It Was Just an Accident
The question of identity falls all over Jafar Panahi’s “It Was Just an Accident.” For one, they are so certain about another’s identity that they do something awful. Others he finds himself encountering along the way are not so sure, and others are, and they know how they’d respond. In the end, we get some clarity in terms of answers in identity, but less so in what they’ll do with that information. This all builds up to an ending that feels like self-fulfilling prophecy, but even then, we’re left to wonder about the outcome. After all, human nature is not so straightforward.
This story begins with an accident. A man, his pregnant wife, and daughter are driving down a dark road. The daughter is dancing in the back seat when the man (Ebrahim Azizi) runs over something. It’s a dog, and it is dead. The daughter is saddened, but the mother tries to reassure her- it was just an accident. Not long after that, their car stalls. They manage to get to a service station, and one of the people working it (Vahid, played by the riveting Vahid Mobasseri) recognizes the man, who has a prosthetic leg. Or, at least, he thinks he does; he thinks the man is the same person who tortured him when he was a political prisoner. He isn’t for sure because he was blindfolded.
The next morning, Vahid takes the man hostage after running him down with his car, but before he can bury him alive, doubt is sowed in him. So he goes to a friend, a fellow prisoner whom he hopes will help identify him. The friend does not help him, but he does send him to a photographer (Mariam Afshari) who might. She is doing wedding photos for a couple, the bride (Hadis Pakbaten) whom was also tortured by the same man. Neither are completely sure, but both want to get to the bottom of things; they meet up with one more former prisoner (Mohamad Ali Elyasmehr), who is more certain, but none of those who are uncertain feel comfortable with killing him without absolute confirmation.
Panahi’s film is so rich in its simplicity- this is about five people (the bride’s husband-to-be comes along) who are frozen with their trauma of what happened to them, but- when possibly faced with an opportunity to do something tangible about it, their rage is held back by a nagging sense of morality, something they thought was long gone from them. Yes, some of them want to do what this man supposedly did to this man, but that doubt is a tricky thing, especially when they get an unexpected phone call that Vahid answers. Panahi’s sense of control over the tone of this film, which sometimes plays like a dark comedy, is exceptional. This is a film where one event escalates to not just impacting the initial people involved, but others as well. The choices to be made are important, because the wrong one will leave scars that will never be able to heal. Our responsibility to others extends not just in the choices we make, but the ones we don’t make. Even then, if we think we make the right one, it may not turn out to be the best one. Actions, and inaction, both have consequences. Whether they work out well for us is up to the universe to decide. Sometimes, it’d be best if we leave our impulses in check. That’s one of the hardest things we, as humans, are able to do, however.
