When Iranian-Canadian journalist Maziar Bahari went to Iran to cover protests stemming from the country’s 2009 election, his life took a sad and comically tragic twist.
With a pregnant fianceé waiting for him back in London, Bahari was arrested, and spent more than four months facing brutal interrogation at Evin Prison.
According to Jon Stewart’s new movie Rosewater, which is based on Bahari’s memoir documenting the experience, Bahari’s captors used a satirical sketch he appeared in on The Daily Show as evidence he was a spy working for Zionists.
Stewart, the long-time host of The Daily Show, a nightly satirical skewering of newsmakers, wrote and directed the film.
Stewart has become famous for masking profound criticism of powerful people in farcical comedy, and the sketch Bahari appeared in on his show was so obviously farce that his torturers using it to accuse him of being a spy reeks of absurdity without even needing the Stewart treatment.
Which is good, because this movie is not political satire; it’s drama to the core. But its solid performances by the cast and an engaging storyline are still laced with Stewart’s comic sensibilities.
Overall critics have given Rosewater the thumbs up, and if nothing else it captures a historically important time and place, providing a few laughs along the way.
Rosewater plays at the Chaba Theatre at 7 p.m. Dec. 8.
Trevor Nichols
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