A Separation (Asghar Farhadi, 2011)

[lovejuice]

Even though 2012 is still young, if this doesn't end up as my favorite movie of the yeal, I'll be much surprised.

[Li Lili]

Any of you has seen his previous films ?
I saw About Elly, his previous film (2009), with all the same cast, almost set in a same place during all the film, lots of dialog, again very well acted.
I guess the ones who didn't like A Separation won't like About Elly.

[Dukefrukem]

Any of you has seen his previous films ?
I saw About Elly, his previous film (2009), with all the same cast, almost set in a same place during all the film, lots of dialog, again very well acted.
I guess the ones who didn't like A Separation won't like About Elly.

No but added to queue!!

edit: Errrr I guess not since Netflix doesn't have it.

[Boner M]

Taut, morally complex, superbly writted/acted blah blah blah. Came with perhaps unreasonably high expectations so I was left a little less affected than otherwise, but I'm sure a second viewing would benefit.

The only real misstep I felt was the sleight-of-hand regarding [

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the omission of the car accident that might've started Razier's miscarriage.

] Any reason to keep it a last-act revelation? Seemed a little too 'gotcha'.

StanleyK's claims of misogyny are bizarre.

[Adam]

The only real misstep I felt was the sleight-of-hand regarding

[

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the omission of the car accident that might've started Razier's miscarriage.

]

Any reason to keep it a last-act revelation? Seemed a little too 'gotcha'.

[

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To keep you on the same footing as the daughter in regards to siding with either parent? Maybe to absolve the father of the actual guilt right away would've made the mother's machinations with her daughter seem all the more dirty to the audience? Also a lot of the film's momentum, which is one of its best assets imo, comes from getting information in bits and pieces. I think you're underrating what a different film this would be if you see her get sideswiped or whatever when it happened. And anyway don't a lot of movies play it that way - Where you're only allowed to know as much as the main characters know at a given time in the narrative?

]

[Boner M]

Yeah it's not so much an issue on reflection (hence I've added the extra 1/2 star to my rating). Just found the cut from dad across the road w/ Razier on the other side to the group of 'em playing foosball a little bumpy at the time (I, err, actually wondered for a second if I was watching a flashback during the latter scene).

[Boner M]

Interesting tidbit from Sicinski's review:

To wit: in order to be selected as Iran’s submission for the Oscars, A Separation had to garner a recommendation from the nine-member Farabi Cinema Foundation, a para-governmental arts-and-culture administration. Anyone concerned about the nefarious double-dealings of the MPAA should check out the language on the Farabi website which, remember, reflects the Islamist apparatchiks at their most benign. Farabi describes itself as having saved Iranian cinema from the “mystic cinema” of “the first decade of the 80s” [sic], when “the dominating aspects of the films produced by Andrei Tarkovsky and Sergei Paradjanov” as well as “leftist revisionists” essentially crippled the glorious cinema of Iran. (Where Is the Friend’s Home? [1987]; The Cyclist [1987]; The Tenants [1986]; Canary Yellow [1988]. I think we all remember those dark days!) “Such films,” say the Farabis, “repelled the spectators mainly choosing cinema to spend one to two hours having fun.”

[Li Lili]

No but added to queue!!

edit: Errrr I guess not since Netflix doesn't have it.

argh! I think it got an award at the Berlinale, something like a Silver Bear, so maybe one day...