A Separation

A Separation

            The movie “A Separation” is based on a story about a married couple that suffers various conflicts of interest and end up in separation. One of the main reason why they got separated is because the wife in the relationship, Simin, wanted to move her family to the United States since the finally acquired a US visa. Simin also did not want her 11-year-old daughter, Termeh, growing up in Iran under the religious and prevailing traditions. However her husband, Nader, felt as though he could not just get up and abandon his sick father and move to the United States. Nader has the responsibility to take care of his old man seeing as he cannot take care of himself for the reason that he has been diagnosed with the sufferable disease Alzheimer’s. Therefore Nader simply refused to move.

            Simin went on to file a divorce because she could not believe how “selfish” he was being at the chance of having a brand new and “better” life. Simin’s request to file a divorce was, however, declined for the reason that he reasoning was not sufficient enough. Simin ended up moving out of the house and back into her parent’s house. Termeh stayed living with her father. Now Nader needed help with taking care of his father while he is away at work every day, Monday through Friday. In order to be helpful, Simin suggested a woman to her (separated) husband, so Nader called the woman, Razieh, who is a young and deeply religious woman, and hired her. Razieh began working almost right away, she brought along her young daughter.

            What Nader does not know is Razieh purposely failed to mention her new job to her hot-tempered husband Hodjat for the reason that he would most certainly not approve of his wife taking care of an elderly man. Razieh then found the job to be too overwhelming for her so she decided to resign. However she had the brillian idea that Nader could hire Hodjat in her place because he was also looking for paid work. After conducting an interview with Hodjat, Nader hired him. On his first day, Nader was unfortunately taken to jail by his creditors due to having immensely bad credit , so Razieh went in place of her husband. This is where the story begins to unfold. Nader did not know Razieh was pregnant until after he hired her.

            It turns out that one day Nader got home from work and found his father laying in the floor unconscious without his breathing tank and hand-cuffed to the bed. He blamed Razieh for abandoning him for some hours which is something she is prohibited to do when she has his father as her responsibility. Out of anger Nader grabbed Razieh and pushed her out of his apartment. Razieh used this excuse against Nader to make him look guilty for her miscarriage.

             I did enjoy this movie because it was suspenseful and it left me wanting to watch more until the very end. This is definitely a movie I would recommend to anyone who likes watching international films. 

A Cadeira Do Pai

A Cadeira Do Pai or “A Busca”

(Father’s Chair)

            A Cadeira do Pai is a Brazilian film directed by Luciano Moura. This movie is based on a story about a little boy who becomes missing.  The movie starts off with the boy’s father, Theo, who walks into a house. We then learn that this is the house they used to live in as a family before Theo and his wife, Brianca, got separated. Brianca is immensely upset with Theo because he used his key to walk in and she had told him that now that they are separated he is not allowed to do that anymore because it is inappropriate and it confuses Pedro, their son. At that instant Pedro comes home and finds his parents together in their living room engaging in argument. Once they noticed his presence, they stopped arguing and paid all their attention to him.

            Pedro had gone to “get his computer fixed” or at least that is what he told his family. Later on in that scene, Theo passes by Pedro’s room and find’s Pedro holding a chair. Theo right away recognizes the chair and becomes consumedly angry. He is angry because that chair belongs to his father, and since he and his father are not in speaking terms, Theo does not want Pedro to have any contact with him. Out of reaction from his anger, Theo picks up the chair, goes outside, and throws it wickedly.

            Some days later, Pedro goes back to the house for a family dinner. He and Brianca are waiting for Pedro but Pedro is late. They decide to call the friend Pedro has claimed he was going to be with for some days. That friend confirmed that he had not been with Pedro at all. This is how the grand journey of finding Pedro begins. Theo is left with only some clues as to where his adored son could be.

            The movie becomes more and more intriguing every time Theo finds a new clue that could lead him to where Pedro is.

 

            The major theme in this movie is love - just plain old family love. It goes to show how far a father will go to find his only son, and to make sure he brings his son home to his mother.

             This movie was brilliant. I loved the suspense, I loved the actors, and I loved the language. I loved how raw the cinematography was. It is my favorite more that we have watched thus far in this class. I found that the actors were absolutely brilliant. my favorite character is Theo, who is played by actor Wagner Mauro. His talents make him a very good looking man. 

The Wedding Banquet

The Wedding Banquet

            Ang Lee is a Taiwanese director that is highly celebrated not only in his country but all over the world as well. His films are quite Americanized for the reason that Lee moved to the United States of America to study film and theater. He achieved his BA in Theater at the University of Illinois, and then furthermore he achieved his MFA in Film Production at NYU. Beforehand, Lee was raised in Taiwan and attended the military service as a mandatory requirement in his country.

The movie “The Wedding Banquet” is based on a story about a Taiwanese young man that comes from a very strict and traditional family. His family believes in customs, rituals, and is accustomed to a heterosexual way of life. However it just happens that the son of this family, Wai-Tung Gao, is born a homosexual. Gao feels that his homosexuality will displease his parents and furthermore chase them away, thus he decided to keep his sexual orientation to himself. Once he became an older man, Gao immigrated to the United States of America where he met and fell in love with Simon. Simon is an American man, around the same age as Gao. He is also gay and the two are so deeply in love that they share an apartment together.

Gao is extremely happy the way things are going except for the fact that his parents are pushing him to get married because he is getting older by the minute and time is running out. They even made him fill out a form on how he “prefers his women”, and then went on to find him a woman similar to his liking. Almost in the beginning of the film Gao goes on an obliged date with a woman that he had no interest in. his family sent her over to him in hopes that he would fall in love with her and they would get married and have children. But that was not the case.

            In order to calm his parents down, Gao came to an agreement with one of his tenants, Wei-Wei, to marry her so that she can acquire a green card, and so that his parents can be satisfied with his marriage. However, his parents were so excited that they flew in from Taiwan to visit Gao and to attend his wedding. The movie then proceeds into a crazy marital journey from this point on.

Personally, I enjoyed this film, although it was a bit dragged on at times. I like the fact that we get a point of view of what a homosexual goes through when he or she feels ashamed of their sexual orientation, although they should not have to ever feel that way. I also enjoyed the comedic aspect of the film; I found myself laughing a lot. Overall I rate the movie a B+.

Walk on Water

The film “Walk on Water” was produced by Eytan Fox. Fox is a well-known Israeli filmmaker who has immensely contributed to the Jewish film-making industry over the past ten years. Fox’s movies have made great impressions in the movie world, hence why he was the first recipient of the Washington Jewish Film Festival’s Decade Award. He was born in New York City; however he was immediately moved to Israel by the age of 2. Fox’s father, Seymour Fox, was a rabbi in Israel, as well as a professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. His mother was the head of the Jerusalem city council. Therefore, his parents were both educated and quite involved in their society. This, surely, had a great impact on Fox’s upbringing and the way he creates and produces his films.

One thing his audience has noticed about his films is that Fox tends to incorporate homosexual aspects to them, whether it is the main character or just one single scene, perhaps because he himself is in fact openly gay.

I thoroughly enjoyed this film, as I do most international films, because it is a way to learn about the rest of the world and their views. Knowing the producer of this movie is an Israeli man really intrigues me for the reason that I am interested in knowing how other film makers around the world go about making films and expressing their point of views. In this particular movie, I really appreciated how the story was very precise and cohesive. I felt like I was able to follow the story-line without having any problems or being confused about it. I also felt as though the movie was not predictive, and that, in my opinion, qualifies as an extremely good movie; a movie definitely worth watching.