Persepolis is an adult animated film released in 2007, based on the autobiographic graphic novel series by the same name. Written and directed by Marjane Satrapi and Vincent Paronnaud, Persepolis is a coming-of-age film following Marjane Satrapi and her upbringing against the tumultuous backdrop of the Iranian revolution. It tells the story of a Marjane’s childhood to adulthood; her relationship with family and politics, her struggles with sexism and personal identity, and how she struggles to find a place in this world and without sacrificing her integrity as a person.
Produced collaboratively between the US and France, Persepolis premiered at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival, co-winning the Jury Prize alongside Silent Night. Satrapi made it clear that animation was her first choice for the adaptation. “With live-action, it would have turned into a story of people living in a distant land who don’t look like us,” Satrapi says. “At best, it would have been an exotic story, and at worst, a ‘third-world’ story.” (http://’Persepolis’ in Motion | Animation World Network) However, co-producers Marc-Antoine Robert and Xavier Regault were opposed to creating an animated movie at all because of the difficulty and complexity of animation. Luckily for everyone, Satrapi’s intended depiction of her life story as in her novel won, and thus Persepolis was animated. The film design was created by art director and executive producer Marc Jousset, and animation is credited to Perseprod studio and two other specialized studios, Je Suis Bien Content and Pumpkin 3D.
According to Jousset, “Marjane had quite an unusual way of working … Marjane insisted on being filmed playing out all the scenes … it was a great source of information for the animators, giving them an accurate approach to how they should work”. (https://www.filmeducation.org/persepolis/persepolis-interview.pdf) She had a clear vision of how she wanted her novel to be translated to film, and worked with the visual and animation team closely to communicate that.
The animators used more traditional techniques and focused on characters’ being natural and imperfect, as per Satrapi’s vision and guidelines. The choice of using black and white as the film’s dominant colors was intentional, to continue their choice of using traditional animation techniques.
https://www.filmeducation.org/persepolis/persepolis-interview.pdf
https://letterboxd.com/film/persepolis
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persepolis_(film)
https://www.theguardian.com/film/2008/apr/25/animation.drama