyone interested in politics and Iranian cinema.

Iranian films have been the subject of much critical and scholarly attention over the past several decades, and Iranian filmmakers are mainstays of international film festivals. Yet most of the attention has been focused on a small segment of Iranian film production: auteurist art cinema. Iranian Cinema in a Global Context, on the other hand, takes account of the wide range of Iranian cinema, from popular youth films to low budget underground films. The volume also reassesses the global circulation of Iranian art cinema, looking at its reception at international festivals, in university curricula, and at the Academy Awards. A final theme of the volume explores the intersection between politics and film, with essays on post-Khatami reform influences, representations of ineffective drug policies, and the representation of Jewish characters in Iranian film. Taken together, the essays in this volume present a new definition of the field of Iranian film studies, one that engages global media flows, transmedia interaction, and a heterogeneous Iranian national cinema.

An academically acclaimed and globally celebrated cultural critic, Hamid Dabashi is the Hagop Kevorkian Professor of Iranian Studies and Comparative Literature at Columbia University. He is the author of a number of highly acclaimed books and articles on Iran, Islam, comparative literature, world cinema, and the philosophy of art, among them Close Up: Iranian Cinema, Past, Present, Future; Dreams of a Nation: On Palestinian Cinema (editor), Iran: A People Interrupted, and Iran without Borders: Towards a Critique of the Postcolonial Nation. He lives with his family in New York City.