The Salesman

The name of the film "Salesman" have 2 coincident meanings at the same word: one of the meaning is pertaining to the first role actor in theater who his occupation have to sales somethings in term of managing his life poorly and another meaning is affiliated with a woman (ex- tenant of the apartment) who sales her body in an inappropriate way for making money intentionally. In addition, aforementioned movie show us that taking revenge is not really easy when we imagine ourselves in that situation because if you are there instead of guilty person, maybe you act worse than him. What's more, Audience during watching these Sequences, face with a dilemma between forgiveness or revenge which this atmosphere is entirely fantastic and make us satisfied after watching this terrific film.

Masterfully shot in Teheran, the film follows the ill fortunes of a theatrical married couple who, while rehearsing Miller's play Death of a Salesman, find themselves having to abandon their crumbling apartment and to seek alternative accommodation. The film is openly an allegory about social, urban and marital decay. But way beyond it, it is about the costs of masculine pride. By far more than a very good 'Iranian film', this is a superb statement about the unbearable consequences of trying to live up to codes of honour that centre on the female body. In my opinion, actress Taraneh Alidoosti is the hero of the film, both in her performance and in the role she occupies in the script. In contrast to appearances, she is the mover of everything that takes place in this fantastic film. A cinematic poem and a masterpiece in unfolding the twists of human psychology.

This is a true masterpiece, one of the best films of the year. Even though Farhadi's 'A Separation' is even better, this is a great display of storytelling and psychological understanding of the director. There are three elements that ought to be highlighted. 1) Without gimmicks and hyperboles it shows how a common man, with his natural strengths and flaws, gets his own moral code defied by the violence that exists in all societies but that in this case, touched his family. 2) The visual language. Again, it's subtle and straightforward, but its always at the right distance of the characters. 3) The counterpointing of Miller's play is marvelous! What happens to them in real life always affects the development of the play and the tensions backstage have a richness that takes the audience to a new level. A must-watch!!!

After having just moved into their new home Emad (Shahab Hosseini) and Rana (Taraneh Alidoosti), a couple of fellow actors find themselves in a difficult home life situation after a violation of their home. S they go through the performances at the local theater of Arthur Miller's 'Death of a Salesman' their relationship takes a left turn from which it might not ever go back.

I tried to keep the synopsis as vague as possible so not to spoil the film, since, as in most of Farhadi's films, the inciting incident comes in later in the film and the drama ultimately does not develop until the third act, something that this director likes to do and at which he excels, always giving priority to the space in which characters develop and live their everyday lives.

And those are exactly the reasons why "The Salesman" is a fantastically subtle and morally complex revenge tale masked as a home drama, which has some of the best work by actors I have seen in 2016, even though this might be too slightly of a familiar territory from Farhadi.

It is no coincidence that Shahab Hosseini won the best actor award at the Cannes Film Festival, if there is one reason why this film succeeds it is him. This performance is raw and authentic in its own unique way, he manages to guide us through every one of the stages of degradation his character goes through and he manages to do so without us noticing. On a surface level the character arch he goes through would be hard to believe, there are some changes that wouldn't appear natural when spelled out. Yet, Hosseini manages to sell us on this person and all of the turbulence he has to go through, he manages to enhance little moments that I can't imagine working on paper. He fits right into the world that Farhadi builds and comes out giving a powerhouse of a performance that guides the audience through the whole narrative.

Certainly, Farhadi deserves to share some of the credit for the performance too, for many reasons. Firstly, just as in all of his film, the performances across the board are just flawless, he directs actors to perfection and he doesn't even give you a chance to realize this. The way in which he uniquely manages to capture everyday life is profoundly stunning. From the camera-work to every detail of the blocking of actors right down to every word they say, the fabric of ordinariness he succeeds in putting on screen is flawless. I have no idea if this is all meticulously thought out or if it is left to brilliant improvisation and I don't want to know, what is clear to me is that as a director his methods work excellently and the results he manages to produce on screen are remarkable.

Then, when it comes to building the drama, Farhadi is just as masterful. The evolution of it is natural and doesn't ever feel forced upon the characters, the parallels traced with theater might be a little too on the nose, but they are stunningly relevant and used to an incredible cinematic effect. He manages to build and build the drama and make it culminate in a riveting finale where all of the themes and the moral questions the film asks flow out naturally from it and leave you hanging at just the right moment. He also manages to build a complex web of visual cues and use them effectively to complement the characters and the story, once again here the visual parallels with the theater are a joy to see unfold.

It has to be said that this is very familiar territory for Farhadi, the contrast of personal justice versus institutionalized justice is very relevant is his past film "A Separation" and so is the outlook on revenge, the degrading and the toll it takes on the individual and the destructive results of it. Sometimes it even feels like he is retracing his steps and for someone who has seen his film this might result in a slightly predictable outcome, even though the self contained drama in the film never looses its relevance to the characters, ultimately resulting in a constantly fascinating watch that challenges the viewer and defies traditional cinematic beats and expectations

I loved how this movie had some women characters that shows the exact situation of Iranian women. The old lady: "Oh...thank god you are alive.Thank you for saving him.He is my everything.I can't live without him."These are the words of an old lady in a 35 year-old marriage toward his husband which has been cheating on her for 3 years!How dumb is she!? It's the story of many women in Iran which because of their situation should obey their husbands and love them blindly. Raana: She has been raped but she doesn't have the courage to sue also she is so embarrassed that this may become a discredit to her. The prostitute: Imagine A mother with a young daughter what should she do for a living?Nothing in a society specified for Men but to sell her body to those Men! And finally the woman in the taxi: This woman knows the situation of all the women above. she is now a women who had lost her trust to all men.Either something happened to her or to her friends she now sees men all like together.She's so paranoid that she doesn't see that Emad is doing nothing.

-- spoilers alert --

There are many other scenes i loved about the film for example when one of the student asked "how does a man become a cow?"and Emad answered "gradually" and It was actually proved during the film when an old man doesn't find it shameful to touch someone's wife while a kid find it shameful to go to bathroom with his mother's friend!!So again a man gradually becomes a cow!! -- spoilers end --