The Poetics of Iranian Cinema Aesthetics, Modernity and Film after the Revolution

by Sheibani, Khatereh

• ISBN13: 9781848857414
• ISBN10: 1848857411
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2011-11-15
• Publisher: Tauris Academic Studies

Summary

In the wake of the 1979 Iranian Revolution, Iranian society and culture underwent massive changes. Here, Khatereh Sheibani argues that cinema evolved after the national uprising in 1978/79, and ultimately replaced poetry as the dominant form of cultural expression. She presents a comparative analysis of postrevolutionary Iranian cinema as an offshoot of Iranian modernity, and explains its connections with the themes present in traditional Persian poetry and conventional visual arts. She examines the prerevolutionary film industry ? such as Iranian new wave and filmfarsi movies ? its styles and themes, and its relation to the emerging cinema after 1978. Sheibani argues that Iranian art cinema, as one of the signifiers and agents of modernity, underwent a cultural revolution by employing the aesthetics of Persian literature and visual arts in a modern context. This is a valuable contribution to the scholarly literature on Iranian cinema, politics and culture.

Author Biography

Khatereh Sheibani is Lecturer at the University of Guelph, Canada. She holds a PhD in Comparative Literature from the University of Alberta.

Table of Contents

Introduction * Cinema as Art: A Poetic Interpretation * Kiarostami and the Aesthetics of Ghazal * Kiarostami and Modern Persian Poetry * Modernity and Identity in a Cinematic Perspective * Mirroring the Past, Envisioning the Future * Bayzai and the Conventions of Visual Arts * Conclusion * Bibliography