My Tehran for Sale, at VIFF

Today I had the great pleasure of speaking with director/poet Geranaz Moussavi, about her debut feature film, My Tehran for Sale, a poignant and unique look at life within the largest city in Iran.

We sit in the lobby of the Westin Bayshore and Ms. Moussavi is confident and relaxed.

ME: Could you please tell us a little about yourself?

GM: I was born in 1974 in Tehran and I went to primary school and secondary school in Tehran. When I was sixteen I started publishing my poetry relatively widely in magazines and newspapers: literary newspapers that were available back then. When I was in grade eleven, I acted in my first feature film. I had been active in school theatre and all that, but nothing professional. That was the first time I experienced cinema professionally. I did my second feature film when I was nineteen.

I was born to TV/film parents. My mother was a video grader and my dad was a sound engineer for film and TV, so I was raised amongst all these sorts of people.

I enrolled in science at university because when you're a good student and you come from a middle class family, you are expected to become a doctor or engineer, or something along those lines. I knew that I wanted to be active in the world of literature and cinema.
I miscalculated and thought that I could study science, so I wouldn't live a poor life, and could continue filmmaking and acting as well. This, of course, didn't work because I was always busy in drama classes while I was supposed to be studying science. Inevitably, I had to drop university half way through.
I was simply more focused on acting and drama school and writing.

Just after high school, I worked as a book reviewer and editor for a literary magazine.

When I was twenty-three, I immigrated to Australia with my family. It was then that I made up my mind not to be an actor, but a filmmaker. So I started with a bachelor degree, and graduated with honors in screen studies at Flinders University in Adelaide, and then went to the Australian Film Television and Radio School in Sydney, and did a post graduate degree in editing.

After that I did my doctorate in the field of filmmaking and screen studies, with a theme of poetic cinema, at the University of Western Sydney.

Meanwhile, this film happened. I was writing scripts all throughout these years, one thing lead to another, and I was able to make this film.

ME: Could you tell us about your film, My Tehran for Sale.

GM: I had had the idea for years, in my head. I wanted to tell a story of my generation. Un-said, and un-told Iranian stories. For some reason, mainstream media isn't interested in them. They are only interested in the hectic side of Iran, the political side of Iran, and not really focused on individual stories, the stories of middle class Iran.
It was always showing Iran poor, deprived, rural, or Iran upper class, politically run, and the whole tension between these two classes.

The Iranian industry was somehow dismissing the middle class story. Maybe because the market was more available to the exotic sides of Iran. Maybe that was what was being offered in a more kind way to Iranian filmmakers. I don't know the reasons. I've got my ideas, of course, but I can't be completely sure about them. The important thing is that, as a result, the Iranian films grew to be known to international audiences as rural films with no rhythm, landscape films, films for children or about children, or films with marginalized characters from the outskirts of bigger cities like Tehran. Rarely films concerning middle class people, urban life, contemporary life, and the complexities of these paradoxical lives within the city.

That was the main thing that got my attention because a lot of other stories existed that needed to be told.
Because the culture and society of Iran is so diverse, it seemed to me that that piece of the puzzle was missing.

I got to thinking about it, trying to collect stories using my own experiences, as well as my friends' stories, and my observations of society.
I lived in Australia for ten years but was never disconnected from Iran. I went back there, I lived there for a year, a few months, every now and then, and I was always filming, taking pictures and talking to people. I was collecting all these stories for the story I was going to tell in a film.

I had had an idea for the main actor in the film, Marzieh Marzieh Vafamehr. We'd been close friends for years, and we went to the same drama schools when we were eighteen and nineteen. We were very much aligned on the same page when it came to telling the story of our generation and had long conversations when I was in Tehran. She was the back-bone to the whole process and I wrote the script based on her acting in the film. That's why she uses her real name in the film.

It's my opinion that this story is not only authentic because it shows a truth that hasn't been seen, but also because it's coming from our hearts. It's a collective work of a few people who have poured their hearts into this project. People who participated in the film as writer, director, actor, assistant, and crew. They really helped in forming the ideas. It was interesting that people wanted to tell this story.

ME: Where was it filmed? Was it filmed primarily in Tehran?

GM: Yes. The whole pre-production and production happened in Tehran, and the post production was in Australia.

ME: How did it go throughout the filming process? Did you run into any obstacles?

GM: When it comes to Tehran, everything is so complex. There were a lot of problems, a lot of obstacles. This is why we have made this film. This is why the whole tension is there. When it came to our film, because it's a land full of contradictions, there was smoothness when you didn't expect, and problems and obstacles when you never expected. The whole situation was never predictable.

When I went to Tehran to film, I expected the whole process of filming to be a lot more problematic. But what I had, maybe I was just lucky, was a comparatively smooth, easy experience in terms of filmmaking.
It doesn't mean that we didn't have common issues that everybody has in Iran. We had electricity cut off every day for two or three hours, we had traffic, we had problems getting the gear in time, getting the right gear. These are common issues when it comes to the Iranian film industry.

Whether you have permission, whether you don't have permission, the whole film industry in Iran happens in a spectrum of gorilla filmmaking. Not because of the political or social situation, just because the whole film industry is not as organized as in other countries. We had to hire our equipment from individual people. There's no big organization that you can go to and order your stuff. You make your films through personal and individual contacts in a smaller system.

I was working with a very professional, experienced crew. It was small, so managing was not a big deal. And we tried to keep things small. We filmed low key. We didn't want a lot of press on set and articles being written about our film before it came out. We didn't want things to get out of control. We wanted to tell the story in our own way, without interruption.
I really like things to be more improvised and I care about this interaction between people. I wanted them to be part of the creative flow.

ME: What was your relationship like with your editor? There are a lot of poignant moments in your film. Was it a challenge to edit?

GM: Yes. We filmed the film in a free way and just let things happen and we tried not to self censor while filming. We left the editing to the editor.

Of course, while filming in Iran you have to be cautious. I respect the culture and situation there, and of course I want to challenge the boundaries, but we've seen the culture of the film industry there, and I had to consider the safety of everyone too. I didn't want to take my camera there and film everything in a way that you would film outside Iran, take the camera out, and leave people there with the consequences.
I had to be very thoughtful of how I wanted to tell my story. I wanted to take risks, but calculated risks, not go wild. The film isn't all about me. I am also dealing with people who are living in Iran, same as myself, and we have to think about our tomorrow. That's partly why we left it to the editor. We wanted to be safe, but not compromise the story for the sake of safety either. We wanted to find a balance.

I learned this from the Iranian director, Abbas Kiarostami's cinema. It is possible to challenge things in a proper way, and at the same time, say what you have to say. Everything comes through subtlety as well as risk taking.

My editor Bryan Mason was very quick and knew what he wanted to get out of those images. Because I did my post graduate in film editing, I made this film with an editor's mind. The rhythm and a little bit of the vagueness and openness to interpretation, I already had in my mind. Bryan was very quick in grasping that and being able to get all those nuances.

ME: What is Iran like for up and coming film makers?

GM: It's very difficult to say, but I think when the pressure gets high, and restrictions go beyond what is tolerable for filmmakers... there are a lot of restrictions. Very few people get permission for their script. Very few people get permission to be filmed. Very few films get permission for general release. Things become more and more difficult every day, not only in the area of filmmaking, but also in the field of literature, book publishing, galleries, visual arts and all that.

The situation has become so suffocating, in terms of restrictions and limitations imposed on the artist, that it's beyond tolerance. I believe Iranian artists and filmmakers have been so patient and still make beautiful pictures and beautiful works, against the odds.

I think that for young Iranian filmmakers, the future of filmmaking will be more unofficial. More home video style, more digital film. Iran is one of the countries that will most benefit from new technology because this is their situation. It's not so easy to make an unofficial film with 35mm. You need smaller cameras, something more portable. It's not possible to go full crew, full gear, because that requires proper permission.

ME: With your poetry, you stood in front of crowds and read your works. Did you read your script to anyone for feedback?

GM: No, not for this script. That was part of the improvisation. I think there is a better vibe when it's improvised. Not for everything, but there are certain things I am more comfortable with, improvised.
When you do this, it gives more of a documentary vibe, and that was part of the feel I wanted to have with this film. The film travels a fine line between documentary and fiction. I wanted to play with that line.

ME: How has your film been received? It played at TIFF, yes?

GM: Yes, that was the world premiere. We had the film at the Adelaide film festival, but that was more of a local film festival. I was really amazed by the warm reception of the film by the audience. There were three completely sold out theatres for the public screenings. It was really amazing.

ME: What would you like people to take away from this film?

GM: I'd really like them to take away a fresh and different picture of Iran. Something different from other Iranian films.

I actually played with that in the film. I opened the film in a way that for the first one or two minutes people might think “oh, another Iranian film” but instantly it changes. I'd like people to take this fresh image from Iran as something more authentic to the true lives of people behind the walls and behind the closed doors. I hope they take the feeling with them when they leave the theatre, that finally, they got a glimpse of the private, intimate places of real people who are living there today.

ME: What's in the future? What are you working on now?

GM: I have a few ideas in my head and two scripts that I'm working on at the moment. Again, Iranian themes, Iranian stories, urban, and I'm writing these hoping I can develop these scripts and get proper funding for making those films.
Of course, I have to stand by this film and make it more accessible to more audiences and hope that I can get to more festivals and theatres, because that is the main thing for me, especially with a lower budget, risk taking film. I want people to come and watch this film and this is a very good time for it. People are curious about the Iranian people they hear about in the media.

moot or hooey?
all the characters used their real first names in the film.