Maziar
Bahari (left) whose story inspired Rosewater and director Jon Stewart
For as comically inventive as Jon Stewart is on television,
this is an abysmal failure, a film that’s actually hard not to walk out on before
it’s halfway done as you already know the outcome, so it’s predictable as
hell. And therein lies the problem, the
utter conventionality of the picture, never for a single second rising above
preconceived notions and cliché’s, offering zero insight into Islamic culture
or the history of Iran, but instead continually reinforcing American
stereotypes. This is as elementary as it
gets and is an embarrassment to the intelligence of anyone that sees it. Without knowing the director, one might even
think this was a propaganda piece made by someone from FOX and/or MSNBC News,
as it’s so ethically self-righteous in its black and white depictions, showing no
moral ambiguity, no gray lines, where the only tone offered is seen through an
all right or wrong lens. Ostensibly the
film is about the suspicions of heavy vote fraud in the 2009 Iranian
Presidential elections, where the overall western view, based on sources on the
ground, is that incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad stole the election, as Iran
has retreated into a totalitarian, police state mentality where freedom of
expression has been crushed, which accounts for why the two leading Iranian
filmmakers, Abbas Kiarostami and Mohsen Makhmalbaf, continue to live and work
outside of the repressive artistic restrictions in Iran. This pattern of political repression is
similar to what the Soviets, Cambodians, and Chinese did under communist
regimes through the 70’s, arresting all the students, intelligentsia and
professionals that had the capability and insight to understand a better way of
life, which in a Kafkaesque sense was frowned upon, as totalitarian systems
must systematically enforce control through fear tactics and repressive
measures to ensure obedience, not allowing thoughts of democracy or freedom,
which are perceived as failed western models. When the Supreme Leader, a
leadership position chosen after the overthrow of the Shah in 1979, remains a
religious figure who is both head of state and the highest ranking political
and religious authority, in accordance with their constitution, one might
expect moral rigidity, as one might imagine Italy overseen by a Catholic Pope
ruling over the military and all political matters. It’s a significantly different concept than
what America had in mind when they envisioned democracy. This distinction is simply never addressed in
the film, as if this was too complicated for the audience to fathom.
Instead we have a fairly wretched example of America’s
viewpoint on display throughout, which gets a bit ridiculous after awhile,
especially when the cavalry comes to the rescue. The film is based on the 2011 memoirs of
Iranian journalist Maziar Bahari entitled Then
They Came for Me: A Family’s Story of
Love, Captivity and Survival, where he was sent into Iran as a Newsweek magazine correspondent for a
week to cover the elections. At least
initially, in the run-up to the election, the film expresses the euphoria and
elation of Arab Spring (that historically “followed” this event),
where demonstrators take to the streets in hopes for a better future. Bahari is played by Mexican actor Gael García
Bernal, seen leaving his pregnant wife in America, arriving for interviews with
spokespersons on both sides of the election, where the derisive Ahmadinejad
spokesperson is seen as a closeted Stalinist, while the young students placing
their hopes on reformist candidate Mir-Hossein Mousavi are young and
enthusiastic, proudly demonstrating no fear in front of the camera, where they
have obviously subverted the current religious theocracy in their own ways,
taking Bahari to a rooftop filled with satellite dishes to western media
outlets. In this manner, they have
conceived an idea of what their country might aspire to, but their hopes
quickly collapse when the election results show Ahmadinejad with nearly
two-thirds of the vote, making him the runaway victor. Stunned Iranians take to the streets in
massive demonstrations claiming the results are fraudulent, but the Supreme
Leader calls the voting results valid, labeling the victory a “divine
assessment,” while claiming the street protests illegal, leading to extreme
measures used to stop the protestors, including several reported deaths and
mass arrests, including Bahari, who spends the next 118 days in captivity. Visited each day by an interrogator, Kim
Bodnia, known as Rosewater (for the smell of his scented cologne), who forces
him to wear a blindfold while he’s physically and psychologically tortured on a
daily basis, where the tone of the film quickly grows predictable, using
conventional torture porn methods so popular in Hollywood today, always
exaggerating the sadistic element, as if that’s suitable family entertainment
these days. In addition, all the student
dissidents filmed by Bahari are arrested as well, as the government attempts to
round up and eliminate their opposition.
While incarcerated, Bahari envisions his dead father, Haluk
Bilginer, easily the best thing in the film from Palme d’Or winner Winter
Sleep (Kis uykusu), who was arrested and tortured under the Shah in the 50’s for being a
communist, who instructs his son to tell them nothing, to hold fast, to give
them no satisfaction whatsoever, while also recalling flashbacks of visiting
his older sister Maryam (Golshifteh Farahani) in jail, as she was imprisoned
under the 1980’s post-revolutionary regime of Ayatollah Khomeini, again for
being a communist, where we begin to see how others in his family suffered for
his future, where he’s now well-educated and politically sophisticated, living
a comfortable life capable of enjoying the freedoms that they never had. Half the film dwells on the dreariness of his
solitary confinement, which is predictably bleak, as they attempt to break his
will, effectively cutting off all ties with the outside world, isolating him
into a psychological state of humiliation and mental confusion where he loses
all hope, where his father encourages him, “Believe in something. It’s your only hope.” Initially Bahari finds it absurd, feeling he
has nothing to hide, nothing to confess, though they insist he is a western
imperialist spy, going through his computer and personal belongings, finding
every item an example of hedonism and western ideology. The loneliness of the ordeal takes its toll,
however, where his father acknowledges in a humorous aside, “I forgot how
fucking boring this place is.” Being a
relatively good-natured guy, Bahari finds his only plan is to cooperate and
give them what they want, memorizing a rehearsed speech where he apologizes and
admits to his crimes, which is of course televised across the nation. But when this doesn’t produce the desired
effect, as there is instead worldwide outrage and condemnation at his arrest,
they throw him back into solitary, which only emboldens him, as he finally
realizes he is not alone. Of course,
this is purely amateur interrogation techniques to reconnect him to the outside
world, to throw him a lifeline. The
sight of Hillary Clinton on CNN News
expressing her shock and personal condemnation for his arrest is followed by a B-movie
montage of all the international media outlets focusing their attention on this
single event, where all that’s missing are the flag waving sounds of “Let
freedom ring” from “My Country, ‘Tis of Thee,” Kelly
Clarkson Sings 'My Country, 'Tis of Thee' at ... - YouTube (3:23). What follows, of course, is an unlikely
scenario for all the others who continue to be held in detention who aren’t so
well known, who continue to have to endure this brutalizing sort of Stalinist ordeal. Unfortunately, it all feels like painting by
the numbers, where it’s a film of stereotypes and cliché’s that becomes
heavyhanded in its own dogmatic intent.
