As once said by Marcus Aurelius: “The best revenge is to be unlike him who performed the injury.” But to do that ignores the trauma the injury left behind, as well as the opportunity that rarely manifests itself to exact revenge. Garage owner Vahid (Vahid Mobasseri) carries physical, mental, and emotional trauma from his stint from being imprisoned in Iran by the totalitarian regime. The trigger that immediately transports him back to the horrific moment is a squeaky peg leg worn by a man who terrorized Vahid and others. The man, known as Eghbal (Ebrahim Azizi) stops in Vahid’s garage to get service late in the night for his broken down car. After fixed, Vahid tails Eghbal. He waits until the following morning at an opportune time to incapacitate him, with the intention of burying Eghbal alive in the desert.

Eghbal pleads desperately for his life, and maintains that he is not the man Vahid thinks he is. And he may be right, because Vahid and others were blindfolded and never got a look at the aggressor. Knowing he cannot in good conscience let the man perish without knowing for certain if he really is the tormentor, Vahid asks for help in confirming his identity from others who were imprisoned. Vahid’s action and the ones that follow will either provide closure to the painful time period, or be misguided by wrongfully targeting an innocent man and forever leaving his family without a paternal figure.

This year’s Best Picture race could see as many as three foreign films land in the ten nominations. One of those is the French entry (though co-produced with Iran and Luxembourg) of It Was Just an Accident. The final product is a frenzied, if a little overlong, morality play with a ton on its mind courtesy of its creator.

Writer and director Jafar Panahi has been in the filmmaking business for 30+ years, and nearly all of those years have been met with controversy from his home country of Iran. Panahi’s views on the authoritarian Iranian regime, the treatment of women, class disparity, and more have all found their ways into his filmography. His views have even had him jailed and currently barred from making movies in his home country, including this one. To do all of this in secret is an impressive feat of prowess, as you’d never think that he is compromised by his situation, but he’s clearly using what’s available to him in the way of an abandoned warehouse, an expansive desert, and a compressed van to serve as effective settings for his contained story.

The route Panahi has to go to shoot and get his movies released is nothing short of remarkable; and in some ways slightly overshadow his movies, including It Was Just an Accident. It’s hard not to become engrossed with the behind the scenes, if only because Panahi’s script is clearly coming from personal, lived-in experience that his characters embody in their viewpoints and feelings on what they should or shouldn’t do. His script and accompanying dialogue balances tension but also has dashes of subtle humor too. The middle stretch of the feature—while raised in volume and aggression thanks to one character in particular—runs somewhat lengthy. But it’s easier to overlook when the film has such a strong and hooking start and is bookended by a thought-provoking and gripping ending. The final frames will not be forgotten anytime soon.

The power Panahi is able to wring out of his movie from his mostly inexperienced cast is worth mentioning as well. He never seems to ask them to do too much or strain credulity. The big standout is Mobasseri, our center point and biggest emotional tether as we find out slow drip fashion all the things he lost, as well as the difficulties and blockers that impede him from fully moving forward in life.

It Was Just an Accident showcases a filmmaker’s ability to maximize everything at his disposal to create a compact drama and thematically thorough movie. It’s no accident that it’s appearing on so many end of year best-of lists.

B+

Photo credits go to impawards.com, neonrated.com, and IMDB.com.