Lorestan ▼ Bakhtiarian ▼کوچ بختياريان ـ 1924 ▼ GRASS

Grass: A Nation's Battle for Life (1924) is a silent documentary film which follows a branch of the Bakhtiari people in Persia (Iran) as they and their herds make their seasonal journey to better pastures. It is considered one of the earliest ethnographic documentary films. It was written by Richard Carver and Terry Ramsaye. The ducumentary film was done by Merian C. Cooper, Ernest Schoedsack, and Marguerite Harrison as they followed Haidar Khan leading 50,000 of his people and countless animals on a harrowing trek across the Karun River and over Zard Kuh, the highest peak in the Zagros Mountains. In filming the journey, Cooper, Schoedsack, and Harrison became the first Westerners to make the migration with the Bakhtiari. The film highlights the extreme hardships faced by nomadic peoples, as well as the bravery and ingenuity of the Bakhtiari. At the same time, the film is also a reflection of the context out of which it emerged, that of Hollywood in the 1920s. Having heard about the success of the first (commonly assumed) ethnographic documentary Nanook of the North, Cooper and Schoedsack set out for their own real life adventure. Like Nanook, the central concern of Grass is to present primordial human struggle with harsh environments. The filmmakers attempt to document "timeless" and "ancient" human struggles, still observable in this part of the oriental world. The film has an engaging but deeply Orientalist tone in presenting the Bakhtiari as unchanging and archaic.

The documentary presents the filmmakers' travel as a narrative of a return to an ancient past: they turn the pages of history backwards until they get to "the very first page". Therefore what they present to the audience in the documentary is not a culture in the present, but a culture of the past. Mention is made of a sort of genealogical quest for so-called Aryan origins of 3000 years ago, calling the Bakhtiari, "the Forgotten People". The film highlights migratory Anatolian and Iranian peoples as continuously in a struggle for survival: the hunter on the Taurus mountains "does not hunt for sport, he kills for food". The film presents the annual Bakhtiari migration to Iranian highlands, where several environmental difficulties stand in the way of the tribe, which over time has developed ingenious solutions to overcome them (barefoot trail cutting over snow-covered Zard Kuh, goat-skin floats at the river crossing, etc.).

In 1997, Grass was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".

Category:

Film & Animation

Tags:

• IRANIAN
• TEHRAN
• PERSIA
• LORI
• LORESTAN
• PAHLAVI
• BAKHTIARI
• MOSHIRI
• BAHMAN
• MAGHSOUDLOU
• MARGARET
• HARISSON
• MERIAN
• C.
• COOPER
• ERNEST
• B.
• SCHOEDSACK

[LorBakhtiyari]

wow , Man fekr mikardam avalin filme Irani Dokhtare Lor boodeh , vali Dokhtare Lor 1934 boodeh.

[GulfoPersico]

@exudecourage How I wished to be there, and how I wish when old and gray end my life in there, to touch that Ancient ground, to inhale that ancient air and leave earth when my foot bare...

[exudecourage]

@GulfoPersico I caught it on TCM (Turner Classic Movies) circa 2006ish??? Yeah... it was incredible. Have a copy of it on my DVD shelf. The scene of the tribal dance / stick fighting, the facial expressions of the musicians, the hunter who shot the goat off the cliff, the blowing air into the animals' skins to traverse the wild river, hiking barefoot in the snowy mountains while carrying babies, etc., the black / white puppy trick... ah man... it has so many unforgetable scenes. : )

[GulfoPersico]

@exudecourage It's breathtaking, I watched it about 4 years ago, it just refused to exit my brain. by the end of the movie you feel as you are a member of their tribe, it's that involving!

[HRG86]

Dorood bar bakhtiar!

[homachy]

من فکر کنم ربطی به لرستان نداره! و در ضمن زرده کوه نیست منشاأ زردکوه است در چهارمحال بختیاری

[BerusAdrianParsian]

... *** To Ey Por-Gowhar-Xâk, Az Dorouq-o Az Dosman, Rahâideh-Bemân : Pâki-o Râcti-Goctardeh-Bâd, Baxtyâri-Carafrâz-Bâd / To Ey Por Gowhar Khaak, Az Dorouqh-o Az Doshman Rahaaideh Bemaan : Paaki-o Raasti Gostardeh-Baad, Bakhtiari Sarafraaz-Baad *** ...

[Bahaneh]

yeylagh  yeshlagh nadarin,,,, yeylagh geshlagh ,,,,

[exudecourage]

By happenstance I saw this movie on TV a few years ago and it totally took me in. I bought the DVD and I watch it once in a while. The music is amazing and familiar to me (I am Persian). This movie is for all and intents purposes a time machine into the trial and tribulations of the nomadic Bakhtiari people. It's one of my all time favorites. Gotta give HUGE props to the film-makers.