The brittle flamenco verses of a drunk man slip into the room from outside, along with the full moon light. It’s Saturday; fifteen minutes to midnight; the precious moment; it’s movie time. 'The Color of God' in Iran, 1999. 'The Color of Paradise' today in the Western lands. The film starts. A black screen displaying the credits. ‘In the name of God’ was the first line. 'Majid Majidi', the last.
Using images to show what can’t be seen. Filming to deny the picture. My favorite challenge and a common practice that only few can handle keeping the eyes of the audience stuck to the frame. Cinema is more cinematic than ever when that miracle happens, the screen becomes the horizon, the viewer changes into a character, the character comes to life and the director becomes the master of that 90 minutes lasting universe.
I can see myself seven years back, searching for beauty… my higher goal in that time. I used to use my eyes, I used to sharp them and shoot my glance like brown wooden arrows fiercely crossing the space to fall. I didn’t know eyes are meant to be blind to that, I dind’t know beauty was not an entity but a quality, I dind’t know twenty years were too less to set priorities in life.
Beauty is not to be searched but to be found in the grace of something out of the reach of our glance. The motion of a gesture, the firmness of a self commitment, the light of the astros hitting our hands, the silent language of eternities of perfection: morality, the invisible and only place where beauty can be felt and found.
Mr. Majidi, I wish you could hear one more time my applause.
