The Cycle of Censorship

An Analysis of the Evolution of Censorship during Pre- and Post-Revolutionary Iran

Authoritarian regimes rely on censorship to remain in power and limit public knowledge; like a double-edged sword, it can deter radical thought but worsen the political state in the process. This idea is especially true in Iran, where two contrasting periods have unveiled different restrictions, showing how changing governments will impose certain limitations on censorship. From the start of the Pahlavi regime to the Post-Revolutionary Era, censorship in Iran has changed in form and grown into an opaque guideline. Through the course of the Pahlavi Era, many Iranians exhibited forms of resistance through the mediums of literature, film, and music. Iranian literature such as Sadegh Hedayat's The Blind Owl and Iran Pezeshkad's My Uncle Napoleon often directed demurral and even mockery towards the Shah and questioned the values of the state. As a result, such works were originally banned. Films like Dariush Mehruji's The Cow during the Iranian New Wave were banned because of depictions of poverty and suffering. Whereas censorship in the Pre-Revolutionary Era often involved targeting dissident authors, the revisions of censorship following 1979 involved promoting a standard of Islam, which caused filmmakers to be even more creative in finding ways to tell a story. Jafar Panahi’s The Mirror changed the traditional landscape of cinema while Tahmineh Milani's The Hidden Half embodied themes of both the expanded rights and complicated roles of women in Iranian society. Following the Khatami presidency, Massoud Bakhshi’s documentary Tehran Has No More Pomegranates encompassed the connection between poverty and lack of social freedom. Much of the work created during the New Wave and following the Islamic Revolution was intertwined with ambitions of conveying aspects of Iranian social conditions with the hope of establishing a greater, more democratic Iran. Censorship has laid the groundwork for the creation of new types of art forms–such as reflexive cinema–to instill a sense of critical thought in Iranian audiences. Although the purpose of censorship might seem originally transparent, it has actually established a paradox: as the state continues to further proscribe certain film, art, and music, Iranian creators have adapted in order to find ways to send their messages, especially ones in which they can provide an effective viewpoint to represent their perceptions of society.

In the Pahlavi Era, several texts were written portraying poverty or criticism of the state and its ideologies, and the Shah was concerned about a worsening national perspective. Consequently, censorship was fueled by the regime’s desire to establish a state sense of common “modernity” throughout Iran. When attaining power, one of the Shah's first acts was to transfer censorship power from the Ministry of Education to the National Police. In 1938, the government transferred more power to the Office of Guidance and Writing, which worked with the National Police to “control dissenting publications” and promote literature that was supported by state ideologies (Small Media Foundation 12). The continuous growth of government censorial power was the start of a larger shift–one that attempted to eliminate any challenge with the state and any conflicting messages with the state's goals. During the Shah's reign, possibly the most influential challenger of Iranian modernity was Sadegh Hedayat, the author of The Blind Owl. Although disturbing on the surface, the novel provokes audiences to think critically, perhaps the true reason why the government believed it to be dangerous. While explaining his unsettling life's story, Hedayat's narrator states, “Ugh! How many stories about love... and death already exist, not one of which tells the truth! How sick I am of well-constructed plots and brilliant writing!” (65). Hedayat paved the way for experimentation to be part of the Iranian writing style. His prose involves an active approach to question the repetitive, untrue nature of produced content and known stories. The “well-constructed” plots he refers to are censored ones; content that abided by the Pahlavi idea of modernity often were stories that contained fiction, as writers had to conform their writing to fit the guidelines of censorship. Yet through his narrator, Hedayat calls out the fallacies within these seemingly “brilliant” stories to convey a message about realizing the truth. On a broader scale, it is a call to question the state’s idea of modernity and the state itself. Hedayat's novel may be disturbing, yet it hints at truth at the core and chastises other stories not necessarily because the narrator is unhinged, but because the stories themselves are not realistic.

Much like The Blind Owl, My Uncle Napoleon highlights the tension between reality and fiction: the discord between real and fake is integral to understanding both the stories and the reasons why they were censored. The real-fake dynamic shapes the characters’ relationships in the novel. Unlike Hedayat's more serious approach to uncovering the nuances between the real and artificial, Pezeshkad derives his plot from humor to create a metaphor, comparing the political representation of the household to that of Iran. By doing so, his story appears to make the Shah's iron fist not just cruel and unjust, but unnecessary and fatuous. The character Uncle Napoleon can only exercise petty tyrannies in his own home, yet he represents far grimmer dictators with far greater power, such as the Shah. Pezeshkzad's indirect references to Iran's reality are evident, perhaps the reason for the book's banning after its publication. In the novel, after Dear Uncle Napoleon sees the phrase 'Napoleon is a donkey,' he demands to know who insulted him. Pezeshkzad describes the event by stating, “When the punishment for both the crime itself and the crime committed during the search for the guilty one had been carried out, the crying Siamak set off for his house” (28). Through his diction, Pezeshkzad alludes to the Shah's totalitarian and unfair government in this scene. Inflating the reaction of such a childish act is not just a satirical statement, but an allegorical one. Phrases like “crime” and “guilty one” make such a small act of defiance obscene, much like Reza Shah's zealous intolerance towards any defiance of his own values and the values of the state. The sense of fear within the children further aggrandize Dear Uncle's status within his household, much like how Reza Shah drew authority from suppression to maintain his authoritarian government. Finally, even Dear Uncle's name and character have significance, as Dear Uncle was dubbed the name Napoleon due to an obsession with French culture. This trait is not unlike the Shah, who also had an eye for French culture and maintained close relations with the country throughout his reign. Dear Uncle's paranoia over the British is relatable to Reza Shah's worry over British hegemony. The countless similarities between Pezeshkzad's work of fiction and reality were grounds for its prohibition. Although fiction, My Uncle Napoleon prompts readers to think critically about how artificial plot-lines are related to their own lives. The state saw a need to censor the novel to prevent critical thought in Iranian audiences, yet the novel's purposeful relationship to real-life shows how creators can rebel against oppressive regimes.

In addition to Pahlavi censorship, the international players in Iran acted as influencers in the Iranian media, further affecting independent filmmakers’ ability to produce artwork. In the 1960s, the Shah's need for political control aligned with the needs of media companies regarding “economic control of the world markets” (Naficy 257). Thus, censorship in the Pahlavi Era masked itself as a form of Western propaganda; the Shah's strengthened ties to the West influenced specifically what the Shah censored. Although censorship and propaganda are two different entities, both work together to distort the truth. The Pahlavi Era enabled a unique type of propaganda; the American need for control in media resulted in Iranians consuming more American films, television, and radio. This saturated media market may have promoted more progressive, Western ideologies; however, the cost was crowding out original Iranian work. In the following decade, exchange relations between Iran and the West flipped, and more content was produced within Iran's borders. The Cow demonstrates how the bounds of censorship changed as a result of Western influence. Originally the film was banned, as the state feared contradictions of “the official message of Iran as a modern nation of promise and plenty” (qtd. in Naficy 259). However, after receiving international recognition, the film was unbanned. The international success of The Cow provided the necessary momentum for Iran to support filmmakers and the New Wave. Mehruji's work demonstrates just how flexible the terms of censorship are: censorship is not always a weapon whose sole purpose is to suppress, rather it acts as a tool to manipulate the truth. In part, the Pahlavi regime based censorial policy relative to the perspectives of the international community. The fear driving this particular censorship arose from the possibility of an international reputation that did not resonate with Iran's official message. Mehruji's depictions of poverty and struggling contradicted this message, but after the film's international and critical acclaim, the ministry lifted the ban on The Cow. The government's support for the New Wave led filmmakers to express their critical view of Iranian social conditions indirectly through allegory. The New Wave was essentially cinema for a critical, realistic assessment of Iranian social conditions. Through metaphor and allegory, Iranian creators contradicted the goals of both international sponsors and the state, heightening tensions that led to the events of the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Leading into 1979, the unrest surrounding film and cinematography would contribute to a revolution that would change the policies of censorship dramatically. Perhaps the largest form of turmoil was at the Cinema Rex in Abadan in which more than 400 people were killed in an arson started by Islamic militants (Naficy 260). Fires like this one had a role in radically building revolutionary participation. However, leaders of the Revolution were not against cinema, but rather against what Khomeini called “misuse of cinema” by the Pahlavi regime (Poudeh 327). Thus, instead of ending all film, they adopted it in an effort to transform Pahlavi cinema into Islamic cinema. Consequently, this resulted in a change in censorship policies. After the Revolution, the first and most important attempt to regulate cinema occurred in 1982 with the Film, Slide, and Video Monitoring, and Screening Permission Bylaw, which refactored the guidelines of censorship (ASL19 230). According to the bylaw, films could not insult Islam or the state and had to uphold the dignity of women and  Social values were in constant flux and the only subjects considered safe for films were the injustices and crimes of the previous regime.

In light of Iran’s constantly changing guidelines towards censorship, many Iranians sought ways to outmaneuver them. As filmmakers struggled to appease censors while captivating audiences, they changed the traditional landscape of film to produce new art forms within cinema. Self-reflexive cinema was a result that acknowledged the limitations of censored film while incorporating issues that Iranian audiences wanted. Filmmakers had to adhere to the laws of censorship and portray daily life in Iran. Jafar Panahi broke down the traditional barriers of film through his movie The Mirror. The original film tells the story of a young girl who must make it back to her house after being left at school. In a scene that lasts less than one minute, the protagonist Mina looks straight into the camera, breaking the cinematic fourth wall. The director Panahi and the crew enter the scene and are actually absorbed into the film. This film style allowed for a new wave of realism in the traditionally fictitious realm of the cinema. The cinematic style that many Iranians were used to at the time was broken, provoking audiences to question the real and the fake. In addition, this new form of cinema was in part the product of a progressive movement in storytelling in the face of growing and unpredictable censorship. Directors themselves were able to enter the film (where they normally acted as controllers of the story) for the purpose of breaking the theoretical construct of the cinematic project. That is, directors attempted to weaken the idea that audiences were viewing insular “real” worlds rather than artificial ones. Panahi mixes the real and fake to probe at the nature of true and false. Much like Hedayat, Panahi causes audiences to question the nature of reality and the direction the state is headed. For Hedayat, the idea of modernity is analogous to Panahi’s perceptions of the Islamic Republic’s views: writers and filmmakers alike provoked questions that conflicted with the state. New art-forms like reflexive cinema have caused censorship to grow, and the desire to break censorial barriers grew with it. Censorship has a connection to reflexive cinema, as reflexive cinema establishes a political position within itself. Reflexive cinema's incongruity with censorship has only heightened tensions between independent filmmakers and the state, feeding the cycle of further censorship and eagerness to convey critical messages.

In the 1980s, another genre of film developed to cope with censorship policies, one that focused on child protagonists. Like Mina in The Mirror, these films chose to focus on children to circumvent censorship. Thus, films featuring child protagonists were actually intended for everyone, in which the children in the film struggled with familiar issues of practical responsibility and social obligations within a contemporary surrounding. During the 1980s, censorship policies regarding cinema were especially tight, as women had to wear the hijab or chador at all times, and no physical contact was permitted in accordance with the rule of modesty (Badley 182). This form of censorship made it extremely difficult to shoot realistic representations of private life, causing filmmakers to find other outlets of realistic convention: women always dressing as if they lived among strangers did not make for a realistic film. Thus, children became alter-egos for any audience members. More lenient restrictions among children in cinema gave the filmmaker more power in depicting his or her representation of society. Children could also provide a focal point around which the hardships of life in contemporary Iran could be shown. A child's vulnerability or confusion in the face of an unfamiliar Iran was fascinating rather than banal. Furthermore, a child's perseverance was seen not as childish, but rather as heroic. The Center for Intellectual Development of Children and Adolescence, more commonly known as the Kanun, has been instrumental in developing an internationally recognized cinematic presence in Iran. In the Pre-Revolutionary era, this organization was tasked with creating documentary and feature films for children, not films for adults (Moruzzi 117). However, the Islamization of cinema in 1979 urged filmmakers to find more freedom in children's films as a potential genre through which they could produce “educational” films that were not too progressively didactic. The redefinition of “children's cinema” is further proof of creators' abilities to adapt to changing censorship within Iran. Although children provide an excellent medium for filmmakers to convey critical messages in the face of changing censorship, there were still many filmmakers in the following decades who pushed to question the relationship between women and the realistic nature of film.

The connection of reflexive cinema to physical existence has raised questions among Iranian feminists concerning the representation of Iranian women’s lives on-screen. As more and more Iranian films received international recognition, feminists and other critics have taken notice and have repeatedly argued that these texts are unrealistic, as the Ministry of Islamic Guidance enforces a strict guideline regarding women's appearances in film. As a result of changing censorship policies after the Revolution, women experienced changing roles in film. Because women performing in films are not spouses of male audience members, women are required to appear veiled in every film scene, even when performing scenes in private (ASL19 231). This requirement of cinema draws from the realistic nature of film, as women would not be wearing hijabs while in private or even sleeping. In addition, directors must avoid too many close-ups of female actresses and there is a mandated observance of the Islamic code of dress. Because of the many complicated laws revolving around women in cinema, filmmakers are faced with increasing unwritten norms, making the filmmaking process both more complicated and difficult.

The Hidden Half embodies the theme of women’s entwined intellectual and sentimental lives in Iran, boldly touching on many controversial subjects. In the film, the protagonist Fereshteh asks her husband to sympathize with the activities of both her and the prisoner woman by unveiling her communist involvement (or her hidden half) to her husband. The movie's theme of understanding is essential in developing the prisoner woman's circumstances: Fereshteh wants her husband to see the prisoner as only human. Milani’s work mixes cultural oppression entering the post-revolutionary era with compassion and equality. Her film radiates the themes of tolerance and acceptance, and it’s no surprise that Milani was jailed following the release of The Hidden Half: challenging gender roles in the face of censorship was not a trait the Islamic Republic could afford given the political climate. After its release, her film was banned for being critical of fundamentalist political groups. Censorship policies regarding women often take away credit where credit is due: women's lives in Iran are complex and influential, yet censorship does not give filmmakers the ability to address these controversial issues. Although Milani was arrested, her film received many international awards. She was able to produce genuine, award-winning content while still conveying the recurring themes that the state attempted to censor. By noting women's complex role in the Iranian social construct, Milani was able to ask real questions regarding women's actual role in society. Her arrest only served as a message to Iranian filmmakers that their stories–especially those involving the Iranian social ideal–were asking the right questions.

In addition to the reflexive style, Iranian creators also outmaneuvered the law in order to produce content true to its form. The growing yet politically important movement known as underground cinema emphasized experimental culture and progressive themes. In America, underground cinema was originally a reaction of countercultural filmmakers toward the “dominance of the mainstream and Hollywood cinema,” whereas in Iran it is a response to the “control censorship imposed by the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance on Iranian cinema” (Jahed 223-224). Underground cinema is the term used to describe the movement which exists as a consequence of filmmakers' civil disobedience and refusal to adhere to the regulations of the government. The persistent changes in censorship's guidelines and increased pressure on Iranian filmmakers have made censorship incredibly unpredictable. The expanding nature of censorship has reached a point where filmmakers have no more room to change the field of cinema, thus having to create illegal content “underground.” Iranian underground films are often documentaries of the current social and cultural situation in Iran, revealing sexual relationships, drug use, drinking, and police misconduct (ASL19 226). According to the Ministry of Culture, these features are illegal to include in film, yet the aesthetics of underground films are wholly truthful and raw. Once again, censorship proves itself as a vehicle for greater truth: causing creators to illegally produce content that exhibits truth. Filmmakers such as Bahman Ghobadi, the director of No One Knows About the Persian Cats, begin to address issues that have never been addressed in Iranian cinema up to this point. In his film, Ghobadi receives no approval from the Ministry of Culture, and the willingness to defy censorial rule allowed for a different world of music, art, and other marvels to be unveiled in the underground of Persian homes. Cinema has developed into a front for social reproduction and social critique. Although censorship has negatively impacted those with creative talents, forcing them to conform their expressive abilities, independent filmmakers have been called to action to bring light to those who also have talents or stories to tell.

Cinema is a battleground, used not just by independent filmmakers but by the Islamic State as well. Oftentimes, the state will employ filmmakers to produce content that aligns with the government's views to serve as a form of propaganda. The satiric film Tehran has No More Pomegranates actively resists the informative tone that often couples documentaries while having the opposite effect of its original intentions. The narrative of the film is crucial in establishing the idea of reform. Allusions to the bureaucracy of censorship, such as the repeated need for permits and the Ministry of Islamic Culture and Guidance, are related to censorship activities of the state. Moreso, the humorous approach Bakshi takes explains that not even the state has control over those they employ. The atmosphere of reform that spurred from Tehran Has No More Pomegranates is underscored by the filmmaker's message: Tehran is in a constant state of progression. As a result, Bakhshi literally reshapes his film to a new focus and abandons the original project. Reform does not just impact the direction of the film, but also the aesthetics of filmmaking. The theme of reform develops to make a statement regarding the legacy of reform following Khatami's presidency. Similarly in the YouTube music-video “Love for Speed,” Kiorstami and the music group Kiosk together use the Iranian social aesthetic. Lyrics in the music like “multiple-choice elections left to chance” and “underground music or cultural attack” complement visual aspects such as Iranians fighting in the streets. It displays messages of division within fundamentalists and progressives: within traditionalism and modernism. The aesthetics of the music-video provide a complicated representation in Iran at a time when Khatami hoped to progress from Iran's isolated global status. Underground cinema and the rise of popular culture is another result of the ways in which censorship cannot stop Iranians from creating new art–it is simply a barrier that only feeds ambitions of greater work.

Censorship in Iran is not an impartial process; it is encompassed by human bias, human nature, and human error. Every period in Iranian history involved specific political and social circumstances that have affected censorship policies. When governments change, the politics of culture change as well as the dynamics of censorship. A film may be banned due to its portrayal of a “socially and politically sensitive topic in a historical era,” while it may be granted permission to be screened over time as said historical event passes (ASL19 239). Bahram Beyzai’s film Bashu, for example, was originally interpreted as an anti-war film during the Iran-Iraq War and was banned. As time moved past the historically significant event, the ban was eventually lifted and the film experienced no censorial changes. Censorship in Iran works bureaucratically: unlike a computer with an objective criterion, censorship is subject to the same biases and personal tastes of the censors. Because of this, filmmakers can actually establish a relationship with the censors, and the filmmaker him or herself has the ability to smooth the path towards production. The extent to which a filmmaker is committed to the rhetoric of the Revolution and loyal to the values of the state are also influential to censorship. These biases demonstrate how the guidelines of censorship are not clearly defined: they demonstrate the difficulty of producing film in Iran. Films must abide by the Islamization of cinema while also pleasing the censors. As filmmakers find new ways to incorporate a critical perspective within their films, censorship's ever-changing role is perhaps met by filmmakers as a challenge: to continue to create new art-forms and break the semi-permeable boundaries of censorship–written and unwritten. It seems that the purpose of the Islamic Republic has been to not explicitly designate censorship laws in order to leave the battleground of cinematography open to interpretation when sensitive times come and go. Without any clear guideline and severe consequences, it's quite possible that filmmaking in Iran is one of the most difficult, complicated, and arduous tasks: one that bears no clear projection as to the eventual fate of the film.

Over the course of almost a century, censorship has shown itself to be a tool wielded by governments and used at their discretion. Consequently, Iranian creators have challenged and changed the traditional cinematic art form to find ways to send their messages, often resulting in the creation of sub-genres with similar core themes. Filmmakers and musicians refusing to change their artwork to conform to censorship have given way to underground cinema and music, a rebellious form of artwork that often relates to contemporary Iran. Attempts to silence filmmakers and keep hidden the modern social dynamic has often failed, establishing a cycle between tighter censorship policies and filmmakers' continuing ability to create award-winning films that contain the Iranian social aesthetic. Authors such as Sadegh Hedayat in the Pahlavi Era promoted thinking about the nature of reality among its audience, much like Iranian filmmakers like Jafar Panahi in the following decades and Post-Revolutionary Iran. From the state’s perspective, the films, art, and music censored in Iran are dangerous not because they are corrupting, but because they prompt people to ask questions. Stories are powerful, and the need for censorship proves that even the smallest of messages can spark a bright flame of critical thought–a flame that will continue to kindle so long as creators continue to create and tell stories that matter.

Sources (MLA 9th ed.)

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Norma Claire Moruzzi “Censorship in Iranian Cinema” Iranian Cinema in a Global Context, edited by Peter Decherney and Blake Atwood, Routledge, 2018, pp. 112-142.

Poudeh, Reza J., and M. Reza Shirvani. "Issues and Paradoxes in the Development of Iranian National Cinema: An Overview." Iranian Studies, vol. 41, no. 3, 2008, pp. 323–341. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/25597465.

Small Media Foundation. Writer's Block: The Story of Censorship in Iran. London, Small Media Foundation, 2015.