Persepolis Review 2

Persepolis Review
"Persepolis" is a story of a young girl coming-of-age in Iran during the Islamic Revolution. It is through the eyes of intelligent and outspoken nine-year-old, Marjane, who is a rebellious young Iranian heroine. The Iranian people’s hopes are dashed as fundamentalists take power - forcing the veil on women and imprisoning thousands. Clever and fearless, Marji outsmarts the "social guardians" and discovers punk, ABBA and Iron Maiden. Yet when her uncle is senselessly executed and as bombs fall around Tehran in the Iran/Iraq war the daily fear that permeates life in Iran is obvious. “Persepolis” is frequently somber, and is a perfect expression of the imagination’s resistance to the literal-minded and the power-mad, who insist that the world can only be seen in black and white.

“Persepolis” was not what I expected. I have never read a comic book in my life and I really didn't care too, but once I started ready Persepolis I really got into it. I originally thought it was going to be a nice story with a "happy ending." But it wasn't at all what I expected. Satrapi's story focuses on how she remembers the Iranian revolution and then the first years after. It is very insightful and deep, which kept my attention. The story also showed that not everyone from Iraq is “evil.” Most people of the US have negative feelings toward Iranians and perceive them as terrorists due to 9/11. Although there are terrorists in Iran it’s just a small group of people, and that the rest of the citizens are victims of the terrorists. “Persepolis” allow us to relate and sympathize with Marji, and other Iranians who are in the same situation. Satrapi tries to show that not all Iranians are out to bomb the US; in fact she is portraying that some of Iranians support and approve of western culture. For example when Marji got the Iron Maiden and Kim Wilde posters, when they were banned, it shows that Marji liked the western culture. Therefore, the overall view of the people of Iraq changed because we now see that most of them are just struggling to get by and not get in trouble by the government who are truly the “bad guys.”

I liked the movie, but I thought the comic was better. The movie left out some details, and took away from the imaging, which the comic allows. "If the movie version has been conventionally casted and acted, it would inevitably have seemed less magical as well as less real," states one critic. I, on the other hand, disagree. Although I think the simplistic drawing style worked for the comic I don't think it worked in the same sense in the movie. I believe that if the movie was conventionally casted and acted then it would have seemed more real and maybe more people could relate to Marji, since it would have been a real person acting rather than a cartoon. There are other elements that the director can manipulate to make the movie just as effective even if it was conventionally casted, such as the lighting, the background, etc. The director could make the film simple to make it more the like comic, just with real people.

McCloud had mentioned that the position of the panels in a comic can portray a time jump, whereas a movie can’t do the same thing. A movie has to continue the action and cannot just jump around in time, which I thought was another element that took away from the Persepolis movie. The comic easily showed the time jumps that was needed, but the movie couldn’t really do that, and I felt some parts of the movie were longer then they needed to be. For example, the beginning of the movie was pretty fast pace and moved right through Marji’s childhood, but when you get into the second half of the movie when Marji is older it moves a lot slower. As a child Marji had a lot going on such as the demonstrations and being right in the middle of the revolution, so there was a lot to cover, which is why I think it was fast pace at the beginning. Then when Marji is older and leaves the country, she still talks about Iran and the revolution, but since she is not right there with all the action there isn’t as much to cover and so she starts going into her love life and topic of that nature, which I think slowed down the pace in the second half of the movie.

The Music in the movie I think played an important role in trying to appeal to the audiences emotions. For example, whenever Terian was being bombed instrumental music was playing in the background that was melancholy so that the audience feels that sense of sadness and remorse. Most of the music in the film was instrumental and not really that noticeable, which is what the film makers indented. The producers just wanted it to appeal to the audience’s emotion without distracting them from what was going on in the film. One very noticeable piece of music in the film was the scene of Marji singing “eye of the tiger.” I think this was added to show marji’s character, because up to this point we have only seen a more serious side of Marji. As a young girl Marji was a serious person, wanting to get involved with the demonstrations of the revolution in Iran and wanting to grow up and be a prophet. This scene shows that Marji is a regular person who can let loose and it makes Marji more relatable to the audience.

Animation movies today are usually computer generated and have talking animals or unrealistic “fantasy lands,” such as Shrek, Finding Nemo, and Madagascar. Persepolis on the other hand is a very simple black and white film that has no CGI (Computer Generated Imaging). This is very unusual for animated movies, especially these days, and it still got a very high rating according to the Rotten Tomato movie review website.

The movie stayed true to the comic for the most part. One thing though that I thought the movie didn’t cover as well as the graphic novel did is the movie wasn’t as graphic. For example when Marji parents friend Mohsen was explaining how it was in prison the torture he witnessed and saw, in the book is showed a picture of their friend Ahmadi being tortured and then showed him in pieces, whereas in the movie while Mohsen was explaining what had happened to their friend they just showed him on the couch, and didn’t show the images of Ahmadi. I though it took away from the story, because it’s one thing to listen to what happened but I think showing the images, even though they are just drawings, would have had more of an effect on the audience.

Satrapi's drawing style is very simple, the figures very basic, the scenes rarely involving much detail. McCloud stated that, "by stripping down an imaging to its essential meaning an artist can amplify that meaning in a way that realistic art can't." So basically by making the drawing simple, Satrapi can portray what is going on the scene more effectively. Which I think since the drawings were simple you paid more attention, which made the reader more aware of changes in Marji's face and her emotion came across very effectively. The only negative about the simple drawing is sometimes I couldn't tell the characters apart.

The illustrations enrich much of the text. Even though the drawing style is simple the message it is conveying is much more apparent. Since it is a comic there isn’t much text, so the illustrations and text are both necessary to get the message across. For example, when Marji talks to God the audience understood that, but then looking at the picture of God and Stalin, you realize that Marji associates Stalin with God. This would have never been conveyed to the audience if it weren’t for the illustration.

The comic of “Persepolis” appeals to a range of all types of audiences. Some would argue that comics are childish and for kids, but once you start reading the comic it is quickly realized that “Persepolis” is much more than a childish novel. It deals with important issues of the Iranian Revolution, and is actually quite somber.

In conclusion, I really liked the comic of “Persepolis.” It was not what you would expect a comic to be, but in a good way. Reading Eisner and McCloud also helped understanding “Persepolis” better, because it pointed out things that comics portray that movies and texts can't which was useful. Overall, I enjoyed reading “Persepolis” and I am glad we saw the movie, which was very unique since most movies focus on the action whereas “Persepolis” focused more on the emotion and change of Marji. The movie for the most part stayed faithful to the comic, except for the gruesome scenes, but I would recommend people to see it.