11. Negotiating the sacred body in Iranian cinema(s): National, physical and cinematic embodiment in Majid Majidi’s Baran (2002)

In the post-revolutionary period, Iranian cinema has been subject to strict Islamic censorship regulations that dictate what can and cannot be show on screen, particularly in terms of the representation of women and romantic relationships between men and women. The rules relating to the representation of women mirror, in a highly exaggerated way, the codes of modesty relating to women in society more generally. Censorship functions to ensure that both onscreen bodies and the bodies of viewers in the audience remain modest. These bodies must be protected from un-Islamic, profane, blasphemous or sacrilegious utterances, acts and gestures: primarily those related to sex and un-Islamic behaviour. This is achieved in life primarily through the veiling of female bodies, and on screen by a ‘screening’ of such acts and suggestions of sexuality that might cause one to become impure or ‘haram’. The codes of modesty that prevail in society are greatly enhanced in the cinema, as all viewers are considered to be unrelated to the actors and characters who appear on screen. Modesty is maintained primarily by ensuring that onscreen women are appropriately veiled and clothed in loose-fitting clothing, and that physical contact between male and female bodies is avoided. Stories involving either emotional love or the suggestion of physical love between members of the opposite sex are generally avoided primarily due to the risk of violating the sanctity of pure, modest and Islamic bodies.^[2] Film form, that is, the technical and stylistic devices for creating meaning in cinema, according to Hamid Naficy has also undergone a radical process of Islamicisation, which obliges filmmakers to uphold the principles of Islam.^[3] In a religious context, where idolatry and imitating the creative act of God is considered to be highly sacrilegious, it is a wonder that the creative audio-visual medium of film has been adopted so readily as an instrument for consolidating the revolution and educating the population about proper Islamic morals and behaviour. Indeed, despite his constant critique of cinema during his years in exile, Ayatollah Khomeini is said to have seen the potential of the film medium for promoting revolutionary (primarily Islamic) values.^[4] Just as Western cinema and the popular and decadent pre-revolutionary cinema known as ‘Film Farsi’ were seen as an evil force that had corrupted the minds and bodies of the population during the Phalavi regime, in the post-revolutionary period, cinema was considered an appropriate vehicle for the purification of spectator’s and by association the nation’s mind, body and soul. With the enmeshing of state and religion brought about with the establishment of the theocratic government in 1979 and the establishment of Shari’a law, both individual and nation must necessarily reflect Islamic values.

Majidi Majidi’s Baran (2001) is an extraordinary film which successfully depicts an adolescent man discovering his burgeoning sexuality, and falling in love with a beautiful young Afghan woman named Baran. Through the use of very clever and subtle cinematic devices, Majidi generates a deep sense of emotion and intimacy without ever showing any physical contact between the two, and without ever violating either the character’s or the viewer’s modesty. Additionally, by couching this love story in the broader context of the socio-economic condition of Afghan refugees in Iran, Majidi produces yet another level of discursive meaning where an ideal model of Islamic love and charity toward others may be perceived, effectively embodying a highly idealised conception of the nation. But, through its complex visceral engagement of the spectator’s sensorium, Baran is a film that also explores the very limits of the sacred Iranian body on both the level of the national and individual citizenry. In this chapter, I wish to argue that through the simultaneous idealised embodiment of Iranian national Islamic values and the faltering, frail and very physical adolescent body of the central male character, Majidi is effectively negotiating the limits of the sacred body in Iranian cinema(s). I wish finally to demonstrate how film — which itself may be considered a body of sorts — may reach out figuratively to touch and move the bodies in the audience in ways that exceed simple observance of censorship regulations and generate vital connections between the viewers and the bodies on screen. In doing so, the film bears witness to the shadows that haunt any sacred utterance.