Movie: The Salesman

The Salesman:  Iran’s Oscar submission for Best Foreign Language film.  This is writer/director Asghar Farhadi’s most recent creation, and the story that is told cannot be predicted based upon the opening scenes.  The film begins with what appears to be an earthquake.  The male lead, Emad (Shahab Hosseini), is awakened by his neighbors yelling to abandon the building.  We learn that Emad is married to Rana (Taraneh Alidoosti).  The building is rendered uninhabitable due to the sustained damage.  Emad is a high school teacher.  Emad and Tana are also actors and are in rehearsal for Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman where Emad plays Willy Loman and Rana plays Willy’s wife, Linda.  As the film unfolds, the play begins its commercial run.   Short clips from the play are shown throughout the film’s 125 minutes.  Because this is an Iranian movie, you may seek political connections between the film and the very American Death of a Salesman.  However, from what I could surmise, this film appears to be Farhadi’s attempt to show the universality of the story he is presenting, which becomes particularly evident in Linda’s final soliloquy following Willy’s death.  In the course of things, an individual connected with the theater tells Emad and Rana of an apartment he owns and available for rent.  We learn the former tenant, who we never see, is a prostitute.  The  story Farhardi is presenting and resulting in numerous awards is revealed more than a third of the way into the film after Rana has been badly beaten, off-screen.   Everyone surmises the perpetrator is a former customer of the prostitute.  Notwithstanding the extent of the beating the police are never called, which is presumably one of Farhadi’s political commentaries.  Being an Iranian movie and not an American one, the film does not morph into a police drama.  Rather, it is a tale about family relationships, male chauvinism and the isolation of women in traditional Muslim society.   Farhadi won Best Original Screenplay at Cannes.  Hosseini won Cannes’ Best Actor award; frankly I was more impressed with Alidoosti’s performance.  I have not seen all the nominees for Best Foreign Film but, at a minimum, The Salesman is a strong candidate.  Subtitles and there is a lot of dialogue.