The Past 2013
In Movie Theaters: Friday, December 20, 2013
Director: Asghar Farhadi
Cast:
Berenice Bejo -Marie
Tahar Rahim-Samir
Ali Mosaffa - Ahmad
The Iranian film-maker Asghar Farhadi has come to Cannes with an absorbing, fascinating if slightly contrived movie, a loss-of-love-triangle starring Bérénice Bejo, Ali Mosaffa and Tahar Rahim. A Frenchwoman, Marie (Bejo), is attempting to resolve difficulties with her Iranian husband, Ahmad (Mosaffa), from whom she has been long separated, and to make a fresh start with a new partner, Samir (Rahim). The film revisits some themes of Asghar's breakthrough film A Separation, about the mortality of love, along with ideas about intimacy and domesticity in a world where the stepfamily is the norm. Here it is further supercharged with a grand tragic theme — the past and its pitiless grip on us. Farhadi shows the desperation and anger involved in trying to defy the past, to annul incorrect life-choices.
It is an intricate and often brilliant drama, with restrained and intelligent performances; there is an elegantly patterned mosaic of detail, unexpected plot turns, suspenseful twists and revelations. The narrative structure itself is perhaps a little over-determined; there is some melodrama in the tragedy, and the continued absence from the screen of one important character perhaps makes the final scene a little easy to guess. It is often rather like a stage-play, but interestingly and bracingly so. The continuing force and intelligence of Farhadi's film-making is compelling.
In Movie Theaters: Friday, December 20, 2013
Director: Asghar Farhadi
Cast:
Berenice Bejo -Marie
Tahar Rahim-Samir
Ali Mosaffa - Ahmad
The Iranian film-maker Asghar Farhadi has come to Cannes with an absorbing, fascinating if slightly contrived movie, a loss-of-love-triangle starring Bérénice Bejo, Ali Mosaffa and Tahar Rahim. A Frenchwoman, Marie (Bejo), is attempting to resolve difficulties with her Iranian husband, Ahmad (Mosaffa), from whom she has been long separated, and to make a fresh start with a new partner, Samir (Rahim). The film revisits some themes of Asghar's breakthrough film A Separation, about the mortality of love, along with ideas about intimacy and domesticity in a world where the stepfamily is the norm. Here it is further supercharged with a grand tragic theme — the past and its pitiless grip on us. Farhadi shows the desperation and anger involved in trying to defy the past, to annul incorrect life-choices.
It is an intricate and often brilliant drama, with restrained and intelligent performances; there is an elegantly patterned mosaic of detail, unexpected plot turns, suspenseful twists and revelations. The narrative structure itself is perhaps a little over-determined; there is some melodrama in the tragedy, and the continued absence from the screen of one important character perhaps makes the final scene a little easy to guess. It is often rather like a stage-play, but interestingly and bracingly so. The continuing force and intelligence of Farhadi's film-making is compelling.
