Fassloh padjom
Iran / France,
1997, 80 min
Shown in 1998
CREDITS
- dir
-
Rafi Pitts
- prod
-
Sophie Goupil
- scr
-
Bahram Beyzaie
- cam
-
Nemat Haghighi
- editor
-
Hassan Hassandoost
- cast
-
Roya Nonahali, Ali Sarkhani, Parviz Poorhosseni, Ghorban Nadjafi, Golab Adineh
- source
-
Celluloid Dreams, 24, rue Lomartine, 75009 Paris, France. FAX: 33-1-49-70-03-71. EMAIL: celluloid@i-t.FR
- premiere
-
U.S. Premiere
-
COMMENTS
Eligible for the Skyy Prize. Screened with The Birth of Light.
OTHER
From the opening shot of a young boy running across the Iranian desert to the final shot, which echoes the same motif, Season Five is a masterpiece of understatement and subtlety. Working with an economy of images and a surprisingly light tone, director Rafi Pitts spins out a compelling and affecting tale of a village divided by a bitter feud. When Karamat insults Mehrbanou on their wedding day by refusing to pay for her dowry, he reignites a long-standing conflict between the two families. And when Mehrbanou’s beloved father dies from the shock of the affront, turning the wedding into a funeral, Mehrbanou vows to seek revenge. But when her brother and Karamat fan the flames, encouraging the feud by offering competing transport services to the city, it threatens to destroy the village. As the emotional center of the film, Mehrbanou embodies the pride, grief and fierce self-sufficiency that sustains the entire village; actress Roya Nonahali’s extraordinary face, in melting closeups, shines with raw emotion. Pitts displays a true gift for capturing emotion in all his actors, and deftly portrays feelings among the villagers with a minimum of dialogue. The result is a visually stunning, lyrical and haunting film.
—Jennie Yabroff
FACTOID #336
Bing Crosby was invited several times for an onstage tribute at the Festival, reports then-director Claude Jarman, but declined the honor. “Nobody wants to see those little things that I used to do,” he modestly replied. He did attend though, with wife Kathy and their friend, Rita Hayworth.
