DECEMBER 9 ― According to Wikipedia, in meteorology, “an inversion is a deviation from the normal change of an atmospheric property with altitude. It almost always refers to a ‘temperature inversion’, i.e. an increase in temperature with height, or the layer ('inversion layer') within which such an increase occurs.”
It also says that, “an inversion can lead to pollution such as smog being trapped close to the ground, with possible adverse effects on health.”
It is a definition that is at once both simple and quite complex. Who else but the Iranians would have the brilliant idea of mining such a simple but potentially rich concept into a simple but startlingly rich and satisfying film called, what else, Inversion?
Because of their pretty strict censorship rules and laws surrounding film-making in Iran, Iranian film-makers have developed an enviable knack for knocking out films that say so much more than what their literal stories are on the surface.
In short, they are pretty much masters in the art of the subtext and allegory. Abbas Kiarostami, the Makhmalbaf family (with father Mohsen, daughters Samira and Hana and mother Merzieh Meshkini), Jafar Panahi and Mohammad Rasoulof have all unleashed plenty of brilliant allegorical films like Taste Of Cherry, The Cyclist, The Apple, The Day I Became A Woman, The White Balloon, This Is Not A Film and Manuscripts Don’t Burn.
It’s only with the emergence of the current-day Iranian cinema, spearheaded by the thrilling and tightly scripted works of Asghar Farhadi (A Separation, About Elly, The Salesman) that a more traditional and narrative-minded form of cinematic storytelling (with a more middle class slant, instead of the lower depths that were often the subjects of the previous generation) have reached festival audiences the world over.
And when I first read about Inversion from writer-director Behnam Behzadi (a name I’ve never heard of before), which debuted at the Cannes Un Certain Regard section in 2016, the plot summary reads like another one of those Farhadi-influenced films as opposed to something that’s under the influence of the 90s masters like the aforementioned Kiarostami, Makhmalbaf or Panahi.
It’s a story about a single thirtysomething woman named Niloofar (a gorgeously dazzling Sahar Dowlatshahi) who lives alone with her mother, and who runs a clothing workshop for a living.
Tehran’s air pollution and smog has finally taken its toll on her mother’s health, leading the doctors to insist that her mother leave Tehran or die because of the pollution there.
Because she is single, her elder sister and brother unilaterally decide that she must move up north with her mother because, you know, the sister and brother have lives in Tehran.
And thus begins a series of inversions, as various things deviate from normal and all sorts of temperatures rise as Niloofar is caught between her loyalty to her family and her desire to live her own life.
I have yet to come across any mention of this allegory in all the reviews that I’ve read regarding the film so far, but as soon as it became clear that the only option that is available to her mother (and consequently Niloofar as well) is either to stay in Tehran and die or move out to live a healthier life, a lightbulb immediately lit up in my head, could this be an allegory about Iranians in general as well?
Despite the already incident-heavy family drama that is unfolding before us, which in itself contains more than its fair share of inversions, like when the brother accuses Niloofar of being selfish for not wanting to move (when it never even crossed his mind that he’s doing the same as well) or the many other instances of shifting of responsibility which causes all sorts of deviations from the norm of their lives, not to mention Niloofar’s determined rebellion against her siblings’ plans for her, the already rich and impressive film’s biggest inversion is the question that it asks Iranians in general ― are their choices limited to either moving out of Iran and living a free and healthy life or stay in Iran and die, freedom-wise?
It’s a bold question that would never have passed through the censors were Behzadi to ask it literally in the film, or ask it in a form other than an allegory like he did here, but following the gigantic footsteps of Kiarostami, Makhmalbaf and Panahi, while clearly also under the influence of Farhadi, the brilliant Behzadi has managed to craft an allegorical film that’s every bit as suspenseful and emotionally involving as the best of Farhadi’s films.
The allegory never supersedes the film’s narrative thrust, but is entwined with it as the audience is made privy to (and left to cheer for) every single decision that Niloofar makes in the course of her rebellion (i.e. inversion) of the norms that are thrust upon her by her family.
Niloofar is Iran, and every Iranian for that matter, and by the end of the film, when she has made her decision (which is ultimately her choice to make, not anyone else’s), she has also showed the way for every Iranian to answer the main question that Behzadi wanted to ask but smuggled in with that allegory instead.
* This is the personal opinion of the columnist.
