THE STORY – What begins as a minor accident sets in motion a series of escalating consequences.
THE CAST – Vahid Mobasseri, Mariam Afshari, Ebrahim Azizi, Hadis Pakbaten, Majid Panahi & Mohamad Ali Elyasmehr
THE TEAM – Jafar Panahi (Director/Writer)
THE RUNNING TIME – 105 Minutes
Jafar Panahi is one of Iran’s most prominent and well-regarded directors, except not by the Iranian government. In the past, he has repeatedly criticized the policies of the Islamic Republic in their unjustifiable actions against the people of Iran. He’s been arrested many times, with his latest occurring in 2022, where after almost seven months in detention, Panahi was released in early February 2023 after the 65-year-old went on a hunger strike. Despite his work ban, he had always managed to complete film projects in Iran and have them released abroad. He has long used his films to criticize the regime’s oppressive policies and human rights abuses. And although he didn’t have to smuggle his latest film into Cannes on a USB hard drive (“This Is Not A Film”) or watch from a prison cell as the rest of the world received his work as it was with “No Bears” (2022), Panahi still faces hurdles for his art on a daily basis. His latest, “It Was Just An Accident,” was once again shot in Iran without a permit, is his first film since his travel ban was lifted after 14 years, and features actresses working without a hijab, which is mandatory for women under the law in Iran. It’s yet another captivating form of political protest from the 64-year-old filmmaker filled with outrage and searing condemnation against the Iranian regime.
The film opens in the stillness of night. A man (Ebrahim Azizi) is driving with his pregnant wife and young daughter when his car hits a stray dog. He stops to check the damage, finds everything seemingly fine, and drives on, until the vehicle breaks down. At the garage, his limp catches the attention of Vahid (Vahid Mobasseri), a man with a haunted gaze and a deeply buried grudge against the one-legged man. Suspecting the mysterious man to be the same government inspector who tortured him years earlier, Vahid kidnaps him, binds him, and takes him to the desert. With a grave dug and vengeance on his mind, Vahid hesitates. What if he’s wrong? What if this isn’t the man who destroyed his life? Unable to go through with murdering an innocent man unless he knows for sure, Vahid sets out around town seeking validation from others who were similarly victimized by this man and the Iranian regime, including Shiva (Mariam Afshari), a photographer who’s taking pictures of Goli (Hadis Pakbaten) and her husband (Majid Panahi) before their wedding and the hot-headed Hamid (Mohamad Ali Elyasmehr) who wants revenge immediately without a moment’s hesitation. Over a single day, their heightened emotions and thirst for vengeance unravel into something far more complicated: a reckoning not just with the past but also with who they have become in the process.
Filled with anger, “It Was Just An Accident” is a quietly devastating examination of revenge and moral guilt. Filmed with Panahi’s signature long takes and wide framing, the film allows the tension to gradually simmer, allowing its characters and their anguish to breathe within the frame. This results in the ensemble delivering excellent performances that explore the emotional fallout of state violence without ever tipping into melodrama. The final sequence, in particular, is a harrowing flip of the tables, where the kidnapped is tied to a tree as he denies, argues, and then begs and cries in desperation for his life. We may never see what he did to this group of people and hundreds of others despite Panahi’s screenplay telling us. However, showing this scene in an unbroken extended take places the audience right into the terrifying display of emotions that would’ve been expressed.
What the Iranian government did to these people was no mere accident. And what they’re doing in retaliation through this perhaps innocent, perhaps not so innocent man is no accident either. It’s implied the simple act that kicks off the story was put on a path by God, but would God want it to go this far? Has God been taken out of the equation entirely? When the law of the land is set to be oppressive towards its people, is there any room for God, healing, and forgiveness? Panahi’s screenplay gives the audience much to think about, and the result is a tightly controlled thriller where actions have consequences and seamlessly transition from one scene to the next, sometimes broken up by tiny moments of black comedy.
“We’re not killers. We’re not like them.” But are they? They certainly have a right to be. Or is it controversial even to admit that? Panahi’s latest doesn’t offer easy answers, as viewers will have to look within themselves to determine how they would handle such a tense, emotionally-driven situation. It asks whether justice becomes indistinguishable from vengeance once stripped of law and due process. As the characters face the man they believe to be their tormentor, they must confront their own trauma and the systems that created it. Through this moral exercise, Panahi lays bare a cynical cycle of violence that continues to consume Iran and its people while also giving himself the outlet to express his rage and fury in ways he cannot outside the cinematic art form. As was the case with his previous films, the simple act of creating and putting this out into the world serves as its own political attack, albeit one that is constructive and not vengeful and will hopefully continue to inspire other Iranian artists to do the same.
