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Filmic Performance – Authenticity and The Apple

This essay examines ideas of performance and realism in relation to notions of authenticity and identity in Iranian Cinema. Sprio asks: How might the issue of performed authenticity relate to contemporary concerns in relation to ‘reality’ and the tradition of realism in cinema? To date, performance has been framed mostly within the context of Theatre Studies and Live Art debates, less so in other academic areas (including Film Studies). This essay aimed to address this gap. While the context for Performance Studies is often linked to ideas of realism within acting, theories of realism are well rehearsed in the debates surrounding film. This essay's originality lies in its mode of address in relation to this question and its focus on the work of Samira Makhmalbaf (The Apple, 1998) and Abbas Kiarostami (Close-Up, 1990). Contemporary Iranian cinematic practices often utilise the idea of re-staging lived experiences – an influence carried through from Italian Neo-Realism. Non-professional actors re-perform their ‘original’ experiences and the director creates a narrative from these authenticities. In this context, the feature film format is refigured in order to re-think the role of the performative and of identity formation within the realm of the moving image. Through a series of contextualising questions, this essay addresses power relations, and realism's ethics, exploring how these are complicated through the director's explicit manipulation. This essay is the first to look at the historical background of this form of realist performance in Iran. It draws links between this contemporary Iranian practice and earlier models of film and performance, making explicit connections between the Italian Realist works of the 1940s and the contemporary moment. This peer-reviewed essay, published in Wide Screen’s inaugural issue, originated as a conference paper given at Interregnum, In Between States, Performance Studies International at the University of Copenhagen, 2008.