Apu’s World

When I watch an Iranian movie (or atleast an Iranian movie of a certain kind, say one directed by Jafar Panahi or Majid Majidi), my heart is in my mouth. Not that these gently ruminative films are in the least scary, but I cannot help but fear that something very bad is about to happen. Even in a movie like the Children of Heaven, which is all innocence and centres around children, there is the shadow of sorrow lurking around. In a movie like The Circle, where things already begin on a sombre note, you know that something even worse is in store.  

Which is why, when I began watching The Song of Sparrows, (Avaze gonjeshk-ha in the original), I found it hard to let go of my trepidation. Even though the movie is set in the beautiful rural surroundings of Iran and the camera captures it lovingly. The Song of Sparrows turned out to be a very interesting experience for the reason that although ‘bad things’ do happen in the course of the movie, the focus is not on them as transforming events. Instead, it dwells on, very subtly, on the changes that a person’s mind can go through and the effects on everyone around him or her. 

Broadly, the plot is about Karim, a rural worker on an ostrich farm, who is fired and goes looking for work in Teheran instead. When the movie begins, his mind is set on earning enough to find a hearing-aid replacement for his daughter, Haniyeh. A resourceful and hard-working man, Karim soon finds success in Teheran and begins to earn more than what he’d ever expected. Not just money, he also gains access to many discarded items such as old doors, windows, frames and other odds and ends which he starts bringing back home. 

As Karim’s storage dump grows larger and larger, Haniyeh’s hearing-aid seems to grow further and further away in his mind. I’m not going to give away the rest of the plot here, but one scene which I thought was amazing, both for the beauty with which it was shot and for the way it really captures the entire movie in that one shot -

Karim has acquired a blue door which his wife gives away to a neighbour. He rushes to the neighbour’s house and takes the door back. As he carries the door on his back across the fields, from above, the camera focuses on the door. Soon, all we can see is that rectangle of blue dwarfing the man beneath. While the man appears to be hauling the door, he is really bound to it, powerless under its bulk. Against the backdrop of the fields, the blue is more vital than him. And that tells us something about the kind of man Karim is becoming. 

That is a perfect example of a scene which almost makes the rest of the movie superflous. 

Related Posts You May Like
1. Children of Heaven
2. The Circle
3. The Apple

apu Media-Movies-Ads