On Location: Iran

In the opening scene of “The Salesman” (2017), actors Emad (Shahab Hosseini) and Rana (Taraneh Alidoosti) are forced to flee their apartment. The building shakes, cracks appear in the walls, and they are in danger of collapsing several stories to the ground. Initially, the residents believe it’s an earthquake, a common fear in Tehran. However, the cause is revealed to be a faulty construction project on the property next door. The couple must then move into a new apartment.

Asghar Farhadi’s Oscar-winning film has been in a number of headlines recently, many of them due to Farhadi’s decision to boycott the Oscars in protest of President Donald Trump's travel ban. However, these headlines sell “The Salesman” short, as it is a fascinating tale about the consequences of violence against women, emasculation and social pressures in modern-day Iran.

Those who have seen or read “Death of a Salesman” (1949) will notice a number of parallels to Arthur Miller’s classic play, not least because Emad and Rana’s troupe are performing the show with the couple in the lead roles. However, the story that erupts after Rana is attacked in unclear circumstances by a man who walks into their apartment soliciting its previous tenant, a prostitute, begins to blur the line between Emad of Tehran and Willy Loman of Brooklyn.

Emasculation is central to the conflict that frames the narrative on both sides. For his part, Emad is haunted by his failure to protect his wife. The judgment he perceives from others leads him to a destructive need for revenge past the wishes of Rana, who desires only to move on from her ordeal. Rana’s elderly attacker, who Emad kidnaps in the film’s climactic scene, is anguished by his own shameful feelings over the consequences of his dealings with prostitution as well as laments over his belief that the entire episode was an accident. Emad’s intention to tell his family what has happened puts the man into a state of such frenzied panic at the thought of the resulting shame that he has a heart attack.

However, Farhadi’s direction is always careful to note that these narratives ignore the feelings of Rana, the victim of the entire situation. Unwilling to go through the strain and judgment of a public trial, Rana declines to inform the police. However, her desire to move on is hampered by a lack of adequate support and Emad’s need to bring justice to her attacker. Ultimately, she is forced into facing him again in an extremely stressful situation, this time created by her own husband. Though Farhadi does not divulge exactly what happens to Rana, he does make it clear that her struggle has been co-opted by toxic masculinity. As her attacker’s family wheels him into an ambulance, Rana and Emad are left alone in their old apartment, once again standing against a background of cracks in the wall. One cannot help but think that their marriage and maybe their lives and careers are irreparably cracked as well.