INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
TEHRAN-- John Steinbecks story The Forgotten Village has actually just recently been released by the Taq publishing house in
Tehran.Originally released in 1941, the book has actually been translated into Persian by Yusef Najafi Jablu.The novelist who composed The
Grapes of Wrath and the director who produced Crisis and Lights Out in Europe combined their outstanding skills to tell the story of the
coming of modern-day medicine to the natives of Mexico.There have been numerous significant examples of this pen-camera approach of
narrative, however The Forgotten Village is unique amongst them because the text was composed before a single image was shot
The book and the film from which it was made have, hence, connection and a remarkable growth not to be found in the so-called documentary
films.Headed by Kline and with Steinbecks script at hand, the camera team spent 9 months off the tracks of Mexico taping this narrative of
birth and death, of witch doctors and vaccines, of the old Mexico and the brand-new
They traveled thousands of miles to discover just the town they required; they obtained kids from the government school, took guys from the
fields, their better halves from the markets, and an old medication lady from her hut by the side of the path
The movie they made (for release in 1941) is 8,000 feet long
From this wealth of pictures 136 photographs were picked for their intrinsic appeal and for the elegant harmony with which they accompany
Steinbecks text.This new script-photograph technique of narrative communicates its ideas with unexcelled luster and immediacy
In the hands of such master writers as Steinbeck and Kline, it makes the reader capture his or her breath for the beauty and the truth of
the tale.Photo: Front cover of the Persian edition of John Steinbecks book The Forgotten Village .
