Yek Tasadef Sadeh
In this outstanding 2025 Palme D’or winning, darkly funny, Coen-esque abduction tale, a small mishap triggers a chain reaction of ever-growing problems.
Impulsive mechanic Vahid (Vahid Mobasseri) believes he has caught the brutal interrogator who once tortured him for three months and left him scarred – a man given the epithets ‘Peg Leg’ by his victims. The guy has a prosthetic leg. It must be him. But like so much else in this blackly brilliant film, a question mark hangs over this scenario. Is this man (Ebrahim Azizi) really the author of his suffering or is he just a family man called Eghbal, as he claims? Jafar Panahi is a formidably courageous filmmaker who has spent time in jail at the hands of his country’s repressive regime. Here, he brings deep feeling to a movie that often plays closer to a straight comedy than a fiercer indictment of the state. One police officer even fishes out a card reader to take a bribe when Vahid doesn’t have cash on hand to get out of a tight spot. Panahi holds this tonal range expertly as laughs give away to a probing, philosophical third act that upends expectations in quietly thrilling style.
(Subtitles)
Iran 2025 Jafar Panahi 105m
