Subtraction: Double Trouble for Married Iranian Doppelgängers
By Liam Lacey
Rating: B+
The cliché of twin strangers or doppelgängers in psychological thrillers has become tired even as parody. Still, credit Canadian-educated, Iranian director Mani Haghighi (Pig, Men at Work) for refreshing the trope by doubling down on it.
In the sombre, rain-soaked, Tehran-set noir Subtraction, a married couple discovers another couple who look exactly like them. This fantastical premise, worthy of a Twilight Zone episode, is used to create a clammily dysphoric portrait of contemporary Iran, moving to a psychological thriller’s tempo and a twangy percussive score.
The film begins in a car, where pregnant driving instructor, Farzaneh (Taraneh Alidoosti) is giving lessons to a chatty young woman student. Suddenly, Farzaneh’s gaze fixes on something outside the car, a man getting onto a bus.
Convinced the man is her husband Jalal (Navid Mohammadzadeh), she follows him and watches as he enters an apartment building. That night she accuses him of having an affair. Jalal, who works for her father’s furniture and framing business, insists he was away on business and has the receipts to prove it.
Eventually Farzaneh and Jalal learn that the couple in the other apartment are their doppelgängers, middle-manager Mohsen and his wife Bita, the mother of a boy of about six.
There are differences in temperament and economic status between the couples: Farzaneh and Jalal are working-class, and she is clinically depressed, though unable to take her medication because of her pregnancy. Jalal is a passive character, doing menial work for his father-in-law.
By contrast, the affluent Beti is a warm stay-at-home mom, doting on her son. Mohsen, a hothead and a bully, is in trouble for assaulting a manager accused him of taking bribes. The incident could be brushed aside if Mohsen will apologize in exchange for a letter of forgiveness from his victim who is in hospital.
He asks his wife Bita to go ask for forgiveness in his place. Instead, she ends up conspiring with Jalal, with whom she shares a growing intimacy, to impersonate her irascible husband. The scheme sets off a series of unintended, increasingly catastrophic consequences.
In truth, Subtraction’s unexplained double-double premise never doesn’t feel contrived, though it’s largely offset by the emotionally authentic performances by veteran actors Alidoosti and Mohammadzadeh, grounded in a glumly believable world of leaky roofs, traffic jams, and marital spats.
Politically, Haghighi keeps his cards close to his vest. One tumultuous climactic scene seems to place us in the midst of an angry protest march, though the shouting, fist-pumping mob turns out to be nothing more than a parade of boisterous soccer fans.
More broadly, the film attempts to find a new way to frame endemic injustice and the cruelty of haves against have-nots by depicting abusers and the abused as mirror images of each other.
Subtraction. Directed by Mani Haghighi. Written by Mani Haghighi and Amir Reza Koohestani. Starring Taraneh Aidoosti and Navid Mohammadzadeh. Opens June 23 at TIFF Bell Lightbox Toronto, Vancity, Vancouver, Rox, Saskatoon, Playhouse Cinema, Hamilton and in other cities throughout the summer.