Persepolis: A Movie Review

I heard the book was better, but I am not a fan of the graphic novel.

The movie was alright; watched it with a few friends less "engaged" on international affairs, just to see what their reaction would be.

They enjoyed it more than I did. Everyone thought "Eye of the Tiger" was the highlight of the movie.

I thought they would spend much more time on the situation inside Iran. Instead, the entire movie is filmed or drawn as a series of flashbacks, and the volume of material means that parts which are meant to be emotional and intense appear forced.

The first quarter of the movie was difficult to get into - you felt like a rock getting skipped across the water. You are introduced to 20+ people, who are then killed off, imprisoned, etc., but of which you never hear again. This stripped any hope for an emotional attachment to the characters.

The only point of bringing them up was to deliver a message about how people were suffering, first under the Shah and then under the Islamists, but, again, it felt like they were trying too hard and the message seems forced.

Perhaps the deficiencies in the film are unique to the genre. Live actors may have better communicated a range of emotion and information that was missing of simplified in the cartoon.

I was a bit disappointed; it was my turn to pick the movie. Kite Runner was the last one I picked, which everyone enjoyed, and I felt like this was a step down.

Just to add, what I was really hoping for in wanting to see this movie, was the transition from revolution to Islamism. Iran was a vibrant nation with a millennial old class of intellectuals. To think that it could be stripped of its civility and human capital so quickly... this is what interests me, in particular, how this was accomplished.

In every revolution gone wrong, there is a moment, a series of fateful decisions which will utterly change the course of events. In Russia, Germany, Cuba, Iraq... in every revolution you have those who are willing to give their life to build a just, fair society. And yet, so often, the more nefarious elements are successful.

How this happens, from nation to nation, revolution to revolution, is both different and similar, and frightening.