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3 Faces
***
Dir: Jafar Panahi
Starring: Behnaz Jafari, Jafar Panahi, Marziyeh Rezaei (as selves)
(Iran, 15, 1hr 40mins)
Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi uses identity as a tool for exploration in 3 Faces, where all three faces – play themselves. Working with Behnaz Jafari – a fellow filmmaker – Panahi finds himself consoling her when as she receives a plea video from a young girl. The girl says she was lied to, tricked into a marriage and told she could have anything or do as she pleases. Now, it seems she’s suicidal. Distraught, Behnaz spends the entire first half of the film looking for evidence of whether the tape was real or fake. It’s a very long first half of the film.
Having picked up the Best Screenplay last year at Cannes, 3 Faces raises questions about the equality and treatment of women in Iran.
Panahi’s first film, The White Balloon, premiered in 1995 and won the Camera d’Or at Cannes. As Panahi’s work attempts to accurately reflect everyday life in Iran, only his first film has a license for screening in the country – the rest are banned. Following his arrest after the 2009 protests of the re-election of Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, Panahi was sentenced to a 20-year ban on filmmaking, screenwriting and travelling outside of the country. Hence, 3 Faces was made without authorisation; the film itself is an act of political resistance.
While awaiting the result of his appeal, Panahi made This is Not a Film in 2011, smuggled out of Iran and into Cannes Film Festival inside a cake. Being an already-acclaimed filmmaker, Panahi has long enjoyed support from democratic and human rights organisations around the world, more so arguably than many less high-profile cultural activists in Iran, but perhaps the mood is changing. Whereas his previous film, Taxi Tehran (2015) had no names in the credits so that its participants would remain anonymous, here near-enough everybody is listed. Panahi’s work is a striking case of political work and the results of which demonstrate the power this has.
There are a lot of dialogue-free long shots with sunlight beaming and winking into the car and camera. Panahi and Jafari arrive at a village and both are recognised, with people wanting autographs, but when they ask about the missing girl, the audience disperses, disheartened. Loyalties are fickle, and people seem to be upset by seemingly small but politically-charged occurrences in everyday life such as the change from Persian to Turkic language. There is much emotion in the upcoming scenes but again, the comedown from the climax feels a little like the holding of breath. A mood that is present throughout the whole film. It’s intentional but at times rises above what’s intended and makes for self-conscious work at times. The meta-ness of actors playing themselves doesn’t quite come off and at times lapses into…documentary?…experimental? It doesn’t quite find a home.
The difference of old-Iran versus new-Iran are brought to light moreover when Behnaz has a discussion with a local about the alleged fateful power of what is done with the foreskin of a young boy – if it is buried in a prison – he will become a criminal – a university courtyard – he will become a doctor or a lawyer. Is this all it takes to secure a fate? She laughs. But the tension between ideologies is present; the emotional remains of the revolution. The film raises critical cultural and timely questions in the digitally-sodden era we find ourselves in, in dealing with political issues. How does she react to his ideology – in comparison to how those around her have reacted hers? How do we bridge the divide?
words RUTH SEAVERS
Out now in cinemas. At Chapter from 30 April