A Hero

Asghar Farhadi’s latest Iranian drama compels attention but mixes its modes.

The noted Iranian filmmaker Asghar Farhadi has made films in France and in Spain but with this latest piece he is back on home ground with a tale set in the city of Shiraz. A Hero reminds us afresh of what a good storyteller Farhadi is and his new film quickly grab grabs our attention as it tells a tale about one Rahim Soltani (Amir Jadidi). We first encounter him as he sets out on two days leave from the prison where he is serving a sentence, that being for a debt which he has been unable to pay to a major creditor, Bahram (Mohsen Tanabandeh). However, Rahim, a divorced man with a young son, Slavash (Saleh Karimai), has a new girlfriend (Sahar Goldust) who by chance comes across a handbag containing gold coins which has been dropped in the street. She offers the coins to Rahim who plans to sell them to settle part of the debt in the hope that his prison sentence can then be suspended while he earns enough to pay off the rest. But, as it happens, the market is bad and Rahim has second thoughts about selling. Instead he advertises the finding of the bag and is thus able to return the coins to the woman who had lost them. His action gets taken up by the media as a story which portrays him as an honourable man. Indeed, he is the hero of the title but, as the film progresses, we are invited to regard that designation as ironic.

For much of its length A Hero works well since we find ourselves caught up in the story even if at times we come to regard it as a shade fanciful. It certainly takes on a variety of aspects. Jadidi, excellently cast, gives a performance which is wholly convincing even as we question to what extent Rahim was deliberately planning to act in ways that would arouse support for him and bring in funds. Whatever view of him we choose to take, this is a believable portrait of a man whose behaviour is more questionable than the image of him that is being promoted.

Consequently, A Hero is a film about a largely well-intentioned but fallible man who is soon fated to be caught up in ever more complex situations as he finds himself forced into deceits. As a personal portrait, it also shows how his actions humiliate those around him. They become pawns in the lies being told and this particularly applies to his young son. All of this could be regarded as a realistic dramatic situation seen in naturalistic terms. However, A Hero also shows how the prison authorities and a charity that helps prisoners both manipulate Rahim and use the publicity that he has attained for their own ends. This aspect takes on a satirical tone rather different from that of the early scenes and from that of the film’s finale too.

In addition to that, the second half of A Hero builds up twists and turns to make the situation ever more ironical and, while that leads to a damning view of the institutions and their standards of probity, it comes close to suggesting a contrived shaggy dog story. If you want to see social criticism here, you can certainly do so and it is possible, of course, for a film to be effective by adopting exaggerations and satirical set-ups to that very end. The problem with A Hero is that the mix of straight drama alongside these other elements is an uneasy one. That only becomes apparent in the later stages of the film so much of A Hero does work well aided by a very able cast and by Farhadi's ability to claim and hold our interest. The storytelling is great but the story itself suffers from these gear changes.

Original title: Ghahreman.

MANSEL STIMPSON

Cast: Amir Jadidi, Mohsen Tanabandeh, Fereshteh Sadre Orafaiy, Sarina Farhadi, Sahar Goldust, Saleh Karimai, Ehsan Goodarzi, Ali Reza Jahandideh, Maryam Shahdaei, Rana Azadivar, Farrokh Nourbakht.

Dir Asghar Farhadi, Pro Asghar Farhadi and Alexandre Mallet-Guy, Screenplay Asghar Farhadi, Ph Ali Ghazi and Arash Ramezani, Pro Des Mehdi Mousavi, Ed Hayedeh Safiyari, Costumes Negar Nemati.

AF Productions/Arte France Cinéma/Memento Films International-Amazon.
128 mins. France/Iran. 2021. US Rel: 7 January 2022. UK Rel: 21 January 2022. Cert. PG-13.