Until tomorrow:
Wednesday 26. Babel Room 4. 16h. With the presence of the director, Ali Asgari
Thursday 27. Babel Room 3. 22.30h.
Klondike:
Wednesday 26. Babel Room 3. 18h.
Thursday 27. Babel Room 1. 20h.
A modest neighborhood in the city of Tehran. A young woman begins her day, when an unexpected phone call will turn your life upside down. Her parents announce that they will come to visit her the next day.. Problem: The young woman is a single mother and her parents are unaware that she has had a son. From here, begins a trip to leave the child with someone he trusts to take care of him for a few hours until his parents return home. First, try the next door neighbor. Impossible, has its own problems. At last, Call a friend to help you resolve the issue.. Together they will undertake an eventful journey to get out of the situation..
Iranian filmmaker Ali Asgari supports his work, Until tomorrow, in a seamless script that offers us a very tight plot and, however, effective. With an almost capitular tone, the narrative follows Fereshteh, its protagonist, in his various misadventures. The increasing complications he faces will maintain the tension of an equally modest drama., but that will keep the viewer in suspense. When something seems to be resolved, A new conflict or difficulty will blow up any possibility of a happy outcome.. Asgari plays, in the best hitchconian style, with the expectations of the audience in the room, jumping boldly from mcguffin into mcguffin, What would the mystery master say?, to disorient him. And although, somehow, I can guess the outcome, we don't care.
There is no doubt that another of the supports on which Ali Asgari's artifact is based are the two main characters.. Sadaf Asgari and Ghazal Shojaei embody, in a very remarkable way, a Fereshteh y Atefeh. The duo of actresses maintains, with his own charisma and sympathy, the pulse of a story that, otherwise, was in danger of falling into anodyne. It's not just how they face the situations that they will have to solve, It is the sparkling vital energy that the two give off.. Actually, another mcguffin, but we don't care either.
Y, at the bottom, behind so much distraction, The plot of this film is revealed as an excuse to critically review contemporary Iran.. Again, the same conflict between tradition and modernity. Fereshteh runs away from his parents, who knows they won't admit a single mother. The fear of returning to the town where you come from and losing your freedom, It is also among the dangers that you will have to avoid. But he's not the only one. Or is Fereshteh's journey not also a journey against herself?? Before every obstacle, You will face a new mirror in which to look at yourself. The reflected image will prompt her to reflect. Maybe she's the one who's afraid of herself.. Maybe she is the one, finally, do not accept your situation and the responsibilities it entails. Until now, It had all been a game that I hadn't been too aware of.. The film becomes, So, on a personal journey towards maturity. Beside, the refuge of friendship, as the best handle. In the end, we are not so alone.
Everything that Ali Asgari's film can have that is vivid, disappears in a production like Klondike, directed by Ukrainian Maryna Er Gorbach. There was curiosity to approach this film made by a director who spoke in first person about a conflict that has all of Europe on the ropes., but it came from long before, especially given the lack of unbiased information we seem to have to rely on in the media. The result is, at least, ambivalent.
The film places us somewhere in the territory of Donbas., on the border between Russia and Ukraine. As everybody knows, This territory is inhabited by a majority Russian-speaking population.. We are in the early stages of the current conflagration between the two countries and clashes between pro-government Ukrainians and pro-separatist militias are frequent.. In this context, we enter a couple's house, That's Irka. And here this story begins.
When approaching a film like Klondike, you have to be a little careful. This is not about taking a political position with either of the two sides in the fray.. Maryna Er Gorbach wants to bring us emotionally closer to the experience of war. That is why he chooses an anonymous couple as the protagonists and victims of this case., although with the particularity, nothing free, that it is a mixed couple, she ukrainian, he of russian inclinations. We could say that, somehow, here everyone is a victim of the same thing.
The problem is that this intention of immersion is somewhat blurred in the face of an excessively theatrical staging., so much for Er Gorbach's harsh camera control, as in the rigidity of his movements, the placement of elements within the composition, a very obvious photograph, as well as a less subtle character characterization than perhaps required by the situations we are going to witness..
The movie starts, So, with a long circular shot inside Tolik and Irka's house. He urges her to leave the house and take her to the hospital.. So, we understand that she is pregnant. Irka, despite the pain, You don't think it's still necessary. Where are you taking me??, she wonders. “To a place where there is no war”, he answers. While the couple argues, the camera explores space, leaving them out of the picture. In the end, both characters meet again in the center of the scene. something is going to happen. At last, a bomb explodes and the house collapses.
From here, we face different situations. Tolik and Irka try to rebuild their home. Besides, a friend who took the car they were thinking of escaping with, He asks them to kill the cow they have in the barn of the farm where they live to feed the Russian soldiers who are fighting nearby.. Irka's brother shows up at the house and accuses Tolik of being a traitor to his country. (Ukraine). Disconnected situations that occur without a plot connection, to the point that, sometimes, We don't know where the characters are going., where do they come from, and who are those people that go to the background of the screen. This fragmentation of situations prevents, seasoned with the elements previously exposed, Let us empathize with what this work means.. And so, the tape will advance. Only when certain plot moments appear do we manage to enter the film, what happens at the end. And then, Yeah, We will know who is who and what role they ultimately play in the show.
That war is bad and brings out the worst in ourselves is something we know. That the righteous pay for sinners, also. But perhaps we expected that a job like this, in the current political moment we are living, dig deeper into the details of a conflict that appears more complex than it seems and the film addresses.
The final dedication, leaves us somewhat perplexed: “to all women”, says the director. Nobody doubts that, in a war conflict, they are the first victims, yes ok, In this movie all those who die are men. some of them, besides, trying by all means to protect her and, as we will discover, risking his life. Curious. G.LEON
