Copyright by Blake Robert Atwood 2011 The Dissertation Committee for Blake Robert Atwood certifies that this is the approved version of the following dissertation: RE-ENVISIONING REFORM: FILM, NEW MEDIA, AND POLITICS IN POST-KHOMEINI IRAN Committee: M.R. Ghanoonparvar, Supervisor Kamran Aghaie Kristen Brustad Mia Carter Michael C. Hillmann Nasrin Rahimieh RE-ENVISIONING REFORM: FILM, NEW MEDIA, AND POLITICS IN POST-KHOMEINI IRAN by Blake Robert Atwood, B.A., M.A. Dissertation Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of The University of Texas at Austin in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy The University of Texas at Austin December 2011 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The completion of this dissertation was made possible by the hard work and support of a very devoted group of advisors, friends, and family members, and I owe many thanks. I have had the great fortune of working with an amazing and encouraging dissertation committee. I am especially grateful to M.R. Ghanoonparvar, who has supervised my work over the last five years with patience and steadfastness; his unyielding belief in my abilities as a teacher and a scholar made me feel at home in the field of Persian studies. Michael Craig Hillmann has pushed me to be rigorous in my scholarship, and I appreciate his willingness to share with me his vast knowledge of and enthusiasm for Persian literature. Kamran Aghaie’s open door meant that I often ran to him first with good news and bad. He gave generously of his time, knowledge and advice, and I cannot begin to express my thanks to him. Kristen Brustad has gone out of her way to support me and my work, first as graduate advisor, then as chair of the Department, and finally as a member of this dissertation committee. She is the model of professionalism that I aspire to be. I thank Mia Carter for reviving me intellectually and academically when I needed it most and for continuing to challenge and encourage me. Finally, I am so very honored that Nasrin Rahimieh agreed to serve on my committee from afar. I have long admired her work in Iranian studies, but the warmth and kindness that she has brought to this project inspire me the most. At the University of Texas at Austin, I found a welcoming community of people working on the Middle East. Anousha Shahsavari has been a tireless friend, supporter, and collaborator. She was never too busy to help me with Persian sources or talk about Khatami, and I would never have made it this far without her. I am so thankful to Faegheh Shirazi for teaching me so much about Iran and for always speaking to me in iv Persian. Zeina Halabi kindly read one chapter of this dissertation, and her feedback and her friendship have been invaluable to me. Over the last several years, I have had the pleasure of working alongside other students whose interests intersected with mine. For their friendship and encouragement, I thank Dena Afrasiabi, Mardin Aminpour, Beeta Baghoolizadeh, Nastaran Kherad, and Mikiya Koyagi, Early in my studies, I had the good fortunate of working with Zjaleh Hajibashi and Farzaneh Milani at the University of Virginia. They patiently nurtured my interests in Persian and Iran, and I am forever grateful. Many thanks especially go to Zjaleh Hajibashi, who took a special interest in my study of Persian and devoted a lot of time to preparing me for graduate study. She also graciously agreed to read a chapter of this project. Over the past several years, I have been kept sane by a small but amazing group of friends. I thank Anthony Ferraro being the kindest and most giving person I know and for pushing me to be a better person myself. Dena Afrasiabi has, since the beginning of our short friendship, been someone I can confide in and connect with, and she knows best how much that means to me. I cannot begin to express my fondness for Saffron Hall, who taught me the importance of friendship. She stuck by and encouraged me through all the ups and downs, and I cannot imagine completing this dissertation without her help. I am very lucky to come from a loving and encouraging family. My admiration for my parents runs deep, and I am thankful to them for making my education their priority and for supporting my intellectual journey. My siblings are the people to whom I feel closest in this world, and I thank them for lifelong friendship. My brother Seth and his wife Jessica make a concerted effort to bring us all together, and some of my happiest memories over the last few years have taken place in their company. My sister Ashley knows me better than anyone, and I appreciate her for being just as crazy as I am and for v inspiring me with her hard work and kind heart. For almost as long as I can remember, my brother Tyler has been my partner in crime, and our recent summer together in Austin was a dream come true. Our late night donut runs, frequent trips to coffee shops, dance sessions, lemonade-making extravaganzas, TV-watching parties, and general tomfoolery made the final stages of this dissertation a genuinely happy time for me. My greatest thanks are reserved for Drew Paul, who read and commented on every page of this dissertation (sometimes more than once). He has been a constant source of support and encouragement, and his kindness and patience made all of my days better. Thank you. vi RE-ENVISIONING REFORM: FILM, NEW MEDIA, AND POLITICS IN POST-KHOMEINI IRAN Publication No._____________ Blake Robert Atwood, Ph.D. The University of Texas at Austin, 2011 Supervisor: M.R. Ghanoonparvar This dissertation opens a multimedia archive of contemporary Iranian films, documentaries, newspaper articles, and political philosophies in order to rethink the complicated relationship between cinema and the Reformist Movement in Iran. The existing scholarship has largely reduced interactions between these institutions to modes of mutual support, noting Mohammad Khatami‘s backing of the film industry during his tenure as Minister of Islamic Culture and Guidance (1982-1992) and his liberal cultural policies as president (1997-2005). However, the research presented in this dissertation indicates that Iranian cinema and the Reformist Movement crucially informed one another, and the dynamics of their exchange functioned on an ideological level. More than just benefiting from the Reformist Movement, certain films and filmmakers helped to shape and articulate its emerging political discourse. vii At the same time, the dialogue between Khatami‘s Reformist Movement and Iranian cinema have generated a unique set of aesthetic qualities that includes a revival of mystic love, the use of Tehran as a metaphoric site of social and structural reformation, and reconfigurations of perceptions of time. I examine films that were released during Khatami‘s tenure as Minister of Islamic Culture and Guidance, his presidential campaign and presidency in order to interrogate the relationship between film and reform and to theorize the visual language that has emerged to enunciate this relationship. I also consider a film and a music video released two years after Khatami‘s presidency ended. They did not benefit directly from his cultural liberalism but nevertheless participate in central reformist debates. Their experimentation with form suggests that the reformist aesthetic possesses a momentum that permits it to develop and transform without explicit contact with the political movement that inspired it. I argue, therefore, that the Reformist Movement marked a change on the political landscape at the same time that it signaled a new trend in the country‘s cinematic history. I connect innovations in film to current trends in new media and youth culture and propose a new reformist model for the study of cultural productivity in contemporary Iran, one that moves past the reductive category of ―post-Revolution.‖ viii CONTENTS A Note on Transliteration . x Chapter One The Aesthetics of Reform 1 Chapter Two Mystic Love and the Emerging Poetics of Reform 27 Chapter Three Documenting Election and the Urban Reality of Reform 87 Chapter Four A Genre of the Second of Khordād 148 Chapter Five New Forms in Cinema and Media in Post-Khatami Iran 210 Chapter Six Reform at Its Limits 255 Appendix 268 Bibliography 269 Filmography 286 ix A NOTE ON TRANSLITERATION For the transliteration of Persian words, I have followed the Iranian Studies transliteration scheme. Diacritical marks have been excluded in proper nouns. For the names of well-known politicians and filmmakers, I have used the spelling that has become standardized in print (e.g. Khomeini, Ahmadinejad, and Khamenei). Consonants ب b ض z پ p ط t ت t ظ z ث s ع ‗ ج j غ gh چ ch ف f ح h ق q خ kh ک k د d گ g ذ z ل l ر r م m ز z ن n ژ zh ه h س s و v ش sh ی y ص s ء ‗ Vowels short long diphthongs a (as in ashk) ā (as in āb) - e (as in fekr) i (as in melli) ey (as in Teymur) o (as in pol) u (as in Tus) ow (as in rowshan) x Chapter One The Aesthetics of Reform The story of Mojtaba Mirtahmasb and Jafar Panahi‘s submission to the 2011 Cannes Film Festival, a 75-minute piece called In film nist [This is not a film] (2011), has all of the makings of a Hollywood action movie. The video arrived in France on a USB stick hidden in a cake that was sent from Iran to Paris.