UPDATED: Jafar Panahi, the award-winning filmmaker (“The White Balloon,” “Crimson Gold,” “The Circle”) has been imprisoned for over a week now, and it’s time for the international and American film community to start to put on the pressure for his release. An online petition, for what it’s worth, is currently available for all to sign. Panahi is not the only cinema artist who has been detained, Mahmoud Rasoulof (“Iron Island”) has also been taken under arrest, without specific charges.
Over the years, I’ve had the chance to talk to Panahi and other Iranian filmmakers about the tricky business of navigating cinematic social protest under the Islamic Republic. (Here is a link to my most recent interview with Panahi in the Los Angeles Times.) It’s nothing unusual for Iranian filmmakers to be detained, harassed and banned from Iranian’s official film business (many have left the country, altogether, of course), but because of the increased pressures of last year’s protests, I, for one, am a little more nervous for Panahi’s well-being.
Fortunately, Abbas Kiarostami has now come forward with a letter asking for Panahi’s release. According to this New York Times blog, in an open letter published in a Tehran newspaper, Kiarostami wrote, “I wish for their immediate release from prison knowing that the impossible is possible. My heartfelt wish is that artists no longer be imprisoned in this country because of their art and that the independent and young Iranian cinema no longer faces obstacles, lack of support, attention and prejudice.”
Panahi knows he’s no friend of the regime, but because of his international recognition, there is the hope that he can keep working. As he told me once, “My movies are about limitations and restrictions, and these are restrictions that I’ve personally experienced.” But that hasn’t stopped him.
“Censorship has always existed in Iranian cinema,” Panahi said. “It’s a credit to the cleverness of the Iranian filmmakers, both before and after the revolution, that they still make their own movies.”
“I am a socially committed filmmaker, and I cannot be indifferent to what is happening around me,” he added.
The European Film Academy is encouraging its members to join a protest for Panahi’s release by sending personal letters to their respective Iranian embassies to express their condemnation of the filmmaker’s arrest.
I would hope American filmmakers would do the same.
I don’t care who wins an Oscar. I don’t really like any of the films, particularly in the best picture category—with the exception of “A Serious Man,” how can anyone take this thing seriously, with films like “Precious” and “The Blind Side” in the running for top awards. To consider which one of these is better, or “The Hurt Locker” vs “Avatar,” is to give validation where little is deserved. It’s like saying who is better: Bill O’Reilly or Glenn Beck? Going down this year’s nominees list, it strikes me how few of the major nominees are actually great films. Maybe if “The Messenger,” “A Serious Man,” “The Fantastic Mr. Fox,” or “The White Ribbon” had been major contenders, I would be paying attention on Oscar night. But they’re bit players in a Hollywood extravaganza that has long abandoned the art of cinema.
I know there are plenty of people out there like me, who give little credence to the Oscars as a value of quality. But everywhere you look—even “The New Yorker” cover depicted an Oscar theme—the Hollywood awards have dominated entertainment coverage. This time of year, it’s so damningly apparent how much editorial content is driven by advertising dollars it kind of sickens me. Can’t we just stop the fawning, prognosticating and kissing-ass, and focus on something else? I can’t wait until next week so we can change the conversation: Did you know Bradley Rust Gray’s “The Exploding Girl” opens next Friday?
What do filmmakers have to gain from the Tribeca Film Festival’s recent move into distribution. Sure, now, there’s another much needed distributor in town, but what sort of deals are filmmakers receiving? I assume the deal structures will be similar to IFC, with paltry advances that many producers continue to complain about, and slow overage payments that often get eaten up by things like digital distribution fees and other marketing costs. Like every other big announcement that’s ever come out of a new industry player, the devil is in the details. And we’ll have to wait and see, when all is said and done, who is being empowered: The Tribeca machine or the filmmakers they aim to support?
The political debate circling “The Hurt Locker” is intensifying with an Oscar victory in sight. But I’d like to point out—tooting my own horn—that I tried to advance this particularly controversy back when the film premiered in 2008. In my blog post “Explosions and Xenophobia” from September 15, 2008, I addressed what I felt was the pure entertainment value of the film, using a superficial depiction of the horrors of battle to essentially give its audience a testosterone-fueled thrill-ride.
In recent weeks, bloggers such as IFC’s Vadim Rizov (“How Kathryn Bigelow’s non-political movie has gotten politicized”) and Chuck Tryon (Reality Effects: Politicizing “The Hurt Locker”) have weighed in with more thorough and divergent arguments on the subject. But I wanted to take this opportunity to highlight some of the comments that have come in since I reprised my post in December 14, 2009—particularly those coming from veterans, some of whom hate the film, others who love it.
I suspect military blogs are all over the film, but it’s interesting and instructive to see these comments on an indieWIRE blog.
One commenter, who identifies himself as “in the military,” writes: “Onboard our ship anyone who was been IA (deployed to the middle east, Individual Augmentee) refuses to watch the movie because its nowhere near what happens there to the point of finding it offensively stupid. Today I saw that it was nominated for best picture and started laughing. I seriously thought this was a borderline B movie when I watched it.”
On the other side, another poster, who calls himself “Sgt. Mack,” writes: “You’ve never been to Iraq or look like you’ve even touched a gun, but take it from someone who’s been there and done that, when a fucking 15 year old points an AK 47 at your head, then wherever you go, EVERYONE is suspect….Get over your ignorance, you obviously have no idea what you’re talking about, and furthermore, who says that a war film can’t be anything BUT a suspenseful thrill ride?”
From the lowest budget productions to James Cameron’s costly, ambitious blockbuster “Avatar,” it’s a surprise that any of this year’s leading Oscar nominees were ever made in the first place. Indeed, Hollywood perennially overlooks its eventual Oscar contenders on their way to fruition; Danny Boyle’s “Slumdog Millionaire” and Bennett Miller’s “Capote” were cast out by their original distribs’ parent companies, and how many of Hollywood’s most celebrated directors—Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Scorsese, Sidney Lumet—have faced resistance on subsequent projects after earning honors from that very same establishment?
With studios relying ever more on familiar commodities, specialized divisions seen as a drag on resources and the dogged persistence of the economic slump, “executionally dependent” films have increasingly become Hollywood’s neglected stepchildren—eventually dressed up nice and paraded out only during award season. As one director told me, “No one wants to take a risk. Unless you’re extremely brave or extremely wealthy, it’s very hard not to think seriously about making a safer choice and doing something more commercial.”
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