Ali is an ex-convict who on release from prison returns home to the city of Tehran. Reconnecting his fragmented family of wife and daughter, he finds a job working night shifts to provide. Tehran, depicted as an urban jungle fraught with dissent and unrest, becomes like a 'prison' to Ali, and he manages to hold on to his sanity by going away to the forest North of the city, as often as he can, to hunt.One day Ali's wife and daughter go missing. After a tense and lengthy procedure to try and locate them, he learns from the Police that they have been killed in the cross-fire of a city gun fight between Police officers and an Insurgent group. There is an ambiguity surrounding Ali's wife and daughter; around their origin (is she really his daughter); and concerning their ultimate fates.Ali almost breaks but manages to retain some sense of his sanity by instead breaking from the state. He takes his hunting rifle and staking out a highway road from a hill top, he kills two random police officers. He leaves Tehran and goes on the run only to be tracked by a police helicopter which eventually leads to a high speed car chase when his car is spotted on a foggy mountain road by a patrol-car. Captured by two policemen after a deep forest pursuit, the three of them find themselves lost. Wandering in frustration through dense mountain forest, their is a shift in the dynamics between the Policemen and Ali, and a deadly conflict between the two officers gradually surfaces.It is a striking and tense, emotional thriller with long periods (sequence after sequence beautifully shot) absent of dialogue which makes the film all the more fully engaging.

This review was made following a screening at Cambridge Film Festival (September 2010):This film runs to 92 minutes, and, for me, achieves much more than it has been given credit for here without squandering resources, the main one being the enigmatic lead portrayal of hunter.Ignoring whether this is mere photography (a dissatisfaction better founded, say, as a response to Jarman's experimental films?), it is a moody film, and it takes time, deliberately, to establish moods. Although I several times predicted where it was going, it still disrupts and undermines our notions of where it fits into our typology of films (as the festival write-up indicated).Say that there is no plot overlooks the significance of the whole trajectory, and fails to relate later events to earlier ones: obviously, I cannot spell it out, but, to understand it, it is important to pay attention to what is said to the hunter in the woods. That information explains his earlier actions, which seemed motiveless (or arising from some nihilistic and sleep-depriving reactive despair), but which turn out to build on events that we have not been shown.Knowing, at this point, what he has done, we can maybe guess why: we were given detail earlier about his daughter that had been kept from him, but which he might have uncovered, and could have made him see his family life differently. Or he might have had some extreme and pathological reaction to the conditions of his existence.We already knew something about his past, and can soon see that he has something of the stamp of a loner that is seen in TAXI-DRIVER, content to drive around in his car and wait for first light to hunt. These are important elements in both films, and I was soon reminded of this one's older brother.Dialogue is sparing in both films, and they share the desire for revenge that comes over characters at what cannot be tolerated in someone else's behaviour. That, coupled with the recurrent impulse here to implicate others, is at the heart of this film.It is one of quiet scenes into which sudden loud noises tear and where threat and intimidation inject, by the nature of their origin, onward twists that lead to the final scene and complete what, for me, is a very definite structure. That being said, if one expected this film to spill its explanation into one's lap, it will remain tightly closed as a story-book, and seem to have taken the viewer nowhere.I rate this film highly, but there is one niggle to do with how the ending is set up, with our three figures in isolation (and a good misdirection that others will be on the scene): the hunter is given something by one man, but, irrespective of whether it was his own, it would not only have been traceable to him, but his fingerprints would also have been inexplicably all over it. In those terms, unless I have misunderstood the closing shot, I do not see that it worked as intended.

Rafi Pitts directs himself in a portrayal of a man left with a very compromised life after serving time in jail. All he has/cares about is his girlfriend and their daughter, but because of the past he is locked in a situation that gives them few chances to meet. As he works and lives in chaotic and overpopulated Teheran feeling chained to circumstances he finds some outlet in hunting, or rather just walking around with his rifle in the forest. While driving there's speeches from the supreme priest Ali Khamenei.Then things takes for the worse as the only thing he held onto was taken away from him. First he looks for answers and help, but gets neither. What is then left? This is a grim and well-crafted thriller. The chase through foggy landscapes kept me on the edge of the seat. Look elsewhere if you want a optimistic sunshine story though. Recommended to people who have been to Iran and has a balanced view of the situation there. Don't come here for a first-impression of an amazing country.

I viewed The Hunter at TIFF, entering the theatre without having researched anything about the film. The only thing I knew was that it was an Iranian film. Essentially, I went in with an open mind and zero expectations, yet I still came out fairly disappointed.The film kicks off full of energy with a still referencing tense relations enjoyed between Iran and America since 1979. We meet a lower-class average man named Ali who sports the same sullen face from beginning to end. Is he angry simply because his employment as a watchman doesn't afford him much time to see his family, or is there a deeper plot about his time spent in prison? We never find out. Why did he go to prison? We never find out.Occasionally, Ali steals away from the city (where he's bombarded with political propaganda, which again is not touched upon in any detail) to a quiet area in the country he knows very well; a hunter and his trusty rifle alone in the wilderness. Ali stalks an unknown prey, and fires off a couple shots (probably the most exciting part of the film, as the gunshots are devastatingly loud). What is he hunting? We never find out. Does he actually kill anything, or bring it back home? We never find out. He must be the most incompetent hunter in the world, or he's letting off some steam. We never find out - especially given that he maintains the same sullen face upon returning home.Even when his family dies as a result of a shootout between the police and "insurgents", Ali oddly expresses little, if any, reaction. Was his wife secretly an "insurgent" (and did he know?) or was she merely caught in the crossfire, as the police told him? We never find out. Why does he express zero emotion at the sight of his dead child's body? We never find out.Eventually, with nothing to lose, he finally expresses some talent in hunting by plucking off two police officers driving down the highway. With the authorities chasing after him, you'd expect some feelings of anxiety or excitement, but it's too strewn out to be much enjoyed. Worse, a second plot that develops about the corruption of the two police officers who apprehend Ali drags out long enough for me to check my watch.The Hunter is a film that appears constantly to reach for deeper themes, deeper emotion, and a deeper plot, but always falls short. Any promising element succumbs to extreme minimalism, which, ironically, destroys the element of art in film making by trying to be so artistic. It's not ambiguous, it's vague. It's not subtle, it's empty. And it's not patient, it's boring.Such minimalism causes the viewer to imagine plot development, and it is the source of major frustration. It's like imagining vivid additions to a canvas painted in a single colour, but why are we making stuff up in our minds when the art piece should be guiding us along to the story? There is so much rich substance the director, Rafi Pitts (who stars as Ali), could have incorporated even slightly into the plot - namely Ali's past and his (and his family's) involvement with national politics. A quick and simple explanation that he served time for involvement in "insurgent" activities, for example, would have connected beautifully to his murder of two authorities from the state.In my opinion, it wouldn't have taken much for Rafi Pitts to incorporate greater elements of political tension or character development (and background), as it's obvious there is a lot of rich substance to be drawn. Ultimately, The Hunter is a draft sketch of a screenplay prematurely put to the camera.I'm sure an ivory tower film critic somewhere would praise The Hunter for its deep questions, but the reality is that the only question most will have after viewing the film is, "What the hell actually happened in that hour and a half?" And in case I entirely wrong about The Hunter, and I am actually too blind to notice a deeper connotation in the film, I award it 1 star out of 10.