Persepolis is a great film. I can remember watching the Academy Awards in 2008 and seeing a clip of this film while introducing the Best Feature Animation nominees. I thought it looked horribly rendered, elementary, and by no means should it have been in the same category as Ratatouille. However, I decided to give this film a chance recently because I'm writing a paper on Iranian cinema for my Pakistan class.
Already with the small amount of resesarch I've accumulatd, I've discovered Iran to have an incredibly extensive and especially flamboyant cinematic history. There's something about film that knocks over barriers of the human conscious. People speak freely and excercise their real feelings and desires. In Iran, film has become a powerful tool of expression. It has been used to reveal the real people of Iran, the poor, the resistance movement, and especailly the women. Iran has an infamous record of censorship, and imprisonment of their own filmmakers; most recently, the arrest of Jafar Panahi.
With the Academy Award for Best Foreign Film recently given to the Iranian film 'A Separation,' a film about a divorce (to put it lightly), it's clear that Iranians are an expressive, emotional people. It is difficult to find any such notion on television media stations.
The film 'Persepolis' puts into context the struggles of an Iranian woman from childhood to marriage. It juxtaposes the routine coming of age story with the struggle against an oppressive Iranian regime. It clearly illustrates the fact that being a woman is not easy, and being a woman in Iran is much more difficult.
As far as the animation goes, I found it to be refreshing. With such a serious story being told, the poignant bits of old school animation, caricature, squash and stretch, slow in and slow outs, adds some great alleviating humor. The designs are great, and the design work is very graphic and simple, but feels very cinematic as well.
For some further analysis, check out the link below.
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