A Comparative Study of Pari and Hamoon's Encounter (in Mehrjui's Movies) with Lacanian Symbolic Order

In the present research it is investigating two outstanding movies of Iranian cinema through the philosophical-psychological theories of Jacques Lacan. Pari and Hamoon are both made by the Iranian prominent filmmaker, Dariush Mehrjui. The protagonists of both movies are characters who represent psychological perplexity and disorderliness of the modern individual. In his theories, Lacan deeply analyzes these perplexities by introducing such concepts as “name of the father”, “object of desire”, “objet petit a”, “Other” and the famous theory about three stages of self-formation which are “imaginary order”, “symbolic order” and “real order.” The main objective of this study is to find out how Pari and Hamoon, two modern rebellious individuals, are able to find a way out of Lacanian symbolic order. Other minor points of this paper are first studying the solutions hired by these characters in achieving the real order and returning to imaginary order; second, comparing and contrasting their strategies in confronting the elements of name of the father in the society; and third, surveying their different methods of achieving their object of desire. In this research, first of all the Lacanian concepts and theories have been described and interpreted and consequently through text analysis, the deep implied meanings of the both texts along with the two main characters have been studied to test the applicability of Lacanian theories in cinema. Since there is no way out of symbolic order for human beings, as Lacan stated, Pari and Hamoon’s rebellions and deconstructions have been doomed to failure. They are able neither to confront the real order nor to return to the imaginary order. It can be said that although the type of failure of the two characters are different, they both are destined to live on in the symbolic order.