The Blog

I'm a bit curious about what magazines or newspapers related to film Mr. Rosenbaum regularly reads, maybe New Yorker? Village Voice or so? Now many film-buffs even critics consider that QT as the originator of so-called "narrative disorder", but in your opinion, Mr. Rosenbaum, who really deserved the title, Resnais or some earlier filmmakers?

Why is Denby such an idiot? This little comment by Rosenbaum is the least of it. It's scary, because he seems to write for a certain crowd, instead of really writing. The crowd? Older, nostalgic people who actually don't care that much more about film except as something that goes with cocktails, a crowd that, because they don't care about film, should be smashed and manipulated to smithereens with lies (Mystic River? Crash?!) everytime they do go out. Yes I read him, just because I'm masochistic like that.

My opinion of Taste of Cherry was near-hostile when I first viewed it, and I especially disliked the jarring ending. Years later, I viewed it again with my own little Kiarostami retrospective (one that's missing key early works such as Homework). My opinion toward Taste of Cherry drastically changed on the second viewing, and it's not to do with any denouncement of Bush's illusory "Iran." Whatever the reason for Denby's alteration of his opinion of the film, I only wish he would acknowledge it, perhaps in the same way that Dilys Powell admitted her originally misguided opinion of Peeping Tom (which was a complete turnaround, not quite matching Denby). It's also hard to fathom how Quentin Tarantino's Pulp Fiction has more "courage, surprise, and ravenous hunger for life" than does Kiarostami's work, especially when viewing the ending of Taste of Cherry, which I now readily confess is the best element of the film. It's infuriating that Denby has actually seen the films of these directors and still can't weigh in a consistent, appropriate opinion on the stylistic and humanistic elements of Tarantino, Kiarostami, and Resnais. Denby's inconsistent opinions give the illusion that he floats with the wind. As a side note: on the Criterion DVD of Taste of Cherry, there is an interview with Kiarostami. The interviewer asks an obviously idiotic question, which is something like "what do you think about Quentin Tarantino?" Kiarostami's response is quite humorous.

Regardless of their seeming incompatibility, I'd prefer to live in a world where one can love and engage with both Kiarostami and Tarantino (as I do). It's too easy to just dismiss one or the other out of hand, using the work of one filmmaker to shoot down the work of another. Perhaps the content is contradictory, but there's a difference between contradiction and hypocrisy. We should strive to hold such seeming antitheses in our head and heart, and examine them accordingly, in all their complexity.

I saw three programs of Kiarostami's early films this past weekend at MoMA and was enchanted, finding them to be full of "the courage, the surprise, the ravenous hunger for life, of a serious work of movie art." "Taste of Cherry" was the first Kiarostami film I saw back in 1998, and I plan to see as many more as possible during this rare opportunity to see his entire career in context. Having also recently re-seen Resnais's glorious and groundbreaking "Marienbad" and "Muriel," I think Resnais's so-called "narrative disorder" is infinitely preferable to the ugly tone of "Pulp Fiction." QT's "Jackie Brown" at least had characters worth caring about.

Ever the voice of reason, Keith; you took the words right out of my mouth.

And, for whatever it's worth, I also agree with Keith, and am sorry if my screed implied otherwise. My main point, in any case, was "complexity," not dismissal: trying to make sense out of Denby--or speculating whether any sense can be made--by juxtaposing his evaluations of both filmmakers.

Why waste one's time with Denby when one can read fresh musings on Kiarostami by writers who actually care? (Namely, Keith and myself!) Keith's ongoing coverage of the Kiarostami retro (including his interview with The Big 'Bas himself) can be found on House Next Door: mattzollerseitz.blogspot.com My notes on HOMEWORK and THE TRAVELLER are on my blog: shooting.alsolikelife.com

My phrase, "Bush's demonization of what he chooses to call 'Iran' has been misunderstood by some people (see, for instance, Kathy at www.thestranger.com/blog/2007/03/iranian_cinema), so let me clarify by basically repeating what I sent to her blog: What Bush is choosing to call `Iran' is chiefly a narrow-minded fundamentalist like himself, not a complex society of millions of diverse individuals that is every bit as multicultural as the U.S. We rightly get upset when foreigners assume that 'America' is Bush, so we should also pay attention when Bush demonizes millions of people in the distorted and limited image of one of its leaders.

Oh, I decided Denby was an idiot long ago when I read his review of Kieslowski's *Red.* I actually saw that thing he recently wrote about Kiarostami in the New Yorker and wondered if he would do the same to Kieslowski's film...if it were shown is someplace like the MoMA. It is people like Denby as a so-called film critic who lacks the courage, surprise, ravenous hunger for cinema that make for a serious film critic.

In his previous comment, Mr. Rosenbaum attributes statements to me that I didn't write. The author was Annie Wagner, the film editor at The Stranger. I simply added a comment to her original post (to praise "Taste of Cherry" and "A Moment of Innocence"). I have no association with Ms. Wagner or The Stranger.

There's a brief interview with Kiarostami in yesterday's New York Times, available online. The interviewer makes the same error as Denby in describing "Taste of Cherry," "in which a man drives around the country for the entire film, unsuccessfully asking strangers to help him commit suicide." Elsewhere in the interview he says the Sunni/Shiite conflict in Iraq is more of a class division than a religious war, which I think is an important observation.

To Kathy F.: I apologize for the error.

While I agree with the idea that one can like both Kiarostami and Tarantino, let's at least acknowledge the vast difference between a filmmaker who's engaged with the real world and one who acts as if it didn't exist. The characters in "Reservoir Dogs" and "Pulp Fiction" are terminally familiar types we've seen in a thousand other movies (Harvey Keitel's career criminal who believes in honor among thieves; Samuel L. Jackson's hit man who has a sudden religious awakening), and "Kill Bill" is even worse in that it does away with character completely. As pleasurable as these films are, they can't compare with the fun of watching "Life, and Nothing More..." (for me Kiarostami's most interesting work) because the interactions between the middle-class protagonist and the impoverished people he encounters, which are needless to say far more nuanced, actually tell us something about the world we live in (as opposed to existing in a vacuum where the only reference points are other movies).

Soori, I think these are two filmmakers who both excel at engaging with the real world, but in different ways. Tarantino knows full well that the characters in his movies are stock figures that we've seen a million times before, which is what interests him in them; they populate the "real world" of our shared pop cultural memory, like characters from fairy tales and folklore. Kiarostami is obviously up to something completely different, but I would argue, no "realer." Also, pulp characters who have sudden religious awakenings and essentially start dictating the themes of their own sequels are rare in popular cinema.

Whether or not Tarantino knows the characters are stock figures, he doesn't present them as such (where as in a film like Godard's "Band of Outsiders" the characters all model themselves after movies they've seen). Whether or not Kiarostami's films are any "realer," they're considerably fresher.