Poster of "Persian Lessons".
Directed by Vadim Perman and starring Naville Perez Piscayat and Ras Edinger, the World War II film Persian Lesson was released on March 19 in mainland China. Inspired by real events, the film is based on Wolfgang Kohljas's short story Erfindung Einer Sprache (The Invention of Language), set in 1942 when a young Belgian Jew traded a sandwich for a Persian book, held it in his possession during a mass execution by a Nazi executioner, and falsely claimed to be a Persian to avoid death. It so happened that a German officer was looking for a Persian teacher. In order to survive, the Jewish prisoner had to remember the names of countless prisoners every day as inspiration for his creation of the "Persian language"... In order to create the pseudo-Persian language in the film, the director and a Russian linguist specially developed a grammar and a dictionary of 600 words.
The film received a high response at the 2020 Berlin Film Festival and Beijing Film Festival, with a Douban score of 8.3 points. The Hollywood Reporter praised the performances of the two male protagonists: "a performance greater than life". The Guardian said the film presented an incredible survival scene for the audience.
The two main actors of "Persian Lesson" appeared at the Berlin Film Festival.
"Persian Lessons" was filmed entirely in Belarus and co-produced with the Belarusian Film Company, which officially submitted the 93rd Academy Awards "Best International Film (formerly 'Best Foreign Language Film')" in early 2021, but because the main language is not the official language of the submitting country and most of the creators involved in the production of the film are not from Belarus, it does not meet the eligibility requirements for the award and is disqualified by the Academy.
The director specially developed a 600-word pseudo-Persian dictionary
Ukrainian-American director Vadim Perman, who now lives in Canada, directed the World War II film, whose directorial debut was "Dusty Homeland" released in 2003, which won three Oscar nominations for best actor and best supporting actress. Perman, who has Jewish ancestry, was fascinated by the Persian Lesson program. Most films portray the Nazis as war machines, terrifying, evil, and very single characters. But he wanted to go beyond that and seek to find a breakthrough in humanity, carefully portraying a Nazi who felt jealous, fearful, and loving like everyone else. "This humanization is not about praising what they do in any way. It's about showing them as people, so that you as an audience resonate. You would say, (in other words, I'm in that situation) maybe I'll do the same. ”
German actor Ras Edinger plays The Nazi officer Koch.
Russ Edinger, a German actor who plays The Nazi officer Koch in the film, said, "It's important to have outsiders tell the story, they can do better than the Germans, because a lot of people in this country are still afraid to face history." Edinger's father was born during the war, and his grandfather fought in the war, though everyone insisted that the Holocaust was a thing of the past and had nothing to do with their "new generation." But as a German, that thought traumatized him. In his view, starring in the film is a way to heal trauma and remember history and not let the tragedy happen again.
The film's screenwriter, Ilya Zofi, was born in the Soviet Union and studied screenplay and drama at the prestigious Gerasimo Film Academy in Moscow. In 1990, he came to Berlin as a Soviet Jewish immigrant, initially unable to work as a screenwriter, but instead did a lot of different jobs until he had the opportunity to enter a logistics company. Later, he founded a logistics company and a trading company on his own. After selling a company in 2011, he returned to script writing, where he truly loved, writing many screenplays for film and television productions in Russia and Germany, and founding the production company LM Media in 2017. The script for the Persian Lesson was originally written in Russian before being translated into English and German.
More than two thousand "Persian" words are made up in the film, using a large number of personal names as root words.
The most amazing thing about the film is that Jew Gilles created a Persian language with the names of prisoners, and finally read out 2840 names, so that those who died in Nazi concentration camps will be remembered by the world. Director Vadim Perman said it was the genius of screenwriter Ilya Zofin that the whole project of creating the false Persian language was not only a plot tool to try to survive, but also to honor the victims there. In the film, Giles made up more than two thousand words and memorized them, and eventually he and the Nazi officer Koch, a "teacher and student", could even converse in this language, although only they could understand each other.
The main dialogue of the film is in German, the beginning and end are interspersed with some French, and the real Persian language is not until near the end, when the German officer Koch passes through the security check, the customs inspectors say a few words.
At the end of the film, Koch, who spoke "Persian" at the airport security checkpoint, was seen through and arrested and escorted away.
To create a pseudo-Persian language, the director worked with a Russian linguist to develop a grammar and 600-word dictionary that splits the language and the names of refugee camp victims and combines them into roots to make it sound like a real Oriental language.
Jewish prisoners wanted to survive, and Nazi officers wanted to be cooks
Among the films depicting the World War II concentration camps, there are films such as "Schindler's List" and "Son of Thor", which show the horrors of the Nazi concentration camps, and there are also films like "Beautiful Life" and "Jojo's Whimsical World", which depict the war in a relatively relaxed, comedic metaphorical way. Director Vadim Perlman believes that "Persian Lessons" is in the middle of the two, both serious and humorous.
Naville Perez Biscayat plays Jelly Jeles the Jew.
Jew Gilles strives to survive by creating a Persian language in the film. Navel Perez Biscayat, who plays a Jew, is 35 years old, born in Argentina, his native language is Spanish, and he also speaks German, Italian and French. This very good language talent, let him star in the film with ease, and a pair of innocent big eyes, can not help but make people have a desire to protect. With the 2017 film 120 Hits Per Minute, Biscayat was nominated for Best Newcomer at the César Film Awards in France and Best Actor at the European Film Awards.
The authoritative Media "Variety" magazine in the United States commented: "Biscayat's performance is one of the most in-depth performances in a film showing the Holocaust since Adrian Brody starred in "The Pianist" nearly 20 years ago. ”
The image of the Nazi officer Koch in the film is quite elegant, breaking the audience's impression of the inherent evil symbols of the Nazis. Before the war, he was a cook, dreaming that when the war was over, he would go to Tehran, Iran, to join his brother, open a restaurant, and learn Persian so that he could use it in Tehran. His name "Koch" means "chef" in German.
The two "teachers and students" who are learning "Persian".
The Nazi logistics officer seemed to be somewhat different from the Nazis' usual ruthless and brutal setting, and compared with other Nazi colleagues in the concentration camp, in addition to being brutal, he was not only intelligent and studious, but also had a relatively gentle personality, especially his attitude towards prisoner Giles, which had a very complicated ambiguous relationship. In the view of director Vadim Perman, these are the perfect embodiment of the complexity of human nature, "it is a symbiotic relationship of mutual use, but I would not call it 'friendship'".
The "Persian language lesson" changed the fate of both men at the same time, and it became Giles's umbrella in the Nazi concentration camps, able to survive. For nazi officers, Persian language classes were his future tools for making a living in Tehran, and he was grateful to Gilles for opening his heart for a while, making him more human, and making him human again. For example, Giles's first question koch asked in fake Persian was "Who are you?" Koch did not answer "Hauptsturmfuhrer Koch," but said "Klaus Koch," which was his real name.
Beijing News reporter Teng Chao
Edited by Huang Jialing Proofreader Wang Xin
Source: Beijing News