Persépolis

...in fact, there is nothing average about this film. Traditionally animated in black and white flashbacks, it tells the story of a French-speaking woman's childhood and young adulthood in Tehran, Iran, and in Vienna during the 1980s and '90s.

Marjane Satrapi grew up in a family of revolutionaries against the Shah's regime and the Islamic government that subsequently took hold, and the film literally illustrates her feelings and thought processes as a little girl, following her as the government control in Iran got more and more strict. When her parents insist she leave the country, we also see her struggling to deal with adolescence and missing her beloved family; when she returns, she is also coping with the increasing repression of her freedoms as a woman. Most of all, you see her own personal conflict as she tries to stay true to herself.

This movie beautifully balances both the historic and personal issues and pulls the threads together into a compelling narrative, made a bit quirky by the style of presentation, resulting in work that is altogether touching. Along with intelligence and humor, a deep and strong sense of truth infuses every part of this film, making it even stronger. One of my only qualms was the feeling that it ended somewhat abruptly without much of a conclusion.

Overall, though, it was fantastic - definitely worth watching.

It's quite unusual for a writer to adapt its own book to the screen, especially when it's a comic-book (well, Frank Miller's done it, but that's another story), and especially when it's an autobiographical comic book. That's the originality of this movie, which is the adaptation of a autobiographical graphic novel by its very author. "Persepolis" deals with the life, and especially the youth of Marjane Satrapi, in Iran, during the reign of the Shah and the Islamic revolution. But if the memories could be easily told alone in front of a blank paper, isn't it harder to be true and sincere when you are surrounded by a all animation crew ?

That's the great achievement of the movie : to be true to the comics and therefor, to the life of Marjane. The best parts of it are all about her personal relations, with her grandmother or her uncle. You really have the feeling that she relates all this events to praise their memories and who they were. On the other side, the political scenes and historical point of view that supposedly are the goal of the movie seem to me a little less good than the family or personal souvenirs. It may be true but it seems a little bit simple and even cliché sometimes (see for instance the history of the Shah for all audiences). The personal view on the repercussion of the Islamic repression is way better than this kind of big exposes. The death of a young man trying to escape the police after a party or the attitude of a man insulting her mother in a parking tells us more about the regime in Iran than the speech the movie sometimes (but not so often) gives us.

So, paradoxically, the more personal the movie gets, the truer it is. The all rapport the difficulties to left your country and to adapt to another world seems for instance very honest and touching. The childhood period, told in a comic strip style is both funny and melancholic. In the end, this movie is far from being a movie about Iran, but only tells an individual life, crying for freedom in a country were a woman can't reach it, but transfigured by personal memories and a strong animated point of view, that uses all the techniques and styles a comic-book adaptation could offer.

Persepolis is one of the most thoughtful, poignant and original films I have ever seen. Hang on, "poignant" and "thoughful", an animated movie (and based on a comic-book, on top of that)? Exactly, because coincidentally Persepolis also happens to be the first really adult "cartoon" I've had the pleasure to watch (Waking Life and A Scanner Darkly don't count, as they were filmed with real actors first, and subsequently modified in post-production). For all their good intentions, the likes of Dreamworks and Pixar always have an eye for what the little ones want to see, while The Simpsons, despite the occasional "mature" storyline (basically Homer and Marge's sex life), contains nothing a 12-year old isn't supposed to see. As for Family Guy and South Park, they might be aimed at grown-ups with their merciless satire and, in the case of the latter series, explicit language, but are made with an almost puerile sense of joy which prompts younger kids to watch them in secret. Persepolis, on the other hand, deals with adult themes in a serious, unpretentious way. So yes, it is an animated film. Yes, it is based on a comic-book. And yes, there is the occasional neat movie reference (Rocky III being the most memorable one). That doesn't mean it's a kids' movie, though; it just means the picture was made with a particular style because it was the most effective way to tell this specific story.

And what is so special about the story? Well, it is an account of what is going on in contemporary Iran, a topic that is more relevant today than it's ever been before. And the extra layer of poignancy derives from the fact that co-director Marjane Satrapi experienced every single event in the film. After moving to France to avoid the increasingly oppressive political situation that had developed in Teheran (which the ancient Greeks called Persepolis, hence the movie's title), she published her autobiography in the form of a graphic novel, which immediately became a cult phenomenon. With the help of artist Vincent Paronnaud, the stylized drawings have become a motion picture which has already conquered critics and won several awards (the Jury Prize in Cannes being one of them).

The film's strict adherence to the book's style makes for simple but powerful viewing: the simple pictures ensure the story doesn't need to be filtered, but can be understood right away, while the use of black and white provide the images with a strength that would otherwise be missing. A good example is a scene depicting a demonstration against the despotic regime in Iran and the subsequent shooting of one of the protesters, whose body is left lying on the ground: as his blood starts to flow, the corpse almost merges with the environment, giving the shot (pun not intended) an emotional relevance it wouldn't have, had the whole thing been in color. The choice of animation proves to be particularly effective in a most unusual choice for this kind of film, namely fantasy sequences: there is a hilarious moment, for instance, when Marjane, during a stay in Vienna, looks back on her disappointment in love and sees her ex-boyfriend as a depraved freak; live-action would have ruined that scene, undoubtedly. As it is, however, it comes off not as a bizarre formal experiment, but a fundamental tool for understanding the heroine's psychology.

That said, it should also be noted that Persepolis isn't just a bold take on the difficulties in the Middle East. As seen in Clint Eastwoood's Iwo Jima double bill, the line between "heroes" and "villains" is very thin, and the film never misses the opportunity to show how bad our own society can be: Marjane ends up hating Europe more than her home-country, and at the beginning a flashback shows the British government's role in manipulating Iranian politics for money's sake. Incidentally, the latter scene is depicted as a puppet show, providing a new, fresh angle: what sets truth apart from fiction?

Persepolis works because it handles an uncomfortable subject with grace, using a simple but constantly effective storytelling technique and never once pandering to audience expectations with the usual 'toon gimmicks (even the casting proves that: except for Catherine Deneuve, who plays the low-key role of Marjane's mother, there are no famous voices in the feature). It sticks to traditions and stretches the medium at the same time, showing that animation is no longer a "children's genre" and therefore delivering a new way to look at film-making and its possibilities. For this reason, and several more, it is one of the best pictures of 2007.

I rated this film a 9 more as a visual complement to the comic book (of two volumes, now bound as one), which I believe to be a masterpiece. If you left the film less than emotionally attached to the characters, PLEASE give the book a chance, because, as is often the case, episodes and histories of a lot of the characters, including Marjane, are left out to adapt the story to a film medium. Having said that, there are great sequences, expressionistic animation, and the wiseass grandma is left fully intact from the books! I can understand why some people weren't emotionally compelled by it though, since the movie doesn't take the time to fill the audience in on all the quirkiness and endearing qualities of the characters as Satrapi originally conceived them.

Adapting "Persepolis" in my opinion was a very important project. Especially (but not only) during times of fear and extreme distrust regarding other ethnicities it's necessary to communicate better understanding for these cultures. Films are capable reach millions of people all around the world. Therefore this medium is a very effective way to do this (unfortunately it can also get misused in the opposite direction).

Seen from this cultural perspective "Persepolis" is an entertaining feature which also meets a certain social responsibility. To me it is the right picture at the right time. In a individually visualized way this animation picture shows Marjane Satrapis personal biography and gives you an idea about the historical background of the Iran and the way of living in this part of the world. Besides several tragic moments "Persepolis" never loses it's humour.

In a short: "Persepolis" is a very true and affectionate adaption of the original comic also drawn by Satrapi who directed the film. An important issue and not only for this reason I truly recommend it !