Film Review – Reading Lolita in Tehran

In 2003, author Azar Nafisi published a memoir about her days in post-Islamic Revolution Iran, returning to her homeland to remain an English professor at the University of Tehran during a time of severe social and political change. Director Eran Riklis (“Spider in the Web”) and screenwriter Marjorie David (a television veteran) attempt to make a film out of Nafisi’s details, with “Reading Lolita in Tehran” endeavoring to understand the pressures of living in the country, and how such intensity worked to grind down the professor’s spirit. It’s a story told in four chapters, and doesn’t always provide the most enlightening understanding of the subject’s experience. However, the bullet points are clear, and Riklis oversees fine performances to help sell the anguish of the educational and living situations presented here, preserving Nafisi’s experience as she attempts to endure an impossible situation of gradual submission and form a plan for a secret revolution. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com