Letters to the President Review

Published by Jeff Leins on: April 7th, 2009

Filmmaker Petr Lom managed to secure unprecedented access to Iranian President Ahmadinejad for the documentary Letters to the President.  While the press credentials are impressive, the resulting film is a stripped down series of “man on the street” interviews lacking any commentary on the controversy.

Lom engages random people in candid discussions about their personal situations, showing an honest look at the political stronghold imposed on the country.  Unhappy Iranians remark about their dwindling freedoms, often shying away from the camera under fear of government-sanctioned repercussions.  In the urban population, educated Iranians live in daily fear of street violence and rightfully, openly criticize the priorities of their government.

Outside the cities, common threads are woven among the rural crowds.  More obedient Iranian villagers praise the President who stages countryside rallies and appears to listen to their individual cries.  They are blindly hopeful for better lives.

It’s this hope that encourages them to scrawl letters to the President on scraps of paper and chase his convoy across the desert.  They plead for help on everything, from the price of rice to the state of housing.  When questioned after, the authors seem optimistic that their needs will be addressed and cling to the possibility that the President will respond.

However while almost every Iranian had heard rumors of a positive reply, it seems no one themselves had seen a written response or received direct assistance.  A government official admits they receive 10 million letters a year into a special office ill equipped to sort them.  In reality, the letter answering campaign is a promise from a populist President on which he doesn’t intend to deliver.

The government spreads rumors of responses and lies to its people of plans for future improvement.  Public engagements where Ahmadinejad pretends to acknowledge their needs are laced with propaganda speeches gathering support against Iran’s political enemies.  Mobs cry out, “Death to America!  Death to Israel!” or chant, “Nuclear energy is our right!” in coordinated unison.  Then when the President has said his piece, the newly persuaded people disperse to meager means and skyrocketing inflation.

The documentary presents a cripple country where the hopeful people of Iran are taken advantage of by leadership with maladjusted priorities and political justice takes precedence over poverty.  Unfortunately, this under-produced, simple film requires the audience to connect the dots between the numerous discussions.  It suffers from an unwillingness or inability to form an opinion or slant the story towards a meaningful message, playing like a slideshow reel from someone’s trip to Iran rather than a hard-hitting documentary about a controversial country.  While the oppression is implied, it isn’t anything groundbreaking you couldn’t decipher from watching the national news.

3 out of 5.