[Marxism] Crimson Gold

[Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxx>]

Although Iranian films have a reputation--perhaps undeserved--for the 
kind of wistful detachment found in Ingmar Bergman, "Crimson Gold" is an 
unflinching look at the stark class divisions that mark contemporary 
Iran. It owes a lot to Italian neo-realism and also suggests why 
frustrations with the status quo have erupted into well-publicized 
street demonstrations.

"Crimson Gold" is directed by Jafar Panahi, who also directed the very 
fine "White Balloon" in 1995. "White Balloon" is a more typical Iranian 
film, focused on the efforts of a seven year old girl to track down an 
exceptionally plump goldfish for a New Year's Day celebration. Both 
"Crimson Gold" and "White Balloon" were written by Abbas Kiarostami, who 
also directs his own films. Since Kiarostami's reputation is based on 
films with a private vision, I was surprised to see such a biting 
criticism of class inequality in Iran today.

"Crimson Gold" tells the story of Hussein (Hussein Emadeddin), a 
lumbering, overweight and impassive man in his 30s who delivers pizzas 
on a motorcycle in Teheran. He is a veteran of the Iran-Iraq war and has 
a medical condition--presumably war-related--that requires him to take 
cortisone, which accounts for the weight gain. He lives in a grimy 
one-room flat and seems to take pleasure in nothing, not even in the 
prospective marriage to the attractive sister of his best friend Ali 
(Kamyar Sheisi), a fellow pizza deliverer.

Ali is also a petty thief who has talked Hussein into being his getaway 
driver. In the opening scene, they sit in a tea shop going through the 
contents of a stolen purse. When they discover a receipt for a valuable 
bracelet, they go to the jewelry store along with Hussein's fiancée with 
divergent motives. Ali is interested in casing it for a future robbery, 
while Hussein is more interested in buying a necklace for his future 
bride. In their shabby clothes, Hussein and his companions are treated 
as riffraff by the jewelry shop owner who invites them to go shop in 
Teheran's slums. The rebuff is so upsetting to Hussein that he collapses 
into a cold sweat outside the store.

Although Hussein never articulates his feelings, we can see Teheran 
through his sorrowful eyes. One night on his way to a pizza delivery, he 
is accosted by cops and soldiers at the front door, who tell him to wait 
there until their operation is finished. They are lying in wait for 
affluent people going to a party on the third floor where alcohol is 
being served and where unmarried couples are dancing. This is against 
the law in the Islamic republic. The cops have no regard for Hussein, 
who will not be paid and who will have to wait until the early hours of 
the morning to leave the scene. He strikes up a conversation with a 
fifteen year old soldier from the countryside who has lied about his age 
in order to find a job in the army. The entire scene is a paradigm of 
the brutal class realities of contemporary Iran and practically a cry 
for sweeping change.

On another delivery, he is welcomed into the opulent mansion of a young 
man who has just returned to Iran because of homesickness. Now that he 
has returned to live with his mother and father, he can only complain 
that "everybody is a lunatic" in Iran. As the young man paces around his 
mansion trying to cajole a woman to come spend the night with him, 
Hussein wanders about the rooms in what we understand to be astonishment 
at the extravagant life-style.

The accumulated injuries of class finally drive him to join Ali in a 
abortive robbery on the jewelry store they had visited earlier. Panahi 
and Kiarostami are really not interested in a crime story, however. The 
scene not only takes place in less than a minute, it is foreshadowed at 
the beginning of the film so that when it happens, you are not really 
surprised.

Panahi told the Guardian (9/2/2003): "Take any human being and you find 
that his situation is a direct result of his family, his education, his 
economic position." "Crimson Gold" has been banned for obvious reasons 
in Iran.

In one of the more daring casting choices in the history of film, Panahi 
cast a real-life pizza delivery-man who suffers from schizophrenia in 
the role of Hussein. This gives the character's brooding inwardness a 
reality that might have been difficult for another actor to achieve. 
Panahi said, "We knew he was a schizophrenic in advance, so we knew he 
would be difficult to work with. But I had no idea that it was going to 
be that difficult. On several occasions I was tempted to stop shooting 
and simply abandon the entire project."

Panahi has not only run into trouble with the Iranian authorities. He 
has become part of the legion of artists and writers who have run afoul 
of stringent travel codes set up by the INS in the wake of 9/11. Last 
year he refused to attend the New York Film Festival because the new 
security requirement of fingerprinting Iranian nationals offended him. 
This is the letter he wrote to Richard Peña, the festival's director:

August 5, 2003
Richard Pena
Program Director
New York Film Festival


Dear Richard:

I must thank you for selecting my film, Crimson Gold, for the 
prestigious New York Film Festival, and for all your tremendous efforts 
over the last decade to introduce Iranian cinema to American people. But 
I must apologize for not being able to attend the festival due to the 
fingerprinting requirement for Iranian nationals.

We live in strange times. It’s not just George Bush who subscribes to 
the idea that you are either with us or against us. In my country, too, 
anyone slightly crossing any red lines is subject to the suspicion of 
the censors who label him as being alienated, self-loathing, mercenary, 
infiltrator, enemy agent, and even heretic. Here, they interrogate me 
because I am a socially conscious filmmaker. In America, they 
fingerprint me, and literally shackle me to kill my national pride, 
because I am an Iranian filmmaker. This is the kind of purgatory I, and 
many others like me, find ourselves in.

Dear Richard, I have no doubt you understand why I do not wish to 
subject myself to a humiliating treatment upon arriving in America. I am 
sure you understand why I refuse to compromise my beliefs, as a 
filmmaker and a human being, anywhere inside or outside of Iran.

Respectfully,

Jafar Panahi
Tehran

("Crimson Gold" is now available in DVD/Video and highly recommended.)

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