I don’t believe we’ve already reached this year’s season of lists, much less that we’ve reached the point where “Best Blanks of the Decade” lists are being circulated.  But, as Pete Lit points out, we’ve already got the Times Online UK’s Best Books of the Decade list to ponder.  For the most part, I think ranked lists of literature like this are only useful in establishing what books are well regarded generally, and not useful in any comparative sense. So #98 is not necessarily much “worse” than #12.  Still, I have to admit that I’m always interested (from a cultural literacy standpoint) in finding out what’s what.

Here are the books from the the Times UK list that I’ve read, and a quick comment:

• #89 The Enchantress of Florence by Salman Rushdie (2008) – Certainly the best book of Rushdie’s from the past decade.
• #81 The Emperor’s Children by Claire Messud (2006) — A meditation on morality that leaves you liking almost none of the characters.
• #50 No Logo: Taking Aim at the Brand Bullies by Naomi Klein (2000) – Klein is very persuasive & thorough in looking at the psychology of branding and corporate identity formation (her subsequent books on economics are nowhere near as solid)
• #44 Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner (2005) — Uchicago prof makes you go hm…
  
• #33 Chronicles: Volume One by Bob Dylan (2004) — I was stunned by how good Chronicles was.  The distinctness of Dylan’s voice and the uniqueness of the literary style made this a thoroughly enjoyable read.
• #24 Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro (2005) – Ishiguro steps lightly into the world of science fiction with magnificent results.
• #20 White Teeth by Zadie Smith (2000) — Eventhough the story fell apart in the end, Smith’s pacing and voice was fresh.
• #12 A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers (2000) – I didn’t much like AHWOSG when I read it in 2001, but have loved everything else by Eggers that I’ve read since then.  Makes me want to revisit this book.
• #6 The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference by Malcolm Gladwell (2000) –  Gladwell’s gift is his engaging writing-style and the fresh perspective he brings to most topics.   He’s often guilty of over-simplification, and of ignoring established disciplines when they don’t suit him, but he always makes you think.
• #3 Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance by Barack Obama (2004) – A great book that was really released in 1995, Obama would have been lauded as a great writer had he not ventured into American politics.
• #2 Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi (2003) — A remarkably good graphic novel, packed with much more history than the film version.

The rest of these are on my “to read” shelf or a wish list of some variety

• #1 The Road by Cormac McCarthy (2006) – I’ve been meaning to read this for a year now, and am now going to wait until we get to the desolate part of the Chicago winter
• #98 Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (2007) — want to read
• #54 Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation by Lynne Truss (2003) — Bought, traded away, still want to read
  
• #32 Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer (2002) – On my waiting to read shelf at home
• #28 The Rest is Noise: Listening to the Twentieth Century by Alex Ross (2007) – On my waiting to read shelf at home
• #The plot against america by Philip Roth (2004) — On my waiting to read shelf at home
• #14 Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books by Azar Nafisi (2003) — On my waiting to read shelf at home

Marjane Satrapi, Chicken with Plums, 2004
This is not as long as Satrapi’s more famous works Persepolis 1 and Persepolis 2 but it carries the same emotional punch and beauty. It’s more of a short story that can be read over a few hours, with a final scene that takes you by surprise with its poetic beauty and tragedy. Chicken with Plums is the favourite dish of Nasser Ali Khan, a renowned master of the tar and a distant relative of Marjane’s. The story follows the 8 days Nasser lay in his bedroom in 1958 (11 years before her birth), intent on dying while memories of his past flooded his mind. Mixing fact and fiction, Marjane explores Iranian family life and culture through his story, with her customary incisive attacks on the Revolution and America/Britain’s damage to her country. Definitely one of those books you must read and share with your loved ones.

Every year, Transparency International makes a list of the most corrupt countries in the world. I searched through the blogs to find out more about each one, from a travelers’ perspective.

1. Somalia

Hardiek at the border of Somalia

“For those of you who don’t know (almost everybody, including me up until a few weeks ago) the once unified country of Somalia is now effectively divided into three, the rump Somalia surrounding dangerous Mogadishu, the country of Puntland from which all the ship piracy of recent fame takes place, and Somaliland, relatively peaceful and open for business, connected by land to the also relatively peaceful states of Djibouti and Ethiopia.” – Hardiek

2. Afghanistan

Samcato telling home base about an explosion in Afghanistan

“From ‘grease my palm’ to ‘oil-fill my bellybutton’: corruption has penetrated the political, economic, judicial and social systems so thoroughly that it has ceased to be a deviation from the norm and become the norm itself. Corruption had existed ever since the Taliban regime was toppled, but it has reached a historically record breaking level. Ordinary Afghans are well aware of this, the majority of the country is sorry, not because it existed but they are not in a position to benefit from bribery. Corruption has become so endemic that it is perceived as normal. Nothing is possible at the same time, everything is possible. When a job comes to a standstill it doesn’t mean there is a problem with the job, it is time to grease up some bellybuttons. If one is prepared to pay as much as needed then anything could be done. Shortcuts are introduced if one is willing to compromise. I could have thought of any word as synonyms for bribery but not compromise, Farsi and Pashto languages are rich with euphemisms for bribe. My favorite and all time fresh is ‘Shirini’, the sweetener. It is generally used when you got something done. In other words shirini is post bribery bribe. Don’t be surprised. At least I had something done, these days ordinary citizens pay bribes as much to be left alone as to get something done. They call it ‘Kharcha’, ‘paeesi chai’, ‘jawani’ and many more which are basically *bribe of survival*. Exactly this has changed everything; everyone attempts to be in a position to take a bribe as oppose to a sucker. Bribe takers are at the highest rank of the society where everybody inspires to be.” – Samcato

3. Myanmar

Markl's tour guide "Stella" spoke about the corruption in her country

“Stella was forthcoming about the current regime and it’s appalling corruption. They have moved the capital inland and have created an insane, artificial compound where the military and civil servants live in pampered luxury. They are building a zoo, of all things there, and transporting the animals from Yangon zoo to fill it. So the people in the capital get a few old camels and the rest get shipped 300 miles inland. Civil service pensions are no better, her mother receives 100 Kyat or $0,10 a day. Stella’s bitterness was mainly reserved for the treatment of the poor who seem to have been mainly abandoned by the political rulers. The stories of aid for rural people post Cyclone Nargis in 2009 were terrifying.” – Markl

4. Sudan

Bonthorn on the road in Sudan

“You have two choices when you come to a roadblock. You can play Mr./Mrs. Nice Guy/Gal and greet the officer as if you’ve known him your whole life, shake hands amicably and ask about his health, his family, their health, etc. Calling him ‘my friend’ and patting him on the back is also a good tactic (although never try this if you are female). After all the formalities are completed, he might just let you off the hook and wish you a “Good Journey”. The second option is to play dumb and pretend you have no idea what the officer is saying, although it’s blatantly obvious. Keep jabbering in English in a tone that is neither offensive nor accusing, and sooner or later, he will hopefully tire of you and your feigned stupidity and wave you on. So far, these are the two choices we’ve attempted, both at pretty successful rates. But the key is to pick one and stick to it BEFORE your car is stopped and you’re face to face with him and his gun.” – Bonthorn

5. Iraq

Rebecca.mcneal went through several checkpoints in Iraq

“After passing through numerous checkpoints, Iraqi, Pesmerga and Awakening Council fighter types we neared Mosul. Mosul was the only place that was worrisome. We passed by a truck bomb site that had killed 250 people in the recent past. We were not allowed to photograph checkpoints which were all manned with machine guns.” – Rebecca.mcneal

6. Chad

Kevandsian picked up some unexpected hitchhikers in Chad

“Crossing into Chad was surprisingly hassle free, the police in this country have a bad reputation for being corrupt and subtracting bribes and ‘tolls’ at every opportunity. We took a hitch hiker at the request of the police and also transported a soldier to the next village. We then gave another 5 police and military personnel lifts to neighboring towns 55 kms away,becoming the essential local transport as the first truck to pass through in 6-7 days. We decided this might help avoid searches and bribes at police stops and ease our journey. They did help at one small town where the police demanded a 16 dollar fee per person for registering and stamping our passports which was eventually avoided successfully.” – Kevandsian

7. Uzbekistan

Crowdywendy's tour guide in Uzbekistan, Behruz

Our first morning in Bukhara introduced us to the entrenched police and official corruption in Uzbekistan. It was our first introduction to “bakeesh” or bribes to officials. At the first Bukhara bank we were told that we were not allowed in. “Why not?” we asked. It was a very large bank and there were numerous tellers open everywhere. Well, we just couldn’t. The police were stationed at the entrance of the bank and would not let people in. Well, of course with a little bribe they would… But we resisted and moved on to yet another bank, and another. Later that evening while talking with other hotel guests, we were told that it is not uncommon for locals to have to try ten or so different banks before they would be allowed entry. The young local people were openly disgusted with the practice.

Similarly, bakeesh is a common practice with the police. There are frequent road blocks throughout Uzbekistan. While we had no problems thanks to Naim calling out “tourists!” at every point we were told over and over again by locals about the road police. Apparently being a police officer on the roads is a much sought after profession. Although they are dreadfully underpaid they certainly make up for it in bribes or bakeesh.” – Crowdywendy

8. Turkmenistan

Ricka leaving the "ferry from hell" in Turkmenistan

We loaded on-board after a trainload of freight was stowed and we were squeezed in between the carriages and the crew started to hassle us for “Security Fees”. We all had the sense to tell them to get lost! We were on at last! Another trip back into the customs hall to get our final clearance and it was back on board, passports handed over to a dodgy looking guy along with $90 and then a stagger up to the deck with our luggage. We wondered why there were loads of crewmembers smiling and laughing at us, little did we know!
The dodgy guy we gave our passports and cash to started to try to explain that if we wanted a cabin they were $100. We said no thanks, at that price we could manage the 12 hour crossing on the deck. I had a suspicion that things may not go to plan so I followed a crew down into the ship to have a look at a cabin. He showed me two of the filthyest, run-down excuses for cabins I had ever seen, with the “bathrooms” being even worse. I haggled with the guy anyway as I knew this was a “take it or leave it” situation and I settled on twenty bucks per cabin – I thought we would be needing them!” – Ricka

9. Iran

Jimsim at Persepolis in Shiraz, Iran

“While Sim took a few snaps of the mosque I chatted to a local soldier who was visiting the mosque. He was very young, and was very upbeat about Iran’s prospects for the future. While not stating a preference for either the hardline or more moderate of Iran’s leaders he seemed to believe that by keeping the right (positive) attitude the people of Iran would pull the country in the right direction. It was hard not to be caught up in his enthusiasm. He was also extremely helpful while we were there, happily answering the barrage of questions I had about Shiraz and it’s major attractions.” – Jimsim

10. Haiti

Mim301 on her first day volunteering in Haiti

“It is so hard to believe that so many people in Haiti live in poverty because of such a corrupt government, but that the beaches and mountains are so beautiful. I guess that this is just another one of life’s great mysteries.” – Mim301

It seems a little premature to me, but Times Online, the Web version of the United Kingdom’s The Times and Sunday Times newspapers has recently released their picks for the Top 100 Films of the decade (the ‘Noughties’ as they’ve called them).

It’s quite a comprehensive list, and certainly worth a once-over for movie buffs, but I do have some quibbles over a few of their choices — and not just because I’ve never seen or heard of their selection for the best movie of the decade.

Their number one was a French-language film from 2005 directed by Austrian filmmaker Michael Haneke called Hidden (Also known as Caché). Back in 2005 this film premiered at Cannes and swept the European Film Awards, winning Best Film, Best Director, and Best Actor — but it didn’t get a single Oscar nod. So, like me, you’ve probably never even heard of it.

The inclusion of a film like this proves the people making the list have done a little homework and been sure not to neglect international cinema. Movies from Belgium, Germany, France, Japan, and elsewhere show up on the list. Some notable non-Hollywood films they’ve included that I have seen include: Persepolis, an animated film from 2007 based on a young girl’s true experiences in Iran and France during the time of the Iranian Revolution; and htY tu mamá también a racy Mexican drama from 2001 about two teenage boys and an older woman’s trip from urban privileged Mexico City to a rural beach paradise.
Persepolis, which got an Academy Award nomination in 2007, came in at 69 on the list, while Y tu mamá también turned up at number 35.

Of course, the obvious tilt of the list is toward big-budget Western blockbusters, like the James Bond revamp Casino Royale, which pops up in eighth, or both Bourne Identity sequels, which inexplicably share the second place spot on the top 100 list.

It’s a list from the UK so I would expect strong showings from movies like The Queen or that Bond picture, but it would’ve been nice to have seen a little better representation from Canada.
Not a single Canadian film appears on the list. Granted, there are movies filmed but not set in Canada — ‘Hollywood North,’ as they call it — like Brokeback Mountain, and movies starring Canadian leading men fared all right (Jim Carrey in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind in at 14, and Seth Rogen in Knocked Up at a respectable 49), but no films set in Canada featuring Canadians in front of or behind the camera show up on the list.

The only Canadian filmmaker on the list is Paul Haggis, of London, Ontario, who came in at a lowly 99th place with his brilliant 2004 film Crash. Crash, which features a compelling, interweaving story about life in L.A., won three Oscars including Best Picture and Best Screenplay, but, according to Times Online, this isn’t enough to compete with Casino Royale, which features Daniel Craig in a speedo.

When I look at cinematic offerings from Canada like Men With Brooms, I understand the skepticism of some that don’t believe there were any Canadian films from this decade deserving to be on an international list like this. However, I can think of at least one, and no, it’s not Slap Shot 3: The Junior League.

The Barbarian Invasions (or, Les Invasions Barbares) is a French-Canadian film from 2003 directed by Denys Arcand. Set in contemporary Montreal, it tells the story of aged and eccentric Québécois academics that come together to spend time with a dying friend before he is claimed by cancer. In 2004, the film became the first from Canada to win the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film. Evidently, the Times Online people left films like this off their list in order to make room for raunchy comedies like Wedding Crashers, 90th on the list, and Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy, 62nd.

Instead of making a list list full of obscure titles that would please critics, or one that was wall-to-wall with well-known Hollywood vehicles to please your average fan, Times Online opted for a list that would please neither.

Not only that, but there’s still a month left in this decade, and some very hyped up movies are on their way in the next month.

Coming out in time for the festive season— and before the end of the decade — are movies such as: The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, which is notable for being Heath Ledger’s last filmic role and for the casting acrobatics director Terry Gilliam had to perform following Ledger’s death midway through shooting — Johnny Depp, Colin Farrel, and Jude Law fill in as Ledger’s character in various scenes; Invictus, the story of the underdog 1995 South African rugby team that united the post-apartheid nation, starring Morgan Freeman as Nelson Mandela; and Avatar, an out there sci-fi thriller from heavy weight director James Cameron (Terminator 1 & 2, Titanic).

It’s certainly been a great decade for the cinema — in Hollywood, here in Hollywood North, and around the world, but I’ll hold off on making my top 100 list until 2010, I’ve got high hopes for Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakuel.

I’m getting pumped for GENaustin’s Girls Now! conference, which is taking place today at the Ann Richards School. I’m doing two music history workshops with Kristen, along with GRCA alums Izzy and LaRessa and we’re gonna rock. 

I also wanted to remind you that the Austin Asian American Film Festival is still going strong this weekend. AAAFF is showing Persepolis for free tonight at Town Lake. I’ll be at a friend’s birthday party and won’t be able to make it, but hopefully I’ll see you at the JenRo/MenRG show at the Music Gym later tonight. Before swinging by Nomad for Karaoke Underground, of course. And while I won’t be able to attend the first Paradise Titty show at the Creekside Lounge, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t.

Since AAAFF’s got me thinking about independent and/or arthouse cinema, I thought I’d highlight a music video that was clearly inspired by the avant-garde. I present Milla Jovovich’s “The Gentleman Who Fell” music video, which was inspired by Maya Deren’s “Meshes of the Afternoon.” If you have any arthouse-inspired music video suggestions, please share!

Milla Jovovich
“The Gentleman Who Fell”
The Divine Comedy
Directed by Archard/Garner

Inspired by Maya Deren’s “Meshes of the Afternoon”

Hace unos cuantos dias puse en el post que peliculas veria veria antes de morir, pero creo que he cambiado de opinión, creo que encontraria el timpo para ver PERSEPOLIS, esta pelicula me sorprendió cuando la vi, aunque es animada no es para niños, es una de las mejores animaciones que he visto, la trama es muy buena, te hace reir, sentir tristeza, te transmite muchas cosas y eso es lo que una buena pelicula hace. Ya se porque ganó el oscar. Si no la han visto, mmm, ¿que esperan?

Last week I got a copy of a graphic novel memoir about a young woman growing up in Iran. That wasn’t called Persepolis. This was Nylon Road by Parsua Bashi and that Persepolis comparison is all over this book. Persepolis is mentioned in the first line of the book’s back cover summary. In one of the later chapters Bashi has drawn herself reading Persepolis. All through my time reading it I was comparing it to Persepolis, and it definitely comes off the weaker.

Bashi tells her story of growing up in Iran and emigrating to Switzerland in the form of a series of conversations with herself from different ages. It’s a decent enough setup to compare her views now with views she had at different ages. Speaking of ages, the back cover talks about it being a young woman’s struggles but she was 40 when the book was published. The point of view throughout is much more mature than young as she tells us about how she used to think. It’s broken into small chapters that aren’t very sequential. More of a collection of ruminations. Selah.

Art-wise, there’s not a lot exciting going on. She uses a similar simple style to Satrapi’s work in Persepolis, which is fine, but doesn’t help avoid comparisons between the two.

I wasn’t a huge fan of the book. Maybe if Persepolis isn’t available and you need a memoir about a woman growing up in Iran this would be fine. It would also work very well as a secondary source in an essay about the graphic memoir form (in a “in books like Persepolis and Nylon Road…” kind of way).

Op 20 oktober projecteerden we de film Persepolis. De titel van de film is een verwijzing naar de historische Iraanse stad Persepolis.

Het verhaal begint vlak voor de Iraanse revolutie en wordt verteld vanuit het perspectief van de dan negenjarige Satrapi. Hoewel haar oma en ouders in eerste instantie blij zijn dat sjah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi de macht wordt afgenomen, verandert dit snel daarna, wanneer de nieuwe machthebbers een nog veel repressiever beleid blijken te voeren. Tijdens de Islamitische revolutie blijkt dat bovendien de positie van de vrouw in de samenleving in het bijzonder onder de onderdrukking lijdt.

De studiekring toonde op ??? de film Persepolis. Enzovoort enzovoort

Rujm al-Malfouf

To be honest, I wanted to call this topic “two mysterious sites”, but as we all know, ancient historians must avoid clichés like “mystery”, “lost city”, and “treasure” – that would be the equivalent of “gathering war clouds”, “ghosts from the past”, or “child of nature”. Yet, today I have to introduce two sites that are, well, quite mysterious:

• Takht-e Rostam: a stone structure near Persepolis (Iran)
• Rujm al-Malfouf: an Ammonite Iron Age fort in Amman (Jordan)

Go there to learn more, and understand less. Two other items: LacusCurtius‘ Bill Thayer has added an article on Roman fire worship to his Antiquaries’ Shoebox, and on his blog, Bill Heroman refers to a common mistake about the Temple of Herod.

Hey all,

Just wanted to let you know that this Monday, 11/9 at 6:30 in Bldg 52 Room B05 we will be playing the movie “Iraq in Fragments” and two weeks from now on11/18 we will be showing “Persepolis” in the same room at 6pm. Stay tuned for updates!

Sometimes I, when I am not being made crazy by his third-grader shenanigans, think I should be sitting at my youngest son’s feet learning the secrets of life and the wisdom of the world. You have already been made privy to his theological opining. Now listen to an example of the kind of things he says while reading the comics in the morning paper:

Youngest Son: Who’s Ken Burns?

Yiddishe Mamme: He’s a documentary filmmaker. He’s made film series about things like baseball and the Civil War. He just made one about the National Parks.

YS: What do you call a person who makes movies? A book writer is an author and a painter is an artist. So what do you call a person who makes movies?

YM: A filmmaker.

YS: Oh. Authors, artists and filmmakers are important people.

YM: What do they do that is important?

YS: They entertain us.

YM: How do they do that?

YS: You know – artists make pictures we can gaze [his word] at, authors make books we can read, and filmmakers make movies we can watch.

YM: So why is that so important?

YS: Because otherwise we would just be running up and down the sidewalks with nothing to do.

Now, that’s an image to ponder. Just like the ones cartoonists and animators put in their work for us to think about. I am a big fan of these artists, because I think that cartoons, comics, animated films and graphic novels (aside from their being amusing) provide access to learning for those of us who are less verbally inclined, while concurrently helping the rest of us strengthen our visual literacy skills.

New and surprising subject matter for R. Crumb

We are all bombarded with images these days, but how many of us ever take the time to really look at something? Sure, we get the basic information we need to from the big picture, but we often miss out on gaining a nuanced understanding. In our fast paced world, we often forget that in many cases it is, as the saying goes, all in the details.

There are those who would think that an illustrated version amounts to a dumbing down of a text, that a cartoon or animated work is a complicated idea made simple for either young children or the lesser literates among us. On the contrary, many highly talented and intellectual authors, visual artists and filmmakers are opting for graphic novels and animated films as vehicles for expressing their own complex and layered thoughts, or to interpret classic or ancient narratives.

A page from JT Waldman's Megillat Esther

True, not every ouevre in this genre rises to the level of which I speak. Superhero, Archie or Pokémon comic books would not cut it. The works which I am lauding here are ones like JT Waldman’s Megillat Esther, a very sophisticated and knowledgeable depiction of the Book of Esther which visually intertwines multiple midrashic and Rabbinic commentaries with the biblical text, presenting them through illustrations that are at the same time delicately detailed and boldly raw. The Rabbi’s Cat, by Joann Sfar, although illustrated in a very different style (and in color rather than black and white), made its narrative – a clever and creative story of Jewish life in Algeria – similarly come alive.

A page from Joann Sfar's The Rabbi's Cat

Some graphic novels are meant to be less metaphorical and intend to simply illustrate an historic event or an experience from the author’s life. R. Crumb, in a recent interview on NPR, said that his work on his newly released The Book of Genesis was a “straight illustration job.”  I cannot comment on this new book by Crumb, since I have not yet had a chance to read it. However, I would say that in the case of Art Spiegelman’s Maus (the first graphic novel I read) or Will Eisner’s The Plot, both of which appear on the surface to be “straight illustration jobs,” are to a certain degree interpretive by nature of their genre.

Will Eisner explicates the origins and history of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion in The Plot

Sometimes even those of us with supposedly strong verbal intelligence just don’t “get it,” until someone draws us a picture. That was what happened for me with The Plot by Will Eisner.  I can’t tell you how many times I had read about the Protocols of the Elders of Zion during the course of my studies and as a teacher. It wan’t until I came across Eisner’s organized, methodical and detailed rendition of the long, convoluted and sordid history of this dangerous hoax that I finally fully grasped it.

Graphic novels, comics and cartoons vary widely in style and purpose. But at the core of this genre is the concept of the visual metaphor. That is what makes it so powerful and so useful not only for enjoyment by adults, but also for the education of children. In a curriculum I authored quite a number of years ago on the use of maxims and proverbs to teach morality, I included a lot of cartoons and comic strips. My high school students’ familiarity and ease with the comics’ metaphoric nature helped ease them into an in-depth study of the metaphoric imagery of classic Jewish and American maxims.

The first Palestinian animated film is the biography of a young woman who died because of the stigma of breast cancer in her culture and the political-military realities of the Middle East.

The box office popularity and critical acclaim of recent animated autobiographical films like Waltz With Bashir and Persepolis show that the animated graphic novel is catching on with an adult audience. I am eager to see a new film, the first animated one to come out of the Palestinian Territories. It is called Fatenah and tells the real and tragic tale of a young Palestinian woman’s struggle to have her breast cancer properly diagnosed and treated.

Even Disney’s The Prince of Egypt, which on the surface appears to be merely an animated feature length children’s movie, can be analyzed for its midrashic content and usage of visual metaphors to deepen the sparse biblical pshat narrative. Just ask my former students (who were also subjected to my using Waldman’s Megillat Esther as our main text for studying that book).

Sarah Lefton, a young Jewish educational entrepreneur, clearly apprehends the power of the cartoon, the visual metaphor and the art of animation. She, in her G-dcast project, has combined all three in an ingenious way to teach children – and all interested parties of any age – the weekly Torah portion. She has enlisted talented artists and writers, primarily the voices of the new Jewish generation, to show kids that comics are not just for laughs…but that that, in no way, should stop you from having a lot of fun with them.

© 2009 Renee Ghert-Zand. All rights reserved.

Reading Lu’s review of Embroideries by Marjane Satrapi reminded me that I had never read the second part of Persepolis. In a rare stroke of luck I found that I still had both books (borrowed ages ago from a friend…!) and plenty of time to read, between the other night and the slowest shift at the theater yet this fall, and a chunk of yesterday afternoon free.

I was just as blown away the second time round as the first. As a graphic novel, Satrapi’s work delivers on every level. Her use of line and black and white is so vivid. Her images, while simple, burst with emotion. And of course the story of her life – growing up in Iran during the Islamic Revolution, followed by her separation as a 13 year old from her parents, and her experiences in Vienna – is fascinating.

Satrapi’s work is amazingly understated. She presents her life in stark black and white, while in reality it was nowhere near simple. As the child of radical parents, and surrounded by a constant flow of revolts, wars, and religious tyranny, her childhood was a difficult struggle to keep up, to try to understand. Her own shifting ideals provide an amazing glimpse into a world that is hard for me to even comprehend. Satrapi’s gift is that she can take this unfamiliar reality and make it accessible by just telling it like it happened – there she was, a girl, a normal kid in a far from normal situation, who had hopes and dreams like anyone else, like myself. This is how she coped, this is how she grew up, and this is how she survived.

Persepolis is, simply, a wonderful book.

I enjoy reading. It’s a family tradition. Shopping for us is buying books wherever we are. I love books and being surrounded by books so it’s no surprise that I like going to the library – Singapore libraries are fantastic – and Borders and Kinokuniya, the haven of bibliophiles. So when a friend suggested I pick up Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi there was no hesitation on my part until he added, “It’s a graphic novel.”  And that’s when I vacillated – I have problems reading bubbles. I read lines in the balloons but I forget to look at the illustrations. The last graphic novel I read was about a Filipino superhero – he turned into Super Girl after swallowing a magical stone.

But I breezed through bubble reading with Persepolis. The black-and-white illustrations were straightforward in its depiction of Satrapi’s childhood in Iran. They didn’t overshadow the wit, sarcasm and irony of the child, teenager and, finally, adult, as one followed her personal history, which was inextricably linked to her country’s history. It was Iran’s history in comics.

It begins with The Veil where the author/artist is 10 years old and is wearing the veil in 1980 in school. A revolution occurred in Iran a year before; a year later the revolution was called Islamic Revolution in which it became mandatory to wear the veil to school. The next frame read, “We didn’t really like to wear the veil, especially since we didn’t understand why we had to” [page 3] and the drawings succinctly captured the vacillation.  One student decided to play around with by putting it over her face, saying, “Ooh! I’m the monster of darkness.” Another decided to use it as reins– her classmate was the horse and she the equestrienne shouting “Giddy up!” A third classmate decided to tie up all the veils into a skipping rope.

She and her classmates didn’t understand the need for the veil because a year before the revolution they were in a French non-religious school where boys and girls were together. However, a year later, it was announced that “Bilingual schools were to be closed down (as) they were symbols of capitalism, of decadence.”

“This was called a ‘Cultural Revolution’. We found ourselves veiled and separated from our friends,” wrote Satrapi, “And that was that.”

This was also the period that Satrapi decided she wanted to be a prophet. Her teacher was perturbed and called her parents who were not bothered by their daughter’s declaration at all.

In The Water Cell [pages 18 – 25] the reader is privy to Satrapi’s history when her father related her family’s background, revealing their unique place in the historical annals of Iran. [Aside: I’m reminded, for some reason, of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s her family history.]

Father: God did not choose the king…

“The truth is that 50 years ago the Father of the Shah, who was a soldier, organized a putsch to over thrown the emperor and install a republic. At the time the Republican ideal was popular in the region but everybody interpreted it in his own way. For example, Gandhi in India, Ataturk in Turkey.

Father: So the Father of the Shah wanted to do the same. But he wasn’t educated like Gandhi, who was a lawyer or was he a leader of men like Ataturk who was a general.

“He was an illiterate low-ranking officer. A blessing for the very influential British who soon learned of his projects.

British: When you are Emperor, your Secretary of State will shine them for you.

Reza: Emperor, me?

British: But, of course, my friend. It’s much better than being President.

Reza: What do I have to do?

British: Nothing! You just give us the oil and we’ll take care of the rest.

Father: And that’s how he became king and naturally his son succeeded him. God has nothing whatsoever to do with this story…The Emperor that was overthrown was Grandpa’s father.

And since his entourage was uneducated, your Grandpa was named Prime Minister…He had studied in Europe. He was a very cultivated man. He had even read Marx. Once he was sidetracked from his Princely duties he began to meet intellectuals. So he became a communist and he was jailed often.

Mother: Sometimes they put him in a cell filled with water for hours.

The subsequent strips recount Satrapi’s experiences through her growing up years: the Iraqis bombing Iran; the scarcity of food and gasoline; the dislocation of friends and relatives whose houses were destroyed by Iraqi missiles; the prohibition of holding parties and drinking wine; the crackdown on people going against the Islamic code of living; her parents’ decision to send her to Austria in 1984 to “escape a religious Iran for an open and secular Europe” and the discovery that her mother’s best friend, Zozo, was not who she thought she would be; her cultural dislocation in Austria and epiphany; her heartaches; and her return to Iran and her decision to leave again.

Satrapi: “…Not having been able to build anything in my own country, I prepared to leave it once again. I went to France for the first time in June 1994 to take a test to enter the school of Decorative Arts in Strasbourg. I was accepted. Then I had to go back to Iran to exchange my tourist visa for a student visa. [page 339]

Between June and September 1994, the date of my definitive departure, I spent every morning wandering in the mountains of Tehran, where I memorized every corner. [page 340]

The graphic novel ends on a bittersweet note. The departure was different from 10 years ago – her mother didn’t faint and her grandmother was there.

Satrapi: “Since the night of September 9, 1994, I only saw (Grandma) once, during the Iranian New Year in March 1995. She died January 4, 1996….Freedom had a price…” [page 341]

Persepolis es la historia autobiográfica de Marjane Satrapi que luego del libro se vuelve peli animada gracias también a Vincent Paronnaud en 2007.

Persepolis fue la capital ceremonial del Imperio Persa durante del siglo VI A.C al siglo IV A.C. Está situado al nororiente de Shiraz en la provincia Farsi del Irán moderno.

Irán es un país, que al igual que sus vecinos, ha vivido en guerra como parte de su historia. Poco sabemos de la dinastía Qajar y de cómo esta colapsó para darle paso a las dinastías de Reza Khan y después la de su hijo Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. Mientras Reza Khan se volvió Shá de Irán y se alió con rusos e ingleses para mantener su reinado a cambio de petróleo, su hijo se alió con ingleses y rusos desconcertados de filiaciones nazis del padre, en la Segunda Guerra Mundial, e invitaron a Estados Unidos a controvertir y manipular el estado mediante una guerra fría. Sin embargo, el petróleo fue nacionalizado por el primer ministro y obtuvo una gran popularidad en el pueblo. Estados Unidos saboteó esa popularidad y en aras de conseguir el control del petróleo arrestó al primer ministro y prácticamente volvió el gobierno del Shá una tiranía.

Comenzó una guerra intelectual entre el gobierno y el líder espiritual musulman Ayatollah Khomeini quien criticó fuertemente la posición norteaméricana y su visión imperialista sobre Irán. El Shá no pudo contra ese poder ideológico y prácticamente sucumbió a sus ideologías. Este hecho fue precedido por una cruenta guerra civil entre afines del Shá y las guerrillas comunistas del Ayatollah quien al final promovió una teocracia de un líder supremo en alianza con ambos bandos. Las relaciones con Estados Unidos se deterioraron fuertemente y causaron una brecha diplomática que Irak aprovechó para invadir territorios en cuestión desde periodos del Shá y se emprendió la fuerte guerra entre Irak e Irán. Guerra que dejó millares de muertos y que después del conocimiento público de que Estados Unidos favorecía ambos bandos se recrudeció la fuerte posición anti-occidentalista y el fundamentalismo local.

Este contenido tan particularmente político en esta entrada es necesario por el hecho de que Satrapi, en su libro y en su peli, muestra su perspectiva como mujer idealista, comunista y revolucionaria dentro de un Irán fundamentalista, en continua guerra donde gracias a la idelogía de avanzada de sus padres y de su abuela logra ser íntegra y contestaria.

Esta peli encarna muchas cosas interesantes para mi gusto y aunque no fue tan fuerte con la presencia y protagonismo estadounidense en estos conflictos (recordar que la política beligerante de Ronald Reagan entre 1981 y 1989 se basó en la eliminación de facciones comunistas mediante patrocinio internacional e ilícito de las fuerzas contrarias así como del recrudecimiento de una guerra fría que al final dió como resultado el desmoronamiento de Unión Sovietica en una occidentalización a través de la controvertida Perestroika de Mikhail Gorbachev), me encantó que trató de ser muy imparcial en muchos sentidos.

Me encantó la ternura de la infante Satrapi y su forma descarada lúdica de ver el mundo, apoyando ingenuamente las ideologías que se debatían en su casa cual metáfora de lo que vivía su pueblo en constante cambio gubernamental.

NOTA. Logré descubrir muchas canciones populares en la peli, unas más obvias que otras, pero descubrir One de Metallica fue una verdadera sorpresa. Me dicen que hubo algo de Radiohead pero no estoy remotamente seguro. Es divertido sentarse a analizar este punto y redescubrir la cultura popular del rock en las sociedades modernas.

La animación es exquisita, no es sencilla, ni tampoco su ilustración, es un toque fatalista pero valga la redundancia exquisitamente lograda.

]]> http://locomotiveblog.wordpress.com/2009/10/26/new-iranian-cinema-%e2%80%93-digital-revolution-hub-or-political-stomping-ground/ Mon, 26 Oct 2009 00:16:36 +0000 Locomotive http://locomotiveblog.wordpress.com/2009/10/26/new-iranian-cinema-%e2%80%93-digital-revolution-hub-or-political-stomping-ground/ http://anothercraftblog.wordpress.com/2009/10/23/its-the-not-final-at-all-countdown/ Fri, 23 Oct 2009 03:56:14 +0000 earacceb http://anothercraftblog.wordpress.com/2009/10/23/its-the-not-final-at-all-countdown/

"Make it grow!".....well....wrong movie...

Things being as they are, my camera is down with a bad case of Not-Working due to AA deficiency, and my craft logging grinds to a halt. My crafting, however, is still in full swing and I have some pretty exciting stuff to post once I hunt down some batteries.

In the meantime…

Wouldn’t a facebook group for loners be ironic?

I’ve developed a thing for short men. I’ve been struggling to not care about my epic height, but now it’s gone full reversal and men of diminuitive stature tug on my heartstrings. I just wanna hug ‘em.

Tomorrow I get to see Where The Wild Things Are. My expectations are pretty high. Coraline was fantastic, 9 had amazing art but horrible dialogue, Ponyo was a giddy treat that left warm fuzzies in my insides for days, and all-in-all, I’m digging the animation revolution aimed at a variety of audience. Does our appreciation for imagination stop after elementary school? I think not. Expect a Top Ten Animated Films You Absolutely Must See list coming soon.

Actually, here one is, as it currently stands, in no particular order:

1. Tekkonkinkreet - plot is beautiful, soundtrack haunting, pacing intense. Character development: delicious.

Click to preview the AMAZING opening!!!

2. Spirited Away – Miyazaki. ‘Nuff said. Following up Spirited Away…

Teatime in your subconscious.

3. Howl’s Moving Castle

Did this inspire me to pursue architecture? Possibly...

4. Ponyo (In my opinion, these are the best three, but his others are still DEFINITELY worth your time)

Magical girl-fish in a bucket.

5. Paprika – Not sure I totally got it the first time, to be honest. But I watched the parade scene upwards of ten times and downloaded the music. Satoshi Kon (sp?).  And will definitely watch it again to untangle the plot a little further.

Clicketty-click for the opening!

6. Coraline – Aspects of all the Grimm&Anderson tales we knew and loved growing up…in our parallel universe where The Little Mermaid actually died and Snow White was vengeful and sadistic.

Cotton candy in the parallel 'verse!

7. The Last Unicorn – Blast from the past. Mostly nostalgia on my part. I think it’s partly responsible for the earliest manifestation of my love for the odd and slightly morbid. My parents did the rest.

...or is it?

8. Persepolis – Entertaining and educational about life in general.

...the only plot in this list based on reality...

9. Fantasia + Fantsia 2000 – A worthy legacy. I look forward to the next installment (!!!)

Live! Liiiiiiiiiivvvve!

10. Wallace and Gromit – Not the full-length movie, but the short 1/2 hour vids. The High Renaissance of Stop Animation, despite what any Tim Burton fans might think.

We knew it all along.

Okay…okay…one more….

11. Fern Gully – Environmentalist propeganda for youngsters! But also a rollicking good time.

Even faeries can have those awkward moments.

Lets talk about some badass anti-sexist comics & characters! Buffy! Runaways! Y-the last man! the Young Avengers!! American Virgin!!! and so many things written by Grant Morrison (esp. the Invisibles)!!!! I flaked out on posting some of these thoughts a long time ago…

Oh, if this isn’t the era of making good on old promises, I don’t know what is. As I’m fond of doing whenever we tread dangerously close to the annuls of geekdom, I’m hereby warning you that its gonna get priiiitty-darn geeky in a hurry, so suspend your usual aplomb, check over your shoulder for nosey co-workers who might report you to the nerd Gestapo, and if you’re an insider, check your self-reproach at the search window- cuz we’re going to feminist nerdville, population, nosotr@s!

We’ve alluded previously (“we” ya know, royally speaking), to emergent feminisms withinmic/ graphic novel genre, and I’ve been angling to give that theme a little more exploration…

The veritable 10,000 lbs gorilla in the room of course is Ms. Buffy Summers, since she provided such a crucial opening. So lets just get that out of the way before airing any reflections on new challenges to male supremacy, gender normativity, and heterosexism (and believe me, we’ll only manage to barely tip our hat to that iceberg on this post).

[I should warn you of spoiler alerts, even though I'm not writing on any super recent content on any of the titles. Just, if you don't wanna know who's transgender or who has a gay crush on whom, or any major plot arcs, then you'd best skim for the recommended titles and not read this till después]

Buffy the Vampire Slayer (the project, not just the character), both on the television, and most certainly beyond in the season 8 comics, has been bold, imaginative, and inspirational, (even if a bit 2.5 wave-ish, IMHO), in its championing of a popular feminism. That last attribute, its accessibility and high public profile, are perhaps its greatest contributions. Anyone who’s taken the time to listen to the commentary on seasons six and seven of Buffy (dorks!) understands how explicitly the writers (and especially creator/ writer Joss Whedon) set up sexism/male supremacy as the villain for the prime time show (groundbreaking, obvi), and the totally awesome seachange of women sharing power with women, embodied by the army of slayers from the TV finale and season eight.

Whats awesome, is hearing some of the female-identified writers from the show speak about this explosion of Whedon’s original idea of a single heroine with tons of latent power, to an organic realization of a truly feminist ideal, when every ‘potential’ slayer is given full slayer powers through the goddess-like witchcraft of everyone’s favorite red-headed lesbian witch, Willow. Fucking righteous.

Okay, lets not get too abstract. What was Whedon’s initial anti-sexist set up? A reaction to the unavoidable paranoia of women alone in the dark in the city… their vulnerabilities, the objectification of women as objects (specifically vampire dinner), and the bizarre displacement of men’s fucked up/ violent/ entitled-feeling desires as the fault of women who “dress like they want it” (that line in particular was used in the show where scantly clad femmes are blamed for attracting vampires- WTF). Right, so that was Joss’s reaction.

By season eight, Buffy transcended patriarchy not only making men yearn for the kind of power that women so ferociously wielded on the show (from Anya, to Ms.Calendar, to Faith, Tara, Glory and Kennedy, not to mention the original Scoobies themselves), such that by the end of the television run of the show, the entire paradigm shifted from “how do we show women being defiant of men’s power and violence” to “how do we envision women sharing the power they build through relationships as a community of anti-sexist feminist praxis”?

Okay, the feminist praxis bit is my own cherry on top, but you get the picture. By time there are thousands of slayers being trained up in Buffy’s European castle, we’re in a different world from the predatory un-dead men of the hellmouth. I can’t believe I have a blog where I can write a sentence like that, and where people like you can read that. Some corners of this world are just it seems (:

and we live in world where comics that were being written post 2003 have that as a pop-feminist foundation, beyond which we get all kinds of serious (by which I mean totally badass-ferocia).

Next up is Runaways, which is awesome for many reasons (chiefly, the superb writing by creator Brian K Vaughan, and the astounding & witty character development), but is worth mentioning here for a couple reasons. First, taking a cue from Whedon, the Runaways quickly settle on Nico Minoru as their leader, one of very few super hero (anti-hero?) teams that is fronted by a woman of color. She’s a fierce fashionista of substantial power, who has a goth-streak and who struggles very realistically with her sexuality. Totally crush-worthy…

which is why Karolina Dean spends part of volume two coming out, through exploring her crush on Nico. Ultimately though, its not Karolina’s chronicle of queerness that proves the ulitmate stroke of subversion (this arc was published after the L-word had already broken ground- although it was still unique in the world of mainstream comic books).

More groundbreaking was the revelation that Karolina’s betrothed, Xavin (a shapeshifting skrull, who initially appears as a black teenage alien- wait thats redundant… a skrull is a type of alien), comfortably changes genders and pursues their feelings for Karolina as a transgender lesbian. This was just five or six years ago, all playing out in Marvel comics so- Wow! Xavin’s friends switch which pronouns they use for hir/them as their gender expression/presentation shifts from comic issue to issue, though Xavin mostly interacts with Karolina as a fem lesbian once she (Xavin) realizes that Karolina prefers women (sexually speaking).

Brian K Vaughan moves past the quotidian politics of generation Y teens by taking a feminist bend to the apocalyptic crisis of September 11th, 2001 in his other graphic novel, Y the Last Man, which was published by the edgy DC/Vertigo Comics.

Here, Yorick Brown and his magician’s assistant/ pet monkey, Ampersand are the only surviving mammals with a Y chromosome. I can do the novel no justice here, buy its worth skipping around to some feminist touchstones that come up in the witty writing of Y the Last Man, including militant Amazon feminist separatists (who ritually cut off one of their breasts in political solidarity, and who burn all the world’s sperm banks), a planet of ubiquitous/normalized F-M transgenderism (and the sexwork that comes with it!), a little S&M rite of passage stuff, queer/co-parenting, a secret all female-run spy network (dating back to the Revolutionary War), and a whole lot of girl-on-girl lovin.

Basically, Y the Last Man is a realistic take on the “what if” concept of a gendered apocalypse, where virtually all the power-hoarding men (ie, all men) die out overnight, and the world wakes up to a dystopia where: 1) the American highways don’t work cuz all the truck drivers are men and they all died on the highway, leaving the wreckage of sixteen-wheelers everywhere, 2) the highest ranked woman in the entire US Government is the secretary of agriculture (anyone else having Laura Roslin/ Battlestar Galactica flashbacks??!) who then assumes the office of the presidency, oh and 3) the strongest military in the world becomes that of Israel, which, as you know, is the only army where women are fully 50% of trained harbingers of destruction. Shit makes for an interesting read! No super-heroes here!

Young Avengers. Not much to say. The hot leading men are gay lovers. BFD. Its a welcome change, but we were ready for that ceiling to be shattered like 30 years ago. Still, Hulkling and Wiccan are key-yute together!

Jumping tracks, Vertigo’s American Virgin “follows the life of Adam, a teenager who is a born-again Christian preacher, and his struggle with issues of his sexuality and faith as he plods step by step toward a lascivious world of desire, temptation, and cultural taboo. In exploring such faux-pas of protestantism, American Virgin whisks readers along a non-stop journey that takes us everywhere from homo-social groups in southern Africa to Phallic worship ceremonies in Japan, the Gay Games in Australia, and an Indian marriage ceremony where Adam and his girlfriend learn about the traditional roles of intersex hijra in sexual rites of passage. Throughout the whirlwind tour, Adam’s near constant companion is his stepsister, Cyndi, who is sexually liberal”, which is to say she’s a sex worker, and super-not ashamed of it, who ends up dating a sketchy Australian guy, who turns out to be trans and maybe not that sketchy? I dunno, I stopped working at a comic shop reading around then and don’t quite know how the story panned out, but shit was cancelled last year which is a huge bummer since writer Steven T. Seagle was taking American Virgin and its readers to new and unexplored levels. Le sigh…

Ya know, next I was gonna grapple with Marjane Satrape, whom you have prolly either read first-hand, or seen a film adaptation of Persepolis- but I decided its not even worth a whole spiel here. Long story short, the implication that liberation for Persian women can only come from accessing an escape valve to the West is a dangerous concept, (ooh la la, I’m in France, now I can be a strong feminist artist with political clout), even if those aren’t her real politics and its just her own story and not a world-view she espouses. Which is not to say I shun the work entirely. It was very worthwhile for me and is for most people- I just want to append it with some critical thinking (which the film does not entreat). From what I hear from friends who’ve seen her, Satrape is an engaging thinker and speaker, and has pretty good politics, so lets just leave it at that…

Great. So last, and possibly my favorite is The Invisibles, where legendary characters like Lord Fanny explode gender, identity, race/ ethnicity, fucking witchcraft and of course sexuality in myriad dimensions (often literally). There is no effing way I can do the Invisibles justice in a paragraph or two, so I may just have to blog about it more fully on another occasion, but but but, a cursory mention of the fag-identified, super tranny ferocia, Lord Fanny is in order.

Lord Fanny may be my favorite comic book character of all time. Of the 5 members in the invisibles cell that form the core of the graphic novel, Lord Fanny embodies Grant Morrison’s project of anarchistic destruction of all normativities. She is a brazilian witch (of mexican ancenstry), who was supposed to be born female. Coming from a long line of witch-priestess women, Fanny’s grandmother takes matters into her own hands and insists that fate-be-damned, this baby boy will be raised as a girl and continue the lineage of family witches. Dude. Badass Granny even slits Fanny’s inner thigh in order to fool the gods into believing that Lord Fanny has finally menstruated and become a woman worthy of their blessings and powers!

Like Xavin of the Runaways (only 10 years earlier), Lord Fanny unapologetically oscillates between male and female pronouns, can be seen trying on silicone tits in a London sex shop, and beyond simply sporting butch or femme clothing, she splashes the pages with cameos of fallatio in almost every city the Invisibles visit. Her nonchalant confrontations with homophobes is reason enough to read the Invisibles, but stick around for the invisibles crew as a whole: feminist power-sharing, leather fetishes, über dyke combatants, san francisco sex parties, and a grand scheme to sabotage the US Military’s attempt to hide the AIDS vaccine deep underground in the American Southwest!

I think the main theme in these graphic novels is not only who these writers and protagonists are, nor what they do or represent, but the ways in which these characters and plots provoke new relationships within the comic book universe. Who these women, trannies, fags, and dykes are in relation to their team mates, their enemies, their world, and the reader is the real feminist push behind books. We are forced to see things relationally, and not just follow a bunch of jacked up men from battle to battle kicking each other’s asses.

oh boy. now I’m all excited about re-reading all of these gems! Check ‘em out! Let me know what you think! And next time, I’ll try and highlight some of the great contributions of independent comics to our bold feminist world…

This post would not be complete if I did not address the obvious elephant in the room: serialobjectification of female bodies in comic books. Voilá:

Fangrrl Power,
Sunshine Superboy

Creio eu que muitos que aqui visitam, já teve a grata oportunidade de assistir Persepolis, uma animação francesa que acabou levando uma indicação ao Oscar 2008 na categoria Melhor animação. No ano de Ratatouille, Persepolis não levou, mas ficou consagrado como um filme cult e super referência para quem quer falar de política sem ser chato.

Seria Marjane, a menina desenhada em preto e branco do filme, a nova Mafalda das famosas tirinhas de jornais? É possível traçar algumas semelhanças entre as duas personagens. Apesar de muito jovens, têm um ponto em comum: o interesse inquietante pela política. A semelhança termina aqui. Uma é da Argentina e a nossa Marjane está bem longe: Irã.

Os diretores Vicent Parannaud e Marjane Satrapi quiseram fazer um filme autobiográfico e político, mesclando aspectos importantes da história recente do país, sem cair no documentário frio e objetivo, mas numa visão diferenciada de uma menina, que se desenvolve acompanhando a revolução iraniana e suas implicações que até hoje são vistas nos notíciários. O olhar é interessante porque quase nunca é abordado, num país ainda extremamente fechado às igualdades entre homens e mulheres.

A confronto entre as culturas ocidental e oriental, as ideologias, a xenofobia, a passagem da fase adulta, tudo é muito bem registrado em Persépolis. A conversa com Deus é para mim um das cenas mais legais. Quem não assistiu, fica a dica.

Nota: 8,5/10.