Tuesday, November 17, 2015

Cinema Clips: Jafar Panahi’s Taxi

Posted By on Tue, Nov 17, 2015 at 11:30 AM


Filmmaker Jafar Panahi is not allowed to make films in his native Iran. He’s got about 15 years left on that sentence. Plus, he can’t give interviews or travel. His ideas are too dangerous, you see. Even though he’s forbidden from making movies, he’s still churned out three in the past four years, each of which has been smuggled out of the country. His latest, “Jafar Panahi’s Taxi,” picked up the prize for best picture at the Berlin International Film Festival this year, although a lot of that is likely symbolic. There’s some ingenuity in “Taxi,” but it’s not an all-timer. Forbidden to pursue his art, Panahi poses as a cabbie and talks to Iranians about all sorts of things. It’s certainly interesting—and worth the watch just to give the finger to oppressive theocratic rule and support free speech—but “Taxi” doesn’t offer much but good conversation.