Maryam
review by Greg Vasich
While so many movies about teenagers today retread the same characters and plot lines, Maryam (2000), written and directed by Iranian-American first-time filmmaker Ramin Serry, centers itself around a teenage title character but confronts far more difficult and important issues than who’s taking who to the prom.
The film is set
in a New Jersey suburb during the time of the 1979 hostage crisis in Iran, depicting
an Iranian-American family attempting to live a normal life in the face of growing
anti-Iranian racism. Similarly, since September 11th, many people of Middle
Eastern descent in the US have been targets of prejudice and aggression. Maryam
reveals the darker side of the hyper-nationalism that follows these traumatic
events, challenging viewers to rethink their own responses.
The film begins with the arrival of Maryam’s (Mariam Parris) cousin Ali
(David Ackert), who has come from Iran to live with her family while studying
physics at a local college. He appears at the airport, looking confused and
out of place, wearing clothes that do not quite fit. Maryam attempts to greet
him with a hug, from which he backs away. Her father (Shaun Toub) later explains
that cousins often marry in Iran and such contact would be
inappropriate.
Growing up in American society, she initially feels many of Ali’s beliefs
are alien to her. Maryam sees herself as the typical teen; she participates
in the school’s news club and has a crush on her co-anchor, a white boy
named Jamie (Victor Jory). However, the beginning of the hostage crisis shakes
the typical life that she and her family knew as the predominantly white community
they live in begins to view them as outsiders, reacting towards their presence
with fear and anger.
Ali comes to the US angry at the nation for protecting the deposed Iranian shah,
a man he views as a heinous murderer. The Iranian people, as well as the Ayatollah
Khomeini, Iran’s new leader, want the shah returned so that he can be tried
for murder and executed, but the US refuses to release him from a New York hospital
where he is being treated. As an Iranian, Ali is outraged at what he views as
the US standing in the way of justice and expresses his love for the Ayatollah,
a man who calls the US “the Great Satan.”
Such strong words certainly rub many Americans the wrong way, but Ali’s
opinions are presented objectively, as those of an earnest, devout Iranian Muslim,
not those of a crazed fanatic. The film also tempers Ali’s opinions by
emphasizing that he has only been so strongly religious for a year, since his
mother died. Thus, his opinions cannot be fully informed, and the movie does
not attempt to present Ali as capable of speaking for all Iranians. However,
the portrayal of many white American characters as ignorant and susceptible
to racism does bring us to sympathize with the Iranian position.
The film also effectively intertwines news footage from 1979 with events in
its plot. It displays the media playing up flag burning demonstrations in Iran,
depicting that nation’s citizens as violent and hate-filled. We then see
pro-Iranian protesters in America being beaten, with an especially brutal clip
of a protester getting knocked to the ground, only to then get kicked in the
head. This increasingly unsafe and uncomfortable climate is also displayed in
the narrative, with Maryam and her family having to persevere through hostile
actions ranging from a racial epithet spray-painted on their car to a brick
thrown through their window. The
integration of non-fiction elements into this story line adds to the film’s
power and credibility.
In addition to using historical footage to back up the plot, another of Maryam’s
strengths is its ability to use its story to make us view some images in a new
light. One of the most powerful examples is a clip of a giant yellow ribbon
tied around a skyscraper, following the appearance of a ribbon on Maryam’s
neighbors’ tree. The ribbons were intended as symbols of unity and hope,
but the film’s events make the skyscraper look like a giant symbol of oppression.
There are other clips of red, white, and blue clad Americans shouting for the
US to bomb Iran. While the motives behind yellow ribbons and renewed patriotism
may have been pure, the film makes it clear that some Americans have perverted
the desire to rescue American lives into the desire to end Iranian lives. The
footage is again an effective tool in comparing the maliciousness of US protests
to the Iranian protests sensationalized in the media. However, the film is again
careful to avoid extremes and uses a clip of President Carter condemning any
racist response towards Iranian-Americans, avoiding unilaterally labeling white
Americans as racists.
The movie presents us with a picture of an Iranian-American family wonderfully
detailed down to the food they eat and the decorations in their house. But while
Maryam and her cousin are thoughtfully and compellingly
depicted young people, the movie’s lone weakness is in falling back on
stereotypes such as the snotty blonde girl and pot head slacker in order to
fill out the rest of its teenage cast. The white characters in the movie are
all so one-dimensional that it makes you wonder if Serry was intentionally turning
the tables on the usual teen movies, which resort to stereotypes of ethnic minorities
for their few non-white characters. Even Jamie, with whom Maryam goes on a date
to a roller skating rink, remains flat and uninteresting. Never seeing white
teenagers wrestle with tough racial issues nor seeing why they decide to alienate
Maryam forces us to experience her confusion, but their unrealistic characterizations
keep us from feeling the impact found in the rest of the film.
Americans responded to the September 11th tragedy by banding together in patriotism.
Stores sold out of American flags, and everywhere signs proclaimed statements
from “God Bless America” to “Freedom Will Be Defended.”
People wore yellow ribbons and celebrated this growing nationalism as a positive
way of America coming together. But that coming together does not include everyone;
it froze out Iranians in 1979, much the way that people of Middle Eastern descent
are frozen out today. But even worse than exclusion is the violence directed
towards these groups, and the footage from 1979 shows the brutal reality of
it. There has been similar hostility since September 11 and similar pleas from
the President to cease such violence. But rather than plead, Maryam shows us
a human picture of the oppression these Americans face in their own country,
an image powerful enough to change minds.
Sadly, few people will have the opportunity to see Maryam, because no major
company has elected to distribute it, despite its being championed by Roger
Ebert, who selected it for his 2001 Overlooked Film Festival. Serry has chosen
to distribute it himself, and the film has played in several large American
cities, including a two week run at Chicago’s Music Box Theatre. Hopefully,
this added exposure will result in a video and DVD deal for a film that is more
deserving of an audience than many of the movies in theaters today.
respond to vasich@uiuc.edu