Response Numba 2, Due Aug. 31

Stephen Bransford, “Days in the Country”

1. What does Bransford mean by his claim that spaces and places in Kiarostami’s films are both real and imagined?

"...That there is a complex interplay in Kiarostami's work between the representation of real spaces and places, imaginative ideas about these real spaces and places, and wholly imaginative constructions of space and place." For example, he takes actual people from actual towns and has them portray an alternate, contrived (though very realistic) reality and therefore blends reality with imaginary. His films can be considered a hybrid of the documentary and the narrative.

2. What function does repetition of locations serve both within individual films and between films? What does Bransford mean by “visual rhymes” (what is the analogy with poetry)?
Kiarostami uses locations to turn his films into a kind of visual poetry, by repeating locations he establishes a chorus of sorts, and similar and repeating shots are rhymes of one another. This allows the film to flow and meander, but always return to a recognizable point, creating a rhythm throughout.

3. According to Bransford, why does Kiarostami stage most of his action outdoors? How does this affect Kiarostami’s visual style (mise-en-scene and cinematography)?
Kiarostami avoids indoors in order to force the viewer to use his imagination as to what goes on inside, but by consistently showing open and welcoming doors, it seems as if Kiarostami is more than aware of what he is doing by having the camera remain outdoors, perhaps to remind the audience that they are guests in this small Iranian village and are nothing but outsiders looking in.

Hamid Dabashi, “Makhmalbaf at Large: The Making of a Rebel Filmmaker”

6. Summarize how Dabashi characterizes Makhmalbaf’s first three films.

They are characterized as "Islamic Cinema" created by a revolutionary zealot and religious visionary.

7. What were some of the key changes in the second phase of his filmmaking career (1986-1988)?
He became a different kind of filmmaker and appealed to an entirely new kind of audience. He would still the same thematic elements within his films, but adopted a more socio-realistic approach rather than a religious/revolutionary one.

9. Why does Dabashi constantly use the term “sur / real” to describe Makhmalbaf’s work, particularly in the discussion of A Moment of Innocence,Gabbeh, and The Silence?

I think he just wanted to highlight the word by seperating the prefix sur- (meaning over or above) and real in order to place an emphasis on how Makhmalbaf's films portrayed reality, but attained surreal attributes in that they are narrative films imitating reality (or perhaps reality imitating narrative).

Assignment Numero Uno

Sharon Tay:

1. Art cinema addresses issues of cinematic aesthetics and practices, affirms certain directors as auteurs, displays formal innovation, includes social and psychological realism, and disturbs classic realist narrative codes and conventions, as well as temporal and spatial constructions.

Alberto Egan:

3. His attitude for the cinema, as he states, was positive as long as the movies were used for education rather than to "keep our young people in a state of backwardness and dissipate their energies." He says he was not against cinema just the kind that corrupt the youth.

4. The Banning of all commercial distribution of videocassettes and the closing of all video clubs, less taxes on Iranian films, creation of the Farabi Cinema Foundation which made a new code of censorship.

5. Because the Fajr International Film Festival was held in Tehran in 1983, which was great publicity for Iranian Film. Also lowered taxes on local films and less censorship restrictions.

6. So the audience would not have to listen to a prayer recited in such a "non-devout" way and have the viewer focus on the demeanor of the children rather than them reciting a prayer.

7. It was the Locarno Festival.