In Iran, All Women Are Banned From Men's Sporting Events
"Offside" is about a group of Iranian girls who attempts to enter Tehran's Azadi Stadium dressed as boys in order to watch a big football match but some get caught and arrested. After the establishment of the Islamic Republic in Iran, women are not allowed to enter the stadiums.
Genre(s): Comedy, Drama, Sport
Runtime: 93 minutes
Rating: 7.1/10 (1,915 votes)
Release Date: 17 February 2006
Country: Iran
Languages: Persian
Company: Jafar Panahi Film Productions
Sound: Dolby SR, DTS
MPAA: Rated PG for language throughout, and some thematic elements.
Director(s): Jafar Panahi
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Producer(s):
Jafar Panahi - producer
Writer(s):
Jafar Panahi - writer
Shadmehr Rastin - writer
Cast:
Sima Mobarak-Shahi - First girl
Shayesteh Irani - Smoking girl
Ayda Sadeqi - Soccer girl
Golnaz Farmani - Girl with tchador
Mahnaz Zabihi - Girl disguised as soldier
Nazanin Sediq-zadeh - Young girl
Melika Shafahi -
Safdar Samandar - Soldier from Azerbaijan
Mohammad Kheir-abadi - Soldier from Mashad
Masoud Kheymeh-kabood - Soldier from Tehran
Music: Yuval Barazani, Korosh Bozorgpour
Jafar Panahi - producer
Writer(s):
Jafar Panahi - writer
Shadmehr Rastin - writer
Cast:
Sima Mobarak-Shahi - First girl
Shayesteh Irani - Smoking girl
Ayda Sadeqi - Soccer girl
Golnaz Farmani - Girl with tchador
Mahnaz Zabihi - Girl disguised as soldier
Nazanin Sediq-zadeh - Young girl
Melika Shafahi -
Safdar Samandar - Soldier from Azerbaijan
Mohammad Kheir-abadi - Soldier from Mashad
Masoud Kheymeh-kabood - Soldier from Tehran
Music: Yuval Barazani, Korosh Bozorgpour
Posted on: May 3, 2008
August 27th, 2007
Walking through one busy day for a young Iranian girl smuggling herselfinto her country's most important soccer match comes across withdecidedly mixed results. Despite hardly a second of actual soccerfootage focused on, Offside could very well be in the running for bestfilm covering the subject. Deciding to film during the actual match wasa brilliant idea, giving some sequences the textured realism they needto flourish. The movie starts out strongest, offering it's mostpalpable scenes during the first twenty minutes documenting the girl'sjourney to the stadium. I must admit however, after this impressiveintro things fall into a downward lull. Much of the movie takes placein a single location and Panahi simply does not have the depth to coverthese scenes in a truly captivating way. Likewise, a few of the film'slater sequences felt stretched out a bit. Regardless, this is still aworthwhile watch, if nothing for it's fleeting moments of ethicalclarity amidst an occasionally well-exploited set piece.
September 2nd, 2007
In The White Balloon and Crimson Gold, the two other films by JafarPanahi that I've seen, the director mines surprising amounts of depthin subjects that seem, on the surface, slight. In Offside, Panahi'sseriocomic tribute to Iranian women standing up for their rights, Idon't think he's as successful. Not that what he's saying isn'timportant, of course (and it's too bad that, like pretty much everyother Panahi film, Iranians can't see it). But, after a while, the filmfeels a tad flat, and it feels long even at 90 minutes. Not saying Ididn't like it, though. The actors are all fantastic, and thecelebration at the end of the film is infectious. But it's not animportant work, in my opinion.
September 7th, 2007
It was simple and yet so nice. I think the whole sense of sexsegregation in society, which can be bitter, was shown very delicately.It had a bitter kind of hummer in it. The fact that most of the actorswere not professionals, made the movie more tangible and morerealistic. There was a "documentary" side to the movie too. The bestscenes were those that all the girls, banned from watching, werelistening passionately to the soldier, who is supposed to keep an eyeon them, broadcasting the game. If you are an Iranian, the familiarcheering and dancing in the streets after a game won, fills you up withNational pride!! If you are not Iranian, you'll still love it all thesame!
September 24th, 2007
I felt this movie was as much about human sexuality as anything else,whether intentionally or not. We are also shown how absurd andparadoxical it is for women not to be allowed to such a nationallyimportant event, meanwhile forgetting the pasts of our respective"advanced" nations. I write from Japan, where women merely got theright to vote 60 years ago, and female technical engineers are a recentphenomenon. Pubs in England were once all-male, the business world wastotally off-limits for women in America until rather recently, andwomen in China had their feet bound so they couldn't develop feetstrong enough to escape their husbands. Iran is conveniently goingthrough this stage in our time, and we get a good look at howridiculous we have all looked at one time or another. Back to the issueof sexuality, we are made to wonder what it may be intrinsically aboutwomen that make them unfit for a soccer game (the official reason isthat the men are bad). Especially such boyish girls, a couple so muchso that you even get the feeling that lesbianism is on the agenda aswell. I think one point is that not all women are the same, and thewomen the police are trying to "protect" are not the ones who would tryto get in in the first place. The opening scenes of the approach to thestadium makes you appreciate the valor of the young women trying to getin — and each one separately — at all. It is a brutish man's world.Any woman brave enough to try to go should be allowed! The world ofsexuality is not one-size-fits-all.
Meanwhile, the apprehended criminal girls bond inside the makeshift penawaiting their deportation to who-knows-where, and in a much moresubtle way, begin to bond with the guards keeping watch over them.These had definite ideas about women and femininity, which were beingchallenged head-on. The change in attitude is glacial, but visible.
Since the movie is pure Iran from the first moment, it takes a littleeasing-into for the foreigner, but the characters have a special way ofendearing themselves to you, and you end up getting the whole picture,and even understanding the men's misunderstandings and give them slack.The supposed villain is the unseen patriarchy of the Ayatollahs, whichremain unseen and unnamed, and likely unremembered.
Knowing that this movie was filmed during the actual event of theIran-Bahrain match gives me a feeling of awe for all involved.
November 5th, 2007
The predominant ideologies of this country were the restrictions placedon women as opposed to men. In particular, the film focused on thelocations that women were not allowed entry to. As seen throughout thesoccer stadium, women were thwarted by authoritative figures and weredenied access to watch the game. The explicit reasons given in the filmwere because the men did not want to place the women in an environmentof vulgarity—thus corrupting them. The implicit reasons seemed tosuggest that the men viewed the women not necessarily as inferior, butrather as holy beings—ones that were uncorrupt. It seemed that if thewomen were allowed to enter such an environment, they too, in time,would become just as corrupt as the men. This was the men's way ofprotecting the women—beings who they wanted to keep pure from the evilinfluences of the world. To me this seemed like a backhanded complimentto the women. The men denied their freedom of choice in order to upholdthe purity of the state, which, if the state was strictly populated bymen, the whole state might collapse in anarchy. The women then werefactors that were used to prevent the state from becoming annihilated.
The authorities of the country were also the only ones who seemed tocare whether or not the women attended the game, or in general, thewomen having restrictions. Contrary, the fans seemed to support thewomen's efforts. This is illustrated in two specific scenes. In thebeginning, there are several fans that notice the girls dressing asboys but do not spoil their efforts in turning them in. Also during thebathroom sequence, the fans that are denied access to the toilets helpthe girl escape from the security guard so that she can watch the game.This leads to the culture's next ideology of unity.
It was apparent that the Iranian culture embraced the principle ofunity by using soccer as the vehicle to establish such unity. Thesubtext behind this idea spoke volumes to me. Knowing the incrediblestresses this country was and still is under (due to the wars), soccerwas an important escape for the people to gather together and create asense of hope—a hope that would give them reason to believe that theycould survive the difficulties of life. That hope would be contingentupon of course whether or not their team won. Losing would only furtherthe frustration and increase the despondency. This idea of unity iscommon amongst most Eastern and Middle-Eastern cultures—placing thecommon good above the welfare of the individual.
November 16th, 2007
When I say "nothing unexpected", I say it in the sense that — justlike many other Iranian movies by the Masters of the trade such asAbbas Kiarostami, Mohsen Makhmalbaf, Majid Majidi and others — thismovie too does not have big protests, shouting, shooting, killing, carchase, lots of emotionally charged dialogs, confrontation,climax…..nothing of that sort. To be honest, nothing unexpected,nothing out of turn ever seem to happen in many Iranian movies and alsoin this movie. Most of those movies are actually pretty mundane, bereftof extremes and simple….just like real life. And their strength iswhat Master Kiarostami has honesty pointed out: Minimalism.
I wonder if many people can make movies with a small budget and withoutany action, special effects and what have you and can still make a nicemovie. Some obviously can, and Jafar Panahi is one of them.
Jafar Panahi is one of those master movie makers, who can make onethink with his apparently simple and dull movies. I have been able towatch a handful of his movies (this being my 4th) and each time I patmyself for having watched another of his movies. Subtlety, the centralingredient of many Iranian movies, is also something you will find inabundance in this movies. Characters in these movies simply talk, andin their talk, very subtly the movie touches upon the most importantissues of their society. If you are used to, and expect to, seeingsomeone to go with a machine gun and mow down all the oppressors, thesemovies won't hit the spot for you. But if you want to learn about theIranian society and the problems (it's like what Master Kiarostamisaid, "Good cinema is what we can believe and bad cinema is what wecan't believe") they have and how traditional orthodoxy clashes withmodernity, probably you should watch the movie.
Forget the football (Soccer for the land, where they play football withhands!) part; this movie is not about football (per se). This movie isabout many other things and important ones.