Review of No Bears (2022) by Mauro_Lanari — 10 Jun 2023

(Mauro Lanari).

A film shamefully crumpled in on itself, onanistic metacinema about the vicissitudes of being directors in Iran. 1) A political criticism of Islamic theocracies makes no sense if one is aware that the root of the problem is theological. The absolute refractoriness to progressivist developments is not due to the lack of encounter with Enlightenment, but to the idea that the Koran would be a copy of the original written by Allah and dictated to Muhammad by the archangel Gabriel, and without human mediation as in the other two Abrahamic religions there is no exegetic, hermeneutic, interpretative possibility. 2) The cordon sanitaire of national and international colleagues has rushed to Panhani's aid as when the Nobel Peace Prize is awarded to an important personality in danger of life. But here Panhani thinks only of his own existence and becomes the spokesman for the oppressed others only in conclusion, mentioning for a few seconds of torture, imprisonment, attempted suicides and murders suffered by his compatriots. Too little, I repeat: shamefully.