Cheap Secret Ballot (DVD) (Nassim Abdi, Cyrus Abidi) (Babak Payami) Price

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Customer Reviews of Secret Ballot

What a wonderful, charming little film!

And it's very, very funny!

I loved it and laughed out loud many, many times. My 20-year old son didn't get it, though. I suppose many people won't get it, but that's OK.

For them there's Weekend at Bernies.

Secret Ballot is serene in its approach, but bitingly sardonic in its message.

The film opens with these two "guards" with the Iranian army. We don't really know what they are "guarding" (against smuddlers, maybe?). They live on a beach... they split 12-hour shifts... they sleep on the bottom bunk... the bed is outdoors on the beach... the old jeep is in the tent... the government airdrops the ballot box... and the ballot official is a woman....

One of the guards must drive her around the island collecting ballots.

It's theater of the absurd in the persian gulf.

Wonderful.

And, best of all, rated G!

Try it, and give it time to settle in.

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A simple - and slow-moving - little pleasure
'Secret Ballot' is the epitome of a 'small' movie. Set on a desolate island off the coast of Iran, it's the story of a voting agent's day - 8:30 AM to 5 PM - as she tries to collect the votes of the island's sparse population while in the company of a grumpy Iranian army conscript.

Along the way, she tackles:

1) Sexism (as the conscript tells her: "They told me an agent was coming, not a woman").

2) Illiteracy (she's forced to resort to pictures of the candidates)

3) Fundamentalism ("I cast my vote for God" one guy keeps telling her)

4) Apathy and skeptism (and who can blame these folks? Despite Khatami's 'democratic' victory, the unelected theocrats still rule the day in Iran)

...and a lot more.

The relationship between the two leads develops slowly and you have very nuanced exchanges like:

Conscript: "When is the next election?"

Agent: "In four years. Elections are held every four years."

Conscript: "Why not hold them three or four times a year? That would be better"

...by this point in the film, this isn't a political statement. It's just the conscript's very (very) subtle way of saying "Gee, it would be great if I could see you more."

Here's a warning: This is a *very* slow-moving film. There are sequences at the beginning where you see a soldier spend five minutes getting ready for bed (in a dilapidated outside cot); then the agent spend two minutes getting the sand off of her feet.

I can see Babak Payami's motivation here. We're being shown how simple and unaffected - and pretty darn difficult - life is on this island. But if you're watching this on a full stomach, be careful: you may nod off. This is not intended as a slam of the film, which - on the whole - I enjoyed very much. I'm just saying you're going to need some energy to soldier through the first 20 minutes of 'Secret Ballot.' Just being honest.

Could have used some editing
I really wanted to like this film. It did raise some interesting points about society and humanity. I'll even agree with some of the other reviewers that the more subtextual approach could be easily missed by those expecting a hollywood-style movie. Yet the film was really slow. There are repeated periods of protracted landscape shots that add nothing to the movie. This would have been a much better film had it been half as long as it was. I wouldn't consider it a comedy, as it wasn't the least bit funny.