Sunday, January 27, 2008

Jason watches "Persepolis"

And I'll tell you, "Teeth" and "Persepolis" makes a pretty weird double feature. I probably should have seen them in the other order.

Anyway, "Persepolis" is a fine movie and it would've been an insult if it hadn't been nominated for the best animated feature Oscar. In fact, it probably has a great chance of winning. I liked the clean, simple lines of the animation. Hell, I liked the fact that it's hand drawn instead of computer animated. Other countries still do that. Just like other countries tell intelligent, adult stories in animation, instead of just kid's stuff. "Persepolis" is the autobiography of director Marjane Satrapi, who was a little girl in Iran during the revolution. She was a precocious and outspoken girl, proud of her uncle (who had been imprisoned by the Shah, and after a bit of freedom, executed by the new regime) and her kind, witty, outspoken grandmother. She has a number of run-ins with the morality police and leaves to study in Europe for a while. But she's miserable there and almost dies of bronchitis. She returns to Iran, but she's a stranger in her own country now. Eventually she moves to France and told her story, first as a graphic novel and now as this movie. It's a beautiful little story that gives you a personal view into Iran that's very different from what we see on the news. Yeah, there's some fucked up things going on, but the ordinary people don't really want it. There are some jerks in power now, but that's not really the soul of the country (same can be said for us).

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