‘Persepolis’ movie infuriates Iranian government
by Eric Millikin
A biting animation about a young girl’s life under Iran’s ayatollahs screened at Cannes Tuesday despite protests from Tehran of Western bias. “Persepolis”, one of 22 films competing for the festival’s top award, is based on the eponymous comic-book series by Iranian Marjane Satrapi.
… Iran has slammed the movie as “an unreal picture of the outcomes and achievements of the Islamic revolution” and protested to France that the festival’s decision to select it highlighted “the biased policies of domineering powers.”
Satrapi herself, however, says the wry autobiographical comic-strip “isn’t a politically oriented film with a message to sell. … It’s first and foremost a film about my love for my family,” she said in production notes. “If Western audiences end up considering Iranians as human beings, not as abstract notions like ‘Islamic fundamentalists’, ‘terrorists’ or the ‘Axis of evil’, then I’ll feel like I’ve done something.”
- Eric
May 23rd, 2007 at 7:59 pm
You know, I really liked the book, but she wasn’t above throwing around a few abstract notions about groups of people herself.
As for Iran: When they stop beating young couples to death for holding hands, I’ll start caring what the authorities there think of movies.