Set in the salt lakes of Lake Urmia situated in Northern Iran, Rahmat rows his boat from each small island to the next, where he performs the strangest task for the inhabitants of these lands. For the past thirty years, Rahmat has been collecting the tears of these people whenever he visits. Due to the nature of his job, he has to see these people at their saddest or most distraught, and so treats the collection of the tears with the utmost respect. Regularly cleaning his collection materials, so that the owner's know that their tears are being looked after and have some worth. Whilst no-one really knows what exactly Rahmat does with the tears, the rumours of him turning the tears into pearls is enough that no one has a problem sharing their own. While on these islands, the villagers look after Rahmat and sometimes get him to help with certain tasks. One day, while agreeing to take the dead body of a young woman off the island so she can be buried on the mainland, Rahmat discovers that the body has been replaced by that of a boy, desperate to travel with Rahmat to the neighbouring islands to search for his missing father. Whilst initially furious with the boy, once Rahmat calms down, he agrees on the proviso that the boy poses as his son, who happens to be mute and deaf.
As I hinted above, I have seen all of Mohammad Rasoulof's films starting from “Good Bye”, which was the film he made directly after “The White Meadows” in 2011. What I hadn't realised though was from when I had started watching Rasoulof's films, it also coincided with the time he was arrested and jailed for protesting a recent election which was considered to be a sham. What is immediately apparent with “The White Meadows” is the difference in the type of Rasoulof's filmmaking style prior to his arrest compared to after. Unlike the direct and angry attacks on the current regime seen in his films from “Good Bye” onward, “The White Meadows” is much more poetic and allegorical in nature, whilst still having plenty to say about the injustices within his country of Iran. While there is no doubt that Mohammad Rasoulof was a political filmmaker right from the get-go, I must admit that I was initially very shocked in this difference seen in his earlier films, where his anger seems to be replaced by a deep concern, and it made me wonder what Rasoulof's film's may have looked like post “The White Meadows” if the State hadn't targeted him for persecution.
“The White Meadows” is a film that begins its story in a normal narrative way, then it starts to lean heavily into allegory before its very symbolic finale. The film is very episodic in nature too, as each time Rahmat visits a new island, we are witness to a small vignette of the inhabitant's rituals, superstitions and beliefs while he is there collecting the tears. In a way, “The White Meadows” plays almost like a road movie, where Rahmat is on a journey meeting new and fascinating characters along the way. One of the interesting things about his journey, is the way Rahmat is unaffected by or doesn't involve himself in what happens on each island. He is there to witness what is happening, not to intervene or take part in it, even if what he is watching has a barbaric nature to it all, like for instance when a young virgin girl is to be married and sacrificed to the lake god, in an attempt to reduce the salt levels in the lake. Like I said, Rahmat appears unaffected by it all, but the same cannot be said for his “son” once he is part of the journey, who finds himself trying to stop the madness to the detriment of both himself and Rahmat.
Visually, “The White Meadows” is stunning to look at with Rasoulof and his cinematographer, Ebrahim Ghafori, using the natural beauty of Lake Urmia to their advantage to create a landscape that is both unbelievably beautiful, while at the same time giving it an otherworldly feeling to it. There is just something about the white landscapes of salt lakes (and the surrounding islands) that makes them inherently eye-catching, but also disorientating because our own eyes are not used to images of this white colour. There are moments in this film where I was really confused as to if I was looking at a painting, or if what I was seeing onscreen was real (which it no doubt was), due to its extreme yet unusual beauty.
Outside of the locations themselves, the other part of “The White Meadows” that I thought was incredibly beautiful was the collection of the tears themselves. Just the idea is immensely poetic, but the way Rasoulof shows Rahmat's process of collecting the tears and both the preparation and cleaning of his equipment before and after the fact, I actually found to be incredibly moving. Rahmat shows himself to be detail oriented and methodical in his preparation, never taking for granted where the tears have come from and from what has caused these tears. In saying that, while he shows the utmost respect to the person giving him their tears, Rahmat still sees it as a job; an important job, yes, but a job nonetheless.
There is one vignette during the film where I saw a glimpse of the future, direct and angry Mohammad Rasoulof and that was the segment that sees a painter being abused and tortured because he wants to paint the sky (or is it the sea?) red instead of blue the way everyone else sees it. His friends are aghast by his decision to go against what everyone else sees and as such it is decided that he will be punished until he paints what he is told to do. This is an obvious allegory on Iran's treatment of its artists who dare try to expose something different than what the regime wants to be shown (which was, unbeknown at the time, soon to be Rasoulof's future too). This is one of the rare moments where Rahmat does step in and offer the man a drink of water, while he is buried up to his neck in salt, showing sympathy towards the persecuted artist. This is probably my favourite segment within the whole of “The White Meadows”.
When the final credits to “The White Meadows” started to roll, I must admit that I was surprised to see that superstar Iranian director Jafar Panahi edited the picture. Panahi is a special figure in Iranian cinema, and was the reason I fell in love with Iranian cinema after viewing his debut feature “The White Balloon” all those years ago. Whilst I knew he edited his own films, I was not aware that he had performed the duties for anyone else, so to see his name amongst the credits was a nice surprise, and thinking back on “The White Meadows” after the screening, I think it is true that the film moves at a similar pace to that of Jafar Panahi's own films, especially his earlier ones like “The Mirror” or “The Circle”.
Overall, whilst “The White Meadows” is a beautifully poetic film, I would be lying if I didn't say that I missed the more direct and angry style that I associated with Mohammad Rasoulof's later films. The film shows that Rasoulof was always a director aware of social issues within Iran, and while his use of allegory to show these injustices is well done in “The White Meadows”, I do not think the message hit as hard as in some of his later films. That said, the very symbolic ending of the film is strong and very well done (where we finally learn what Rahmat does with all the tears he has collected), leaving no doubt on what the main point of the film is.
3 Stars.
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