FALL 2008
September 9

The Mirror

(Ayneh)
Iran 1997, 95 min., drama
Director: Jafar Panahi

From the opening scene of white-shrouded girls crossing a busy street in Tehran, clinging to the robes of their black-shrouded mothers, this is a cinematic delight. Mina, left behind on her own outside the school gates, goes looking for her mother on a city bus. Suddenly she steps out of the frame, saying she “doesn’t want to be in the fi lm anymore”. The director leaves the mike on Mina, and the story replays, but this time as real life, as she leaves the set and tries to remember how to get home.

Anchored by “cinema verite” shots of daily life in Tehran, and the film's star—street-smart, independent six-year-old Mina Mohammad-Khani.

LINKS

»  Jafar Panahi Wikipedia entry.
»  Inteview with Jafar Panahi at the Senses of Cinema web site.

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