Films › Screenwriting
The Salesman
Directed by Asghar Farhadi, 2016
Asghar Farhadi structures the screenplay so a violent incident happens almost entirely offscreen and early, then spends the rest of the film withholding full information from both audience and characters, a discipline that generates suspense through omission rather than reveal. Farhadi threads the Arthur Miller play the couple is rehearsing, Death of a Salesman, into the plot's thematic architecture, using stage rehearsal scenes to comment on the couple's unraveling marriage without ever stating the parallel outright, a layering technique screenwriters adapting existing texts into subplots should study closely. The crumbling apartment building that opens the film is not incidental set dressing but a structural echo of the marriage itself, planted early and paid off in the final confrontation staged in the previous tenant's apartment. Farhadi's dialogue consistently gives characters partial, self serving versions of events, forcing the audience to actively adjudicate truth the way the characters do. Screenwriters building morally ambiguous domestic dramas should study how precisely Farhadi rations exposition scene by scene.
What to watch for
Watch how the play within the film, rehearsed in fragments throughout, mirrors the marital breakdown just before it happens rather than after.
This product uses the TMDB API but is not endorsed or certified by TMDB.
Affiliate disclosure. Links on this page are affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate, Occupy Cinema earns from qualifying purchases, at no extra cost to you. Read the full policy.