Crimson Gold
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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
"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
"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 Tehran. 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 Tehran'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
Tehran 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
On another delivery, he is welcomed into the opulent mansion
of a young man who has just returned to
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 (
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:
Richard Pena
Program Director
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
Dear Richard, I have no doubt you understand why I do not
wish to subject myself to a humiliating treatment upon arriving in
Respectfully,
Jafar Panahi
("Crimson Gold" is now available in DVD/Video and
highly recommended.)