Rosewater is a movie for the idealists, with the implied hope that a principled and conscientious mass media can give the new breed of technologically savvy activists a louder voice.
Iran
Film Review: Jafar Panahi’s “Closed Curtain” — Another Valiant Film From Iran
Under relaxed house arrest, Iranian director Jafar Panahi bravely concedes that, at times during his incarceration, he’s worn down, tempted to end it all.
Coming Attractions in Film: January 2010
By Justin Marble
Azar Nafisi on Iran’s Static Sense of History
By Bill Marx In a recent World Books podcast I talk to Azar Nafisi, the author of the international bestseller Reading Lolita in Tehran. In her new memoir, “Things I’ve Been Silent About,” Nafisi chronicles the trials and tribulations of about growing up in Iran, focusing on her volatile relationship with her difficult mother and […]
Visual Arts: Reading the Prayer Book in Isfahan
Three weeks ago I attended Friday evening services at the main synagogue of Isfahan. I cannot remember the last time that I went to a kabbalat Shabbat service, but I cannot have gone much more often than once a decade for the past 40 years. By Gary Schwartz Isfahan, gate of synagogue on Felestin Square […]
Visual Arts Review: Cartoon Memoirist
By Milo Miles Iranian expatriate Marjane Satrapi continues to expand the art of the comic book. Back in the ’40s, the long-standing prejudice that comic books were incapable of presenting serious, adult matters was exploded by such artists as Bernie Krigstein, Harvey Kurtzman, and Will Eisner. But the discovery of how just how uniquely valuable […]