21/11/2024 - Israeli director Eran Riklis’ film about the female condition in Iran is certainly topical, but it doesn’t convey the repressive insanity of religious and patriarchal dogmas

Two years on from the death of Mahsa Amini - the 22-year-old Iranian woman who was beaten to death by the morality police for not respecting the rules surrounding the veil - and at a time when we’re wondering what will become of Ahou Daryaei, the female student who was arrested because she undressed on the campus of Tehran’s Azad University in early November in protest against the imposition to wear the hijab, Reading Lolita in Tehran [+see also:
trailer
film profile] has screened in competition at the Tallinn Black Nights Festival and is also due to be released in Italian cinemas today, 21 November, via Minerva, having previously scooped the FS Audience Award and the Special Jury Prize for its female cast at Rome Film Fest. Based upon Azar Nafisi’s autobiographical novel of the same name, which was published twenty years ago, the film feels sadly relevant and fits perfectly with the fight led by young Iranian women against the repression at work within their country.

The film is directed by Israel’s Eran Riklis, at it’s not hard to see the irony in this fact, given the current hostilities unfolding between these two countries. Riklis has previously criticised Israeli policies regarding the seizure of Palestinian land and the occupation of Syrian territory through films like The Syrian Bride and Lemon Tree [+see also:
trailer
film profile]. The movie’s cast comprises a group of extraordinary actors, all of whom are exiled and “non grata” in Iran, starting with protagonist Golshifteh Farahani and Zar Amir Ebrahimi who’s an active supporter of the Iranian women’s protest. They’re joined by Raha Rahbari, Isabella Nefar, Bahar Beihaghi, Mina Kavani, Lara Wolf and Catayoune Ahmadi.

Unlike the book, the film begins in the summer of 1979 when Azar Nafisi returns to Tehran with her husband. She’s just graduated, and she’s convinced she can contribute to the Islamic revolution which has so far unseated the Shah. But Imam Khomeini has declared war on the West and on collaborators within the country, so Azar’s enthusiasm very quickly wanes: in her eyes, university teaching is a way to resist the government’s impositions, which are becoming harsher by the day. The war with Iraq is making the climate even more oppressive, and the universities are subjected to vigilant controls by the guardians of the revolution, who are only too aware of the subversive potential of a literature lesson, but also wearing lipstick or a lock of hair escaping a hijab. In 1995, Nafisi leaves teaching and invites seven of her best female students to attend lectures-debates held every Thursday morning in her own home. Together, they analyse and study western literary texts opposed by the regime: Daisy Miller, The Great Gatsby, Lolita. “We are Lolita”, they realise, referring to the removal of the right to make choices or express oneself, of which women are primarily the victims.

The film definitely has the merit of offering another line of thought on the female condition in countries with Islamic fundamentalist regimes and, more generally speaking, around the world. But whilst it shows the regime’s brutality, Riklis’ diligent film direction doesn’t convey the insane levels of repression dictated by religious and patriarchal dogmas with the degree of sensitivity that’s required, while Hollywood veteran Marjorie David’s screenplay struggles to transpose the complexity of the best seller’s reflections and the implications it attributes to that particular act of disobedience. The cast’s appeal is indisputable, but Lolita lacks the disruptive emotional power of Ali Abbasi’s Holy Spider [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Ali Abbasi
interview: Ali Abbasi
interview: Zar Amir Ebrahimi
film profile] or the more recent movie Tatami [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile], directed by Ebrahimi herself with Israel’s Guy Nattiv. 

Shot in Italy, Reading Lolita in Tehran is co-produced by Israeli firms United King Films, Topia Communication Production and Eran Riklis Production, together with Italy’s Minerva Pictures, Rosamont and RAI Cinema. Westend Films are handling international sales.

(Translated from Italian)