What it means to succeed in a culture designed to curb that possibility lies at the heart of Behrooz Karamizade’s well-appointed drama, Empty Nets.
Premiering as part of the main Crystal Globe Competition at this year’s Karlovy Vary, the film follows a familiar trajectory, but a layered screenplay, pristine cinematography and strong performances across the board make this a gripping, emblematic story of hardship and the overwhelming force of social power structures. Anchored by a fine performance from relative newcomer, Hamid Reza Abbasi, it feels destined for a long festival life.
German-Iranian filmmaker Karamizade taps into a vein of morality play that has been made famous over the past several years by the work of Asghar Farhadi. Here, the quandary is less about the relative ethics of a complex situation, and more a parable about the pressures placed on people – especially when they come from less affluent backgrounds – in systems of oppression. The director has spoken about wanting to offer a perspective that speaks about the struggles of young people in Iran today. Through different elements of this story, he addresses the long fingers of traditional, patriarchal values, presents a microcosm of dictatorial regimes, and highlights the long-standing structural inequalities that serve to crush hope.
The story follows star-crossed lovers, Amir (Hamid Reza Abbasi) and Narges (Sadaf Asgari), a young couple who live in a town near the Caspian Sea. Amir is from a humbler background than Narges, and while she is keen for him to speak to her parents about their potential marriage, he wants to make sure he’s in a better financial position first. This leads Amir to take a job at a fishery an hour or so up the coast, where he quickly becomes involved in less-than-savoury activity, aiding in poaching and couriering illegal caviar into town.
Hamid Reza Abbasi is perfectly cast in the lead role, convincing both as the young romantic hero whose charm and ideals have swept Narges off her feet, but also when the eyes are hollowed out and the cheeks sunken by what he is forced to do to thrive. At the film’s opening, he is working for a catering company in town but is fired when he refuses to follow his boss’s orders and halt a wedding party to demand immediate payment upfront. Reza Abbasi has just the right boyish appeal to play the naïf and is suitably charismatic in his early scenes with Asgari, with whom he shares great chemistry, but is also capable of the gravitas to make Amir’s slow descent into criminality hum with pathos.
At first, his time on the fisheries is primarily back-breaking work for little reward, as he sees how the bosses count wads of cash in the office while he and the other labourers, like his bunkmate Omid (Keyvan Mohamadi), have their already minuscule wages docked or withheld. Soon, Amir comes to understand the fishery’s real work – both through their illegal nocturnal angling to meet the demands for black market caviar and through their ferrying of other cargo, such as the dissident writer fleeing the regime. As Narges’ family begin to consider other options, Amir finds himself becoming ever more embroiled in the fishery’s nefarious activities in a desperate bid to prosper.
As well as Amir and Narges, the Caspian Sea itself becomes something of a character in Karamizade’s film, perhaps the clearest beneficiary of Ashkan Ashkani’s sharp but moody photography. In the opening sequence, Amir swims playfully in the sea but Narges fears the potential threat of its roiling currents. When Amir begins his new life as a fisherman, the seemingly ever-present ocean becomes both the provider of their precious bounty – one which they pillage to brutal effect – and a threatening presence lapping at the edge of the frame. It is a road to salvation and a brick wall all at once, particularly to those seeking passage across its dangerous waters. The positions Amir, Omid and Narges are ultimately put in force them to make difficult, at times perilous, decisions to secure their futures in the battle for a brighter tomorrow.
Director, screenplay: Behrooz Karamizade
Cast: Hamid Reza Abbasi, Sadaf Asgari, Keyvan Mohamadi, Pantea Panahiha
Producers: Eva Kemme, Ansgar Frerich, Uschi Feldges
Cinematography: Ashkan Ashkani
Editing: Anne Jünemann
Music: John Gürtler, Jan Misere
Sound: Sebastian Tesch
Production companies: BASIS BERLIN Filmproduktion GmbH, Living Pictures Production, ZDF / Kleines Fernsehspiel (all Germany), Rainy Pictures (Iran), ARTE (France)
Venue: Karlovy Vary International Film Festival (Crystal Globe)
In Farsi
101 minutes
