Not all Palme d’Or winners at Cannes are created equal. Anora last year? Yes indeed, a gift from some kind of god. But Triangle of Sadness or The Eel (remember that?!), really?
Well, Iranian director Jafar Panahi’s It Was Just an Accident, which scooped the prize this year, is a creation high above those films and many other previous winners. It is just so intelligent; so blisteringly powerful; so light of touch.
It is also one of those rare movies that manages to mix an unlikely trinity of shaggy-dog comedy, revenge thriller and seriously heavy political shit.
It begins in a car at night-time on an unlit country road, with a father (Ebrahim Azizi), his heavily pregnant wife (Afssaneh Najmabadi) and their young daughter Nilufar (Delmaz Najafi), who’s gleefully bopping her fluffy toy bunny to bouncy pop music.
Then comes a thud from the front of the vehicle. The car stops and the dying whimper of a dog is heard. They resume their journey, the mother consoling her daughter with, “God surely put it in our path for a reason.”
The car soon breaks down (“Another sign,” says the mother) and they ask for help from a guy in local workshop. A second man, Vahid (Vahid Mobasseri), is out back when he hears the squeaky shoe of the father pacing around.
Vahid’s demeanour instantly flips to strange tension. When the father shouts out a question, Vahid hides himself and answers very oddly with his finger deliberately shoved in his mouth.
It’s already brilliant. The rhythmic “eek-eek” of the father’s steps, the peculiar behaviour of Vahid. Little cinematic specks of mystery; glimmers of what will unfold.
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As the family set off again, Vahid is right behind following them. And it’s soon clear that the father is the one Vahid has an urgent, unexpected problem with.
Without giving too much away, before long the father is unconscious in the back of Vahid’s van, where he’ll remain for much of the duration. What wrong could he have done to warrant this kidnapping? And is he even the man Vahid thinks he is? The answers come in a deliciously slow, chaotically unwinding reveal.
The comedy? Well, that’s taken care of when a wedding photographer, the bride (in full marriage dress), groom and “that nutcase” Hamid join Vahid and his captive in the van. It’s ramshackle light humour at its finest, and that squeaky shoe turns out to be something altogether different and a genius, crucial element of the story.
They are all in the van because every one of them has a burning problem with their prisoner. And this being Iran, where the best films tend to slyly attack the brutality of the governing regime, you may be able to guess who this father works for.
This film was made illegally but, interestingly, while many of his fellow directors have had to flee the country or cannot travel freely, somehow Panahi still lives in Iran (although he has been in and out of prison and on hunger strikes).
Just when you think the freewheeling caper (albeit littered with shocking references to the terror of the regime) will never end, things spiral towards an overwhelmingly powerful final confrontation. It’s strong stuff, as resonant in morality and humanity as it is in political horror.
It's a deeply dark and occasionally light story, packed with the richness of humanity and surprising turns of fortune, which is best enjoyed not knowing too much. And right up until the closing seconds, Panahi keeps his craft precise and measured, with a beautifully subtle sting in the tale.
Every month or so a new “best film of the year” comes out. This is the latest one and unlikely to be bettered. If I could have given it six stars, I would have. It really is that astoundingly masterful.
It Was Just an Accident is screening at the BFI London Film Festival. It will be on general release from December 5
