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OFFSIDE
Edited, Produced & Directed by: Jafar Panahi.
Written by: Panahi & Shadmehr Rastin.
Director of Photography: Mahmood Kalari.
Released by: Sony Pictures Home Entertainment.
Language: Farsi with English subtitles.
Country of Origin: Iran. 92 min. Rated PG.
With: Sima Mobarak Shahi, Safar Samandar, Shayesteh Irani, M. Kheyrabadi, Ida Sadeghi & Golnaz Farmani.
DVD Features: Interview with director Jafar Panahi. Trailers.

In apparent disaccord with French film critic André Bazin’s infamous words, “Film substitutes into our view a world which agrees with our desires,” Jafar Panahi is strictly about realism. In the DVD interview with Jamshid Akrami, Panahi reveals that his self-proclaimed documentary Offside was shot in 39 days. But you would never know it based on a viewing of the film itself. That’s where Panahi’s talent for recreating reality shines.

Following a group of teenage girls who disguise themselves as boys in order to gain access into a soccer stadium the day of a World Cup-qualifying match between Iran and Bahrain, one would assume, especially with the long drawn-out scenes shot in real time, that the entire film had been made on that single day. While Panahi seems to consider himself something of a biased reporter when it comes to filmmaking, Offside seems somewhat a far cry from a documentary. True, all of the actors are amateurs and the great majority of the scenes are undirected (for example, the beautiful celebratory scene at the end when Iran finally wins the match), but, nonetheless, there is something uncannily fictional about the movie – probably because it make its point overly clear through direct utterances by the actors: “Why can’t girls be allowed to watch soccer?” (A little guesswork on behalf of the viewer is always appreciated when it comes to message decoding.)

As is to be expected, no one really seems to have an intelligent response. The soldier who guards the imprisoned, overzealous soccer fans repeats only what he is told by his superiors: it isn’t proper for women to be in a stadium full of men; if the team were to lose, the women would be exposed to a litany of foul language. The absurdism of this logic presents itself quite clearly – how does keeping young women locked up inside a small fence like farm animals preserve their feminine dignity any more than exposing them to the type of distasteful language they themselves can’t refrain from using throughout the entire film? (These are, after all, a group of tough cookies, and for the non-Farsi speaker, much of the comedic ruse they parley is likely to be lost in translation).

In one of the most amusing and particularly symbolic scenes in the film, one of the girls (all of whom remain nameless) is desperate for a trip to the bathroom. The problem? There is no ladies’ restroom, so one of the subordinates finally consents to taking her to the men’s on the condition that she wear a poster of soccer player Ali Karimi over her face. When she complains on the way that she can’t see, the statement heaves with meaning: the characters blindly yield to laws which, in practice, are entirely illogical.

It is important to note that no one in the movie ever reveals a mean spirit. Two of the soldiers are from the outskirts of Iran and speak in humorous accents, implying they are less intelligent than the Tehrani girls (think a New Yorker’s general perception of a Kansan). By refraining from incorporating any “bad guys” in the film, Panahi reiterates: it’s not people who are bad, but the corrupt governments to which they must blindly succumb. This overt sentiment, far from introducing any sort of forward-thinking ideology, simply seems a bit too...well, simplistic.

What one might recognize as the slightly more intriguing underlying theme is the tantalizing power of the game itself. What makes soccer such a grand cultural phenomenon? In the final sequence, when the girls are heaped into a van on their way to their ambiguous punishments, the radio gleefully declares Iran’s victory over Bahrain. Everyone in the car starts cheering and hugging, tight-faced soldiers included. Iranians begin pouring in the streets in a swarm of luminous celebration: people dance, firecrackers spring toward the sky, and a random street vendor even enters the stalled van with a tray of pastries. As Panahi states in his interview, under no other circumstance, even at a political rally, would such a crowd ever gather in the streets. All of Iran becomes like an overly enthusiastic child celebrating the fact that its “national heroes” have... kicked a ball into a net?

By now, we’ve seen enough about the disarray created by the Islamic Republic. Most Americans are even privy to the vast number of restrictions placed upon the Iranian citizen. However, what is fresh about Panahi’s perspective in Offside – something too often excluded from his past films, most notably, and arguably his darkest film, The Circle – is insight into the only phenomenon that distracts Iranians from their daily plight and allows them to transcend into a state of pure joy. Parisa Vaziri
August 28, 2007