Oscar Hernandez
Fiqwas Writing Class
Michael Druffle
28 November 2019
Men and Class in Iran
A lot of people have talked about women in Iranian cinema. For example: Tara Povey, and Elaheh Rostami-Povey. Women, Power and Politics in the 21st Century Iran. Taylor and Francis, 2016,Tapper, Richard. The New Iranian Cinema : Politics, Representation and Identity. I.B. Tauris Publishers, 2002.have all explored how women are portrayed in post revolution Iran. But fewer studies have looked at how men have been portrayed in post revolution Iran. In this paper I am going to look at portrayals of men in Iranian cinema, specifically how different classes are portrayed differently. As Javaher says, “Through socialization and gendered personality development, the child forms a gender identity that in most cases reproduces the values, attitudes and behaviors the child’s social milieu deems appropriate for him or her” (Javaher, 366). She is largely correct in this statement, but she doesn’t note how class contributes to gender formation. Therefore I will answer that question by looking at several movies to see how class contributes to portrayals of masculinity in Iran after the Pahlavi Dynasty( which is the IRI 1979-current), and if any differences, how do the differences contribute on how they treat women.
Some might say that these films are biased and produced by men however these two films that I’ve critically reviewed are both directed by a female named Rakhshān,Bani Etemad.Therefore these films will not be trying to protect or cover up the image of men because they are created by a woman. Thus, the movies are made through the vision of a woman and her insight on life. Others might say that these movies are unrealistic and that they don’t show how men are truly are from different classes,that these films don’t portray real men in Iran. On the contrary, this statement is false, in an interview Rakhshan states “The characters in my movies, from the very first one up to now, although they are fictional characters, are based on people that I have lived with and that I have come across during my research for movies” (Interview. 2016). This clearly proves the fact the movies are realistic, that they portray the people of Iran and society as it is.
Though some people might have their doubts, an article talks about how Iraian films are created and how they portray the reality of the world. That the films makes us ponder about the society we live in. “^ Moreover, one of the motivations of Iranian cinema is to ponder the nature of reality and, in the manner of visual anthropology, to suggest a permanent discovery of the reality it offers us. Engaging with Iranian cinema involves the emotions, and requires that it should be lived. Images carry the responsibilities of memory and are part of the mourning process”(Abecassis,388) Although this article talks about war cinema, it can still connect to regular cinema. Thus proving the fact once again that Iranian cinema portrays reality and also tend to make us feel as if we were the characters.
In a film named Nargess which is the first film Rakhshān ever. It talks about a low class criminal named Adel who falls in love with a woman named Nagress(a low class woman) and tries to change the way he lives just to be with her. However Adel is already married with a middle aged woman and his crime partner named Afagh who despite knowing he loves another woman, she does everything she can to help Adel get Nargess and poses as her mother to help him. However despite Afagh helping Adel, Adel treats her horrible by screaming and telling her to keep her mouth shut. The important thing to notice in this film is how quickly Adel married Nargess and how poorly he treats Afagh. Another thing to notice in this film is how Adel can’t find a job since he has no education to get into a good job.Everyone rejects him because he is a low -class with little education
In another film called The Blue Veiled, it’s about an upper middle upper-class elder man named Rasul. He is a factory owner and manages his factory everyday, we can safely conclude that Rsul has had some kind of education since he is a factory owner and it’s hard to be able to manage a factory. falls in love with an employee named Nobar. Rasul was married but his wife died and he was left alone.Even though having kids, his kids grew up and each of them were left him to have their own family or to study. However Nobar is also a low class woman who has to take care of her family and is single.Even though she doesn’t have kids, she has a hard time taking care of her family because she is the only one able to work. One thing to notice in this film is how long it takes for Raful to marry Nobar and how well he treats all the women despite having money.Another thing is how well he treats the female employees and how long it took him to marry Nobar.
Notice how both of these men are from a different class and how they treat women very differently.However the only thing that is not different are the women they fall in love with, which are low class women. This is important to consider since both women are lower class,therefore it won’t be considered an independent variable.For those confused,an independent variable is defined as a variable that is changed or controlled(Helmenstine,2019). Therefore we can assume that the way the men treat a low class women is the same way they will treat women and it won’t change how they view women.
A major difference in both of these men is the amount of education they have .Raful has more education than Adel. we can verify this by watching Adel not being able to find a job. Thus leading him once again into a life of crime. On the other hand, Raful is a factory owner which require some type of education. Therefore we can conclude that Raful has more education which proves the statement that the higher the class.As The graph shown below(Isfahani,2016) men who live in urban areas(higher class) have more education than people from rural areas (low class man).This proves the point that men in higher class have more education than men in a lower class
Thus we can conclude that Iranian cinema portrays men masculinity depending on the type of class they are, thatmen in higher class tend to treat women better than men in a lower class. That the reason for this is the amount of education the man gets. Additionally that men are different from each other as women are also different from each other.
Work Cited
“Interview: Rakhshan Bani-E’temad.” Film Comment, 9 Oct. 2018,
Azadarmaki, Taghi, and Mehri Bahar. “Families in Iran: Changes, Challenges and Future.”
Journal of Comparative Family Studies, vol. 37, no. 4, 2006, pp. 589–608.,
doi:10.3138/jcfs.37.4.589.
Gerami, Shahin. “Mullahs, Martyrs, and Men.” Men and Masculinities, vol. 5, no. 3, 2003, pp.
257–274., doi:10.1177/1097184×02238526.
Helmenstine, Anne Marie. “Independent Variable Definition and Examples.” ThoughtCo,
ThoughtCo, 9 Jan. 2019,
Javaheri, Fatemeh. “A Study of Transsexuality in Iran.” Iranian Studies, vol. 43, no. 3, 2010, pp.
365–377. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/27919922.
Abecassis, Michaël. “Iranian War Cinema: Between Reality and Fiction.” Iranian Studies, vol.
44, no. 3, 2011, pp. 387–394., doi:10.1080/00210862.2011.556390.
Isfahani, Djavad Salehi. “Iran: Poverty and Inequality Since the Revolution.” Brookings,
Brookings, 12 Aug. 2016,
