Ayneh

A child (Mina Mohammad Khani) waits in vain for her mother to pick her up after school. Whether she tries to resolve the dilemma herself or asks for help from the adult world, this serious little girl confronts dead-ends. At first She asks help from a motorcycle driver and the guy gives her a lift to the bus-stop then she takes the wrong bus so on and on.She challenges the adult world. "If you can show me the way I can go by myself" is a repeated line in the movie but the adult world does regard her either weak or it doesn't care about her.The close camera shot right on the little girl is very good really and the performance of this little girl deserves a standing ovation. Great job! The only thing is that I felt that the movie lacks a little bit action through the turmoil of urban life. The director focuses on littler girl more than necessary I guess. We hear some external voices (like the people on the bus) but the camera is always on the girl so this feels a little bit passive. Other than that it's really great!

Ayneh (The Mirror) is an unusual, interesting, and compelling work. The young star, Mina, is type-cast as a forceful and self-reliant young girl. The city of Teheran, as portrayed, has an almost anarchic quality to its vehicle and pedestrian traffic rules. The constant threat of accident adds a real edge to this cinema verité film. (In fact, the only problem I had with this movie was the ethical concern of allowing any actor, especially a young girl, anywhere near all this traffic.)

The Mirror is an excellent choice if you are looking for a noisy, exciting portrayal of an individual caught up in a realistic urban setting. Not a soothing film, but in my opinion, a great one.

Monsieur Panahi cannot resist a bit of metafiction. In this case the metafiction becomes the subject of the second part of the movie, as his lead child actress finds herself in the exact same predicament as the girl she was playing, running through the streets of Tehran, talking to all sorts of people, trying to get home. Only it starts to feel a little too gimmicky and I lost interest. Plus the fact that they were watching her from a distance, but still I couldn't help but feel they were endangering her.

Anyway, Tehran traffic is hellish and I'd be scared as an adult, let alone a child. But this kid just cannot sit still to save her life. It's true we would not have a movie otherwise, but basically stay in the playground and wait for your mother to come pick you up.

This is a pure concept: Director has chosen to play with two resources: camera and sound. No music, no SFX.

The story itself is quite surprising.

Sometimes, the lower the budget, the greater the creativity. The border between documentary and film is blurred, so the sense of "reality" is quite present and remains till the end.

The director also plays with the audience: there is a certain point when the viewer feels to be misplaced.

As Rene Magritte's painting "la Vengeance", in which the artist does not accept the inherent limitations of his art, he dares to paint outside the easel, that way Jafar Panahi goes beyond the usual simple structure of the movies.

Just for "independent advanced" movie goers.

9/10

Iranian director Jafar Panahi recently got arrested, charged with propaganda. He is sentenced to six years in jail and is banned from making movies for twenty years. This makes his 1997 movie "The Mirror" ("Ayneh" in Farsi) all the more interesting. The movie depicts a girl wandering Tehran's chaotic streets looking for her mother. Suddenly, she decides that she doesn't want to play the part anymore! First time that I've ever seen that happen in a movie.

The only other Panahi movie that I've seen is "Offside", about women getting kept from attending a soccer game, officially because the men's legs are showing. Judging by that, and by the conversations that the girl hears on the bus in "The Mirror", Panahi is not a director whose films really please Iran's authorities. There should be no doubt as to why he now languishes in jail. And above all, I truly recommend this movie.