The Power that Iran Has Gained

The West has been of the impression that by economic sanctions they can make Iran kneel to their political requests. This impression is based on prior experience of West with regard to isolating countries like North Korea in the same fashion. However, this naïve induction cannot work for the west since posing sanctions on Iran’s oil is tantamount to embracing starker cracks in recessing Western economy. This cannot be the only reason for the backlash of these sanctions, since Iraq another major oil exporter experienced similar or even harsher sanctions at Bath party era, when Saddam’s regime could exchange oil for medicine and essentials. The major element in this backlash is related to Syria’s situation.

Syria is a very close ally of Iran and its collapse by Assad’s opponents would result in a more Americanized Middle East, therefore, China and Russia two pseudo-communist countries are not going to let Assad’s enterprise come to an end, this does have the connotation that these two countries would practically resist an attack on Iran. The support of these two eastern powers has made west forget military options and in this situation any tiny threat on exporting oil by Iran will have vast effects on world economy while Iran can afford to enjoy sneers at west in peace.

This was not the case in some 10 years ago or so because Iran was not backed by any Eastern power and in case of any threat Iran had to deal with it with its Middle Eastern allies who would not have guaranteed any victory for Iran let alone causing prevention from the war.

The situation for the west is grave since in case it wants to succeed in overthrowing Iran or Syria’s regime they need to convince the Russians and Chinese. Yet this will never happen because convincing the Eastern rivals would mean succumbing to an Americanized Middle East which will end up in an Americanized Russia and China if this process continues. This will never happen unless Russia behaves naively as she did in the past; selling Alaska to Americans for money. Although Russia seems to have learnt that hegemony buys what money can not borrow!

 

Who is Masoud Ferasati?

Masoud Ferasati is a movie critic in Iran who has become popular recently because of a live air TV Show run by Fereydun Jeyrani about Iranian Cinema named ‘7’.  Before that he was engaged in opposing the intellectual mainstream of Iranian Cinema’s appraisal of the legendary Tarkovsky. He instead decided to highlight Alfred Hitchcock in order to have a persona for criticizing Tarkovsky fans. He accuses Tarkovsky and his followers of being drowned by insipid mysticism. His main reason is that a movie should be parallel with real life. His favorite directors are John Ford and Bergmann.

However, he is infamous for inconsistency in his criteria when examining different movies. He has claimed over and over in his writings and TV appearances that ‘form’ of a movie is everything. Yet when he wants to criticize ‘A Separation’ he attacks the content. The only criticism that he launched against ‘A Separation’ with regard to form was “terrible use of camera” and ‘show-off cinematography’. Although not a sufficient reason for defending the cinematography but ‘Kalari’ won the silver Frog for this movie. After this prize, Ferasati never spoke about its cinematography. He stated that ‘A Separation’ depicts a ‘dirty image of Iranian People’, and that Farhadi is a ‘cheeky director’! Ferasati has very amateur criticisms of other movies too. For example, he criticizes Kiarostami for not being able to ‘demand a proper cut in scenes’, not paying attention to Kiarostami’s neo-realist cinema. Yet one cannot say that he is a person who propagates the idea of ‘the system’ since he criticized Dehnamaki’s movie ‘Ekhrajiha’ which was the hard-liners’ favorite. More than anything else he suffers from a lack of ‘set of criteria’ and ‘consistency’ which will be talked about below.

He states that movie criticism is a matter of taste yet states that cinema is an objective medium. He has stated time and time again that “we do not have such a thing as ‘symbol’ in cinema” and this is a fabrication. He tries to impose his subjective speculations about the movies as objective facts for example, in the running Fajr movie festivals a movie named ‘a simple ceremony’ by Mani Haghighi depicts two human beings who do evil and suffer from it. In the beginning of the movie a verse is recited that if you do evil you will face evil. In a recent ‘7’ TV Show he claimed that this is hypocrisy of the director and he has insulted people because the couple do evil to people. It is not clear how this is hypocrisy and why is it insulting people. He is very concerned about ‘insulting people’ when examining the movies but does not care at all when he insistently insults directors based on personal feelings. He usually dismisses movies with phrases such as ‘It has not turned out well’ or ‘it is a caricature’ or ‘I felt nauseated’, and lags behind when he has to describe scenes to justify his attack or even recite the name of the movie characters.

He fails every single time to give an objective reason for why a movie is good or bad. He uses the term ‘form’ or ‘cinematography’ to attack movies but he never gives a solid and consistent definition of either of them. Basically when it comes to criticizing the movies he does not like, he is ‘against the method’! And will use any set of idea or values for attacking them, no matter how incoherent they may be when stated as a whole. This is why no one senses coherence in his words and ideas in the long run.

He is very ambitious too since he claims that he has educated people enough so that they will avoid watching poor quality comedies. All in all, one cannot say that he is hired by an organization to criticize specific movies since he has criticized movies designated to all fronts. However, one can say with evidence that he is a layman in ‘movie criticism’ and suffers from some kind of aesthetic delirium. Yet his stable seat at ‘7’ TV Show indicates that he is confirmed by those in charge of state-run TV. Maybe because he criticizes all movies and hence is harmless!

 

Turkey Cornered by EU and Middle Eastern Countries

Turkey has stopped political and military relations with France over a French judge’s rule that denial of the Armenians’ genocide by the Ottoman Empire (now Turkey) is illegal. Turks do not accept that such a charge and deny it vehemently. In Turkeyit is a crime to affirm the Holocaust of the Armenians (they dismissed the trial of Orhan Pamuk over such claims under pressure from EU). This reaction to France by Turks has been followed by Netherlands’ major party to pursue expulsion of Turkey from NATO. Iran has been threateningTurkey over placing NATO defense shields in its soil and Israel has stopped selling special weaponry toTurkey out of fear that Iran would be able to achieve them through Turkey. So NATO membership is not exactly helping Turks to find friends.

Before these,Turkey tried to put a show its Islamic face by punishing Israel over the aid shop to Palestine and trying to become the leader of Islamic countries by the advices that they gave to countries in the process of revolution. However, they turned their back to Syria, and now Iran, Iraq, Hezbollah and Hamas are against Turkey for this case.Turkey claims that denouncing Syria’s crackdowns is meant for supporting democracy.

These two cases – Armenian Holocaust and Syria– side by side show what is the problem of Turkey. They want their piece of cake and want to eat it too. They want to penalize others for neglecting democracy when they don’t lose anything but want to penalize others for applying democracy where Turks lose. This shows that among many other factors Turkey is not fit to join the EU. They are not cultured enough to become an EU member. This attitude has not only cost them grudges with Europe but with Middle Eastern countries as well.

 

Press TV has Problems to solve

I m reading Press TV. Everything seems alright but one thing. everyone is criticizing Britain, US and anti- IRI governments and people in the comments and noone has anything against IRI or Press TV. This has either of the two implications: either only pro-IRI read it, or you don’t publish opposing views. one feels that Press TV is happy that has got hold of a stick somewhere!

Press TV enjoys an acceptable journalistic style, grammar and prestige however in some cases it relapses. It had this post about Queen which said “she has begged Iran not to break up with UK” and the person who has said this is an Iranian Lawmaker. It’s a bit hard not think that this is merely a fantasy when the source is so unrelated to such an important news and noone else is talking or has talked about it.

Press TV still has a lot to learn in order to become an A class news agency.

 

Another Year by Mike Leigh: Another Perspective

The movie starts off with briefing the characters which does not turn out so well since most main characters remain undefined till the end. For example Tom and Gerri do not fit into a character and set forth and back between kind and bitter. That might be due to the circumstances mostly but we don’t get a firm character out of any of them. For example in the first encounter between Marry and Tom that is depicted in the movie, after Marry gets drunk and she says “I feel like another person” he retorts “who is that now?” which is quite mean while he is kind in most other parts where he sympathizes with Marry about her efforts for buying a car and the problems she faces.

On the other hand Marry has quite a defined character that gets developed through the story. A troubled young woman who seeks affection from wrong people or in wrong ways. What one might get the impression through the movie is that she develops drinking due to her problems rather than developing problems due to drinking. Joe can be said to have a character too, since he has a quite dubious personality and he remains a riddle to a great extent till he gets a girlfriend home.

Marry is a vulnerable young woman who is shattered through life in most emotional aspects and she seeks refuge in the arms of Gerri and her family. Gerri, who is a psychologist as well, tells Tom “she is getting worse” or “poor thing”, “I feel bad for her” and Tom tries to tell her that Gerri is not at fault. Gerri does have problems in treating her patients with drinking problems and has complained to Tom about her insufficincies as a psychologist. It does seem that Gerri is taking Marry as a case while Tom observes more than anything else.

Marry gets convinced that if she wants to be with the family there are rules and regulations that she has to abide or else she would be boycotted. She is intially a person who seeks affection madly while Gerri and crew try to tame her and teach her that she cannot do that unless she thinks of leaving them for good. Gerri and her family pull a totalitarian posture onto lonesome Marry. Marry has to abide or she will be punished or better to say coerced. This is actually a real scenario that gets repeated among friends in school, family members, colleagues and others. If you don’t abide those who have a firmer basis of social security they will just abandon you and you cannot do anything about it and actually you won’t do anything but abiding them since you don’t want to loose the nest.

Marry is more attractive than the rest of the crew who are non-attractive people. She is enslaved to Gerri’s ugliness and code of behavior. this is a sad fact that life forces upon us. Marry is a free-spirited wonderer who decides to give up in order to “be safe”. contrary to what is said I don’t think that this story is about ordinary people. At least Marry, Joe and Ronnie are not ordinary!

 

Mahmoud Kalari won the camerimage Film Festival’s Golden Frog

Mahmoud Kalari won the camerimage Film Festival’s Golden Frog. This award Came to him because of shooting Nadir and Simin. This was the 19th Camerimage festival.

Mahomoud Kalari was born in Tehran in 1950.

 

Salinger, Holden and Fan Tribute

George Steiner was very unhappy that late Salinger had many fans and used to say that he is not Dostoevsky or Mark Twain. This argument reminds one of a first grader saying that the teacher is not his mom therefore she is not good. You do not have to be Dostoevsky or Twine to be good for sure. they are good, but not exclusively. He has also mentioned that most audience of Salinger are illiterate. Well is that something to say. This really is non-sense and does not need a response.

Henry Anatole Grunwald tries to sooth Steiner’s criticisms yet says that Salinger was a ‘good minor’. honestly, why do you have to speak up for everything as if you you remained silent someone would have complained. You ramble on with your claims but you never substantiate them. Why do you claim that Salinger is a good minor? maybe your reasons can convince some other people as well! Steiner is well out of order though. Dostoevsky my ass, he has become a cliche for pretentious intellectualls to hide behind. all you hear is “if God does not exist what happens to morality?”. Lord! Literature is not about fake intellectual elan. It can be anything and each of us defines it for himself. this is why I don’t criticize Steiner’s mom reading Daniel Steele.

 

Neurofeedback versus Mindfulness

Neuron Feedback is a relatively new method for curing psychological ailments. Basically the process involves a computer monitor that shows the brain waves in different emotional status and you have to learn to control the undesired waves and promote the desired ones through practice. It is contrasted to pills in that pills try to modify your brain’s chemical status while Neuron Feedback tries to modify the electric status of neurons.

Mindfulness is also a relatively new method for psychological ailments too. In this method no fancy monitor is involved but you learn through meditation and cognitive skills to gain control of the undesired feelings you have. For example you take a raisin and you slowly start to chew it and you start feeling it. By this method you learn to concentrate on a task and get rid of the undesired thoughts that want to intervene with you raisin chewing process.

Given the similarities of these two methods and the extremely expensive sessions of the Neuron Feedback and nearly free method of Mindfulness (you need to buy a book and read it)it sounds more rational to go for Mindfulness. Although it should be noted that both methods are much healthier than pills.

 

Iran Rallied Egypt in Volleyball: 3-0

The first set went quite fast and Iran won 24-18. Iran had 12 attacks while Egypt had 8 attacks. Iran had 8 errors while Egypt had 6 errors. The most signifcant point about this set was the rallies of Egyptian player Ahmad Saleh. They were like running bullets.

In the second set both teams played a close match. Iran won this set 25-21. Iran had 18 attacks Egypt had 11 attacks Iran had 8 errors and Egypty had 8 errors Iran had 1 block and Egypt had 6 blocks and each team had 1 dig. In this set Ahmad Saleh dissapointed the volleyball fans and performed poorly and was substituted as a result.

Egypt lost its motivation and hope altogether in the third set. Iran won 25-15.

 

The Playboy Club and Lack of Freedom

 

The TV series was canceled apparantely due to low ratings. However, I believe that the protests made by PTC and others have had an influence. Gloria Steinem claims that this TV series normalizes concepts such as male dominance, well one should ask her which movie or TV series does not? I think she needs to open her eyes and watch instead of theorizing. and PTC claims that the series is broadcasting pornography,  suppose they have not watched TV enough to witness “The mind of the Married man” or “coupling” and the such. where was PTC then? maybe they found watching TV demeaning to women at that time!

Linda Holmes had states that the series has cheesy dialogue. well dear Linda that is first of all a matter of opinion and you do not give us any reason why the dialogues are so. So for all that matter I can say the dialogue is more than perfect. and we can dwindle in this nomadic sphere of opinions till we grow a bunny tail. The movie does not want to make a feminist statement either, it is your interpretation. The first thing you need toknow is that the movie or a book does not say anything you and I read or interpret it in this or that way. Linda Holmes needs some basic lessons before she polutes papers more.

Tim Goodman finds the writing weak and the acting spotty. well this is again a matter of opinion and honestly I don’t see why anyone should care about his opinion more than once! the suspense in the series is much more attractive than the toad-face actors of ‘How I met Your Mother’ squirming around with stupid stories.

and Marilyn Miller who was a real bunny in life thinks that the show is unrealistic. well Miller dear, you have to face it that this is a tv series not a documentry.

All in all it is quite obvious that the show should not have continued and not because of any technical problem but because the conservative American audience cannot tolerate something they do not deserve. Just because they don’t like the series it does not mean that the series should be put off. There are other people who like it. and tv is not like a president, there is only one president so the majority chose one, but in the case of TV there are many channels and series so if you don’t like this series watch another one or read a book. What is really incomprehensible is that you holler ‘democracy and freedom’ in your bathroom. It is highly probable that the conservatives have conspired against the series by brainwashing people about the series and stopping them from watching it and hence the decrease of viewers. They did entice the show advertisers to stop sponsering the series.

Everyone knows their problem is not degradation of women or pornography, they are not that moral, even in theor personal life. These are just a part of the game they ‘have to’ play.