The Silver Bullet
08-10-04, 07:09 AM
Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi's masterpiece, Crimson Gold (2003), is far and away one of last year's very best pictures. Engaging where another jewel of Iranian cinema, Abbas Kiarostami's Taste of Cherry (1997), is occasionally tedious, Crimson Gold follows a very similar structure to the latter picture [not surprising given that Kiarostami wrote the screenplay] in which an isolated and lonely individual – in this case, a pizza-delivery man named Hussein – is left to "wander" from place to place, episode to episode, actively partaking in [though sometimes merely witnessing] a number of seemingly unrelated events – all of which ultimately tell us more about Hussein, the city and the world at large than any standard movie narrative would [or could] do. All of the film's episodes have something very specific to say about contemporary Iran [standouts include the second of three visits to a jewellery store and Hussein's delivery to a depressed but talkative Iranian man who's just returned from America and is now declaring that Tehran is a "city of lunatics"], but are nonetheless relevant to viewers from other countries as well, especially when they focus – as the jewellery store episode does – on class distinctions and other such topics. Crimson Gold is at once both culturally specific and thematically universal, and therein lies Panahi's greatest gift as a filmmaker. Crimson Gold, like Kim Ki-duk's Samaritan Girl (2004), another standout picture, is able to work on two separate levels – as a work of art that's particularly relevant to Iranians [even though neither Crimson Gold nor Panahi's last film, The Circle (1999), have been allowed to screened in Iran] and as a work of art that far transcends any traditional ideas of nationality in the cinema. The film speaks loudly and clearly to anyone from anywhere and – without ever becoming heavy-handed, preachy or obvious with its moral judgements – does so remarkably well. Definitely not to be missed.