Tehroun

Tehroun is a strong film about a network of criminal activities in the Iranian capital. The film gradually opens the story of Ibrahim, a supposed-to-be student from the countryside, who gets tackled with nasty criminal business in the city.

The story is absolutely depressing. To me, having visited Iran and Tehran, the film opened up completely different world than what I encountered. In contrast to hospitable and happy locals, the film shows struggling of people that end up into problems with the outlaw. Such mafia-type business, as depicted in the film, surely exists in the Iranian metropolis, which might not be the best place in the world to live in. To an outsider who knows something about the Iranian culture, the film seems to be quite realistic (and still very entertaining). All that stuff that takes place in the story, is something that I can imagine to happen in a city of a third-world country.

The film itself is very well made. Cinematography looks good like in western movies and there is no problem in following the thoughts and intentions of the characters, which usually is the case at least for me as a western viewer watching a movie from the east (or any culture that is somewhat unknown to me). Even though quite standard mafia story, whose analogs can be found in Latin American cinema, the Middle Eastern cultural context makes the film a bit more exotic than average.

The major contribution of this film to me is the opportunity to look into the life in Tehran from a different perspective than the usual. If you prefer the brighter side of the Iranian cinema, you might want to have a look at Abbas Kiarostami's production, such as "Under the Olive Trees".

In the like of Slumdog millionaire and the best of middle east and central Asia cinema, Tehroun shows us how it is possible to create a visual masterpiece,an emotionally moving story and having it played by unknown - but full of talents - improvised actors. This movie could easily compete in the largest festivals and should have won the Oscar for best foreign language film in 2010, it could have helped Iran and the Iranians in demonstrating the world that the large majority of them is not supporting its oppressive government and wish hard to be as open as civilizations in the west.

Give Tehroun a chance, you won't regret it!