• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to secondary sidebar

The Lincoln Squirrel – News, features and photos from Lincoln, Mass.

  • Home
  • About/Contact
  • Advertise
  • Legal Notices
    • Submitting legal notices
  • Lincoln Resources
    • Coming Up in Lincoln
    • Municipal Calendar
    • Lincoln Links
  • Merchandise
  • Subscriptions
    • My Account
    • Log In
    • Log Out
  • Lincoln Review
    • About the Lincoln Review
    • Issues
    • Submit your work

Iranian films on tap tonight

September 9, 2013

movie reelThe Lincoln Library Film Society will resume screenings tonight (September 10) at 7 p.m. with another installment of “cinemavericks”—innovative filmmakers who did their own thing and guided the art form beyond its inherited strictures. The LLFS will screen the film work of Forough Farrokhzad (1935-1967), one of Iran’s greatest 20th-century poets. Although she only made one film in her short life, it is considered today to be one of the finest moments in Iranian cinema. The House is Black merges visuals with poetry like no other film has done, configuring searing images of reality to match the lines of Farrokhzad’s beautifully sparse and devastating words.

In the eyes of Iranian society, Farrokhzad was never conventional. She was a strong, independent woman who dressed in Western clothing and challenged traditional female roles. After she and her first husband divorced in 1954, she published her first volume of poetry, The Captive. In the male-dominated literary circles of Tehran, her feminine, often erotically charged poems attracted much negative attention. To this day she remains a controversial personality in her home country, but whether loved or loathed, her voice is undeniably unique. Her long-running romantic affair with film producer Ebrahim Golestan led to her involvement in filmmaking, and she even made a brief appearance in his wonderful The Brick and the Mirror (1964). Sadly, she died in a car crash in 1967, just after hearing from a fortune-teller that tragedy would soon strike. Her writing has lived many lives in the years that have followed, published posthumously, banned for several years following the revolution, and translated into other languages across the world.

Film synopses for tonight:
The House is Black (Kẖạneh sy̰ạh ạst‎)
Iran / 1963 / in Farsi with English subtitles (22 minutes)
Directed by Forough Farrokhzad

Ostensibly a documentary about the residents of a leper colony near Tabriz, Farrokhzad weaves didactic narration (along with Koranic and Old Testament passages) into her own elegant verse, alternately contrasting beauty with suffering, and at times rendering the two indistinguishable. The popular notion that she was utilizing her subjects to create political commentary (making their situation into a symbol for life under the shah, for the atrophy of the spirit under repression) is perhaps too narrow an interpretation, as it does little to accommodate her broad humanism. She does not turn to artistic dissociation, nor does she opt for an affected sense of empathy. Instead she distills the impact of the images, seeking out their basic connection to the human experience—which she explores through her own concepts of pain and transcendence—while at the same time presenting them with all of their rough, confronting integrity.

A Fire (Yek atash)
Iran / 1961 / with English narration (24 minutes)
Directed by Ebrahim Golestan
Working at Golestan’s film studio, Farrokhzad edited this documentary about a monstrous oil well fire that erupted in 1958. This apocalyptic-looking event is captured on camera in rich colors and omnipresent noise, as workers struggle day and night to contain it. A peek into the industry that burned at the heart of Iran’s economic rise, the film stands as a bleak statement on both hubris and ingenuity.

“I Shall Salute the Sun Once Again”
Iran / 1997 / in English (62 minutes)
Directed by Mansooreh Saboori
This documentary about Farrokhzad’s life and work that combines analyses of prominent themes from her writing with her own biographical narrative. It includes readings from some selected passages, which confirm her vaunted place in modern Iranian poetry.

Category: arts

Primary Sidebar

Upcoming Events

May 10
10:00 am - 12:00 pm

Lincoln Democrats caucus

May 10
11:00 am - 2:00 pm

Garden Cub plant sale

May 12
6:00 pm - 8:00 pm

“Fort-Night”

May 12
7:00 pm - 10:00 pm

LOMA: Sweetbriar

May 13
10:00 am - 5:00 pm

Blood drive to benefit Boston Children’s Hospital

View Calendar

Recent Posts

  • My Turn: Planning for climate-friendly aviation May 8, 2025
  • News acorns May 7, 2025
  • Legal notice: Select Board public hearing May 7, 2025
  • Property sales in March and April 2025 May 6, 2025
  • Public forums, walks scheduled around Panetta/Farrington proposal May 5, 2025

Squirrel Archives

Categories

Secondary Sidebar

Search the Squirrel:

Privacy policy

© Copyright 2025 The Lincoln Squirrel · All Rights Reserved.