Still Life (Tabi’at-e bijān)
Shahid Saless returns to the coastal town of Bandar Shah, this time portraying the lives of an elderly man, who guards a railroad crossing, and his wife. They are stopped in their tracks when a letter arrives informing them of his impending retirement. Still Life is a powerful meditation on a life lived at the margins of a fast-modernising Iran, on the stilled time of old age and its disruption by modernity – and a broadside against the Shah’s grandiose rhetoric of economic development.
Followed by a conversation between critic and curator Ehsan Khoshbakht and Azadeh Fatehrad, and a reception.
Iran 1974, 93 min, 35mm, Farsi with English subtitles. Written and directed by Sohrab Shahid Saless. Cinematography by Hushang Bahariu. With Zadour Bonyadi, Zahra Yazdani, Habibollah Safarian.
Sohrab Shahid Saless: Exiles is curated by Dr. Azadeh Fatehrad and Nikolaus Perneczky in partnership with the Goethe-Institut London and in collaboration with the Munich Film Museum. With support from the Visual and Material Culture Research Centre, Kingston University (London), Iran Heritage Foundation (London) and Arts Council England. We would like to thank our partner venues Close-Up and the ICA.
Tickets
This screening is part of the series Sohrab Shahid Saless: Exiles, 4 November 2017 - Friday 9 January 2018. Please see full programme details
here.
Back
