Beginning of a Drastic Change

“Frosty Roads” is the product of a certain intellectual and cultural taste that the Founder of the Islamic Revolution presented to the cinematic and artistic directors and officials. During a speech he mentioned “The Cow”(1969) by Dariush Mehrjui as a favorable movie for the regime and therefore a pattern was conceived for Iranian cinema after revolution. Movies with a focus on the deprived and poor, particularly the villagers  became a model for the new officials working in cinema especially those in Farabi Cinema Foundation, such as Seyed Mohammad Beheshti. In a couple of years, Farabi produced a few films which had a lot in common in terms of theme and tone with The Cow, including “Frosty Roads”(1985), “ The Mare”(1986), “Days of Waiting” (1987) and “The Monster” (Wailing of the Devil, 1985). From this point on,  Iranian social cinema moved out of the cities into villages. Among movies that were made based on this point of view, The Mare and Frosty Roads were more successful. Frosty Roads is about the torment and suffering of villagers in Lorestan and their desperate sense of survival. The teacher plays different roles in this community, alongside teaching, he acts as a doctor, an advisor and tries to unite them against cruelty and tyranny. This character became an stereotype and was seen time after time in a lot of movies. The accuracy of Lori accent is one of the things that makes watching The Frosty Roads enjoyable.