La vache

"The cow" (1969) from Dariush Mehrjui can be called (with a little exaggeration) the founding film of Iranian (art house) cinema. In an interview Mehrjui told that the Italian neorealists were his big examples in making this film.

Dariush Mehrjui was born in 1939. He is therefore a contemporary of Bahram Beizai (born 1938) and Abbas Kiarostami (born 1940). Nevertheless Mehrjui is THE director of Iran before the Islamic Republic of 1979.

"The cow" tells the story of a man losing his only cow. Caring for this cow was the cornerstone of his life and the source of his status in the village. The theme of the film is the reaction of the man to his misfortune and the way the villagers cope with his reaction.

In this time of professional psychiatric treatment maybe there is something to be learn from the degree of involvement of the villagers with their neigbour. Hoewever the schocking final scene shows what can happen when involvement turns into powerlessness.

Apart from the man with the cow there are a lot of other things happening in the village. They are hinted at, but we can not speak of elaborated sub-plots. There is for example a couple in love probing every opportunity to be together unnoticed. The glances they exchange speak for themselves. After all this film was made before the Islamic revolution of 1979.