The Tenants

The foibles of human nature are clearly delineated in Darioush Merhjui's THE TENANTS, a bracing social-satire-cum-slapstick-comedy from Iran.

In a suburb of Tehran stands a newly constructed apartment building, in some disrepair. Its tenants are a composite of all walks of life. The landlord of the building, while on a visit to Dusseldorf, Germany, has apparently died in a train crash. This leaves the ownership of the property up for grabs under the "heir-uncertain" law of Iran. The apartment manager, Abbas Derakhshesh (Ezatolah Entezami), is persuaded by the owner of a real estate agency to forge documents transferring the title of the building to his name. Th...