Film Studies Faber Lecture to Examine Cinema and the Iranian Revolution with Theorist Joan Copjec

November 6, 2023

The Humanities Council’s Committee for Film Studies is pleased to present a Faber Lecture from feminist film scholar and theorist Joan Copjec (Brown) on Monday, November 13 at 4:30 pm in 010 East Pyne.

The talk, which is supported by the Eberhard L. Faber 1915 Memorial Fund in the Humanities Council and co-sponsored by the Sharmin and Bijan Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Iran and Persian Gulf, will discuss Abbas Kiarostami’s 1979 film, “First Case, Second Case” and the role that cinema played in the aftermath of the Iranian Revolution.

Completed at the end of the Iranian Revolution, just days before the Shah fled Iran and Khomeini returned from exile to take command of the newly-liberated nation, “First Case, Second Case” had to be significantly revised in the face of this historical scission and an uncertain future. What was at stake in this moment, Khomeini claimed, was the sensorium of the Iranian people and the responsibility cinema had in restoring it. Copjec will discuss the stakes and the response from Kiarostami.

Later in the semester, film studies will also present a lecture from Genevieve Yue (The New School). In her talk, titled “The Unburied: Material Histories of Film in the Owens Valley,” Yue will examine the lives and labors of Asian immigrants and their impact on the often-miswritten film histories of the Owens Valley, a slender stretch of high desert in Eastern California. The lecture will be held on Monday, November 27 at 4:30 pm in 010 East Pyne.

For more information, please visit the Committee for Film Studies website.

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