The Deer (1974)

“FOR TWO CONSECUTIVE DECADES AND IN VARIOUS IRANIAN CRITICS’ POLLS, THE DEER HAS OCCUPIED THE VERY TOP PLACE AS ‘THE BEST IRANIAN FILM EVER MADE’” – UCLA FILM AND TELEVISION ARCHIVE

Wounded by police in an armed robbery, an urban guerilla hunts down an old friend as he looks for a safe place to hide. But his friend is a heroin user and the guerilla stays to help him kick his addiction.

Extremely well-known in Iran for its depiction of urban reality and poverty in pre-revolutionary times, it is also notorious as the film being screened at the Cinema Rex in 1978 when Islamist terrorists set fire to the building killing over 400 people. The fire is often recognized as one of the main triggers for the Islamic Revolution of 1978-79 and the overthrow of the Shah’s regime.

“Here, in a nod to Hollywood’s ‘buddy film’, the familiar hero of Iranian popular cinema is prompted into social action, far beyond the usual romantic conquests. There is a sense of an imminent revolution in this story of a former champ turned junkie who reunited with a leftist classmate and is redeemed by revolutionary anger.”

• Ehsan Khoshbakht

Introduced by Amin Palangi, filmmaker, Lecturer in Screen Production University of New South Wales, Director of the Persian Film Festival

To read Ehsan Khoshbakht's notes on The Deer, please head here. 

Rating

MA15+

Language

Farsi

Cast

Behrouz Vossoughi, Faramarz Gharibian, Nosrat Partovi

Director

Masud Kimiai