**** (out of ****)
It's unfortunate that greatness can often become divisive. How else can you explain the reaction "movie critics" greeted the brilliant Iranian filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami with?
"The Wind Will Carry Us" (2000) - referred to by former Chicago Reader critic Jonathan Rosenbaum (a Kiarostami champion) as "one of Kiarostami's greatest and in many ways his richest to date." - is a beautiful poetic meditation on life, death, age, media & communication, and culture clash between urban and rural life.
Sadly not all had recognized both Kiarostami's filmmaking genius and "The Wind Will Carry Us"s brilliance. The late Chicago Sun-Times critic, Roger Ebert, began his review of Kiarostami's "Ten" (2003) by noting, "I am unable to grasp the greatness of Abbas Kiarostami." Ebert, who didn't often review Kiarostami's films in print or on his famed television show, would continue in the same review to describe "The Wind Will Carry Us" as "about a man driving around trying to find a place where his cell phone would work." While I hate to seem so critical of Ebert - he truly was an important figure in my early understanding and appreciation of cinema - that is a rather ignorant and dismissive way to summarize "The Wind Will Carry Us".
I first became aware of Kiarostami, who passed away in 2016 at the age of 76, thanks to Chicago Tribune critic Michael Wilmington, who placed "The Wind Will Carry Us" on his list of the best movies of the year 2000. Eager to see all of the films Wilmington placed on his year end list, I rented it and instantly fell under its charms and sought more of Wilmington's recommendations of Kiarostami's work.
"The Wind Will Carry Us" feels like a blend between fact and fiction, blurring the lines of reality - which is not uncharacteristic of Kiarostami's films. We follow a journalism (or film. It isn't explicitly revealed) crew from Tehran as they arrive at the small village of Siah Dareh. The crew is led by a man the villagers refer to as the Engineer (Behzad Dorani, in his feature-length acting debut). The men have come to the village after hearing about a 100 year old woman who is dying. They would like to record the ancient rituals that will proceed her death. However, not wanting to appear like vultures swooping down on its prey, the crew keeps their intentions secret, allowing the villagers to believe they have arrived in search of treasure.
The film's opening sequence has the crew in their car, driving down a winding road. Kiarostami keeps his camera at a distance, allowing the viewer to soak in the location and its vast emptiness. It immediately creates an ongoing theme, clashing modern civilization (the car) against ancient, primitive culture. While we never see the men's faces we can hear them talking. They speak with the same dismissive tone as Ebert describing a Kiarostami movie. They deride the directions given to them, the road, and the village itself. It implies a smugness as the big city sophisticates mock the "simplistic" villagers.
The clash between modernity and ancient culture and tradition manifest itself further with the Engineer's clothes - jeans, t-shirt, and plaid button down shirt - and the traditional garments of the villagers. If the crew was really smart, they wouldn't allow themselves to stick out so much, perhaps making their task easier. They would try to blend in and at the very least dress appropriately. But they purposely want to stick out. They aren't from this village and would not want to be connected to it. They are proud to be outsiders because of what that implies to them - intelligence. The villagers however are nice to the Engineer and treat him as an honored guest.
Then there is this business with the cell phone that Roger Ebert described. First, the cell phone is within itself another sign of modernity. The village has bad reception and when the Engineer receives a phone call, he must drive atop a mountain for a signal. While this situation hits on themes of communication it also reinforces the impending disturbance of technology on this small village, pushing the village into modern day society. How a Hungarian dunce like myself can see this and an intelligent man like Roger Ebert couldn't is beyond me. Prejudice can blind us and for whatever reason, Ebert wouldn't allow himself to understand a Kiarostami film.
Of all the villagers, the one the Engineer befriends is a young boy named Farzad (Farzad Sohrabi), whom he relies on for updates on the old lady's condition. The boy nevertheless must continue on with life's daily routines. His main concern is studying for his finals. Interestingly, while the Engineer prides himself on his intelligence and education, he seems annoyed with the young boy whenever he says he must study. To me it suggests an attitude of, "Don't you understand how important I am? My needs come first!" And yet it is the young boy who probably sees through the Engineer among all of the villagers. In one scene the Engineer even asks the boy if he thinks he is a good person.
Outside of the boy almost all of the Engineer's interactions are with female villagers, which always have a hint of sexuality in the air. One of the neighbors across from him is a woman with nine children and a tenth on the way. The Engineer makes flirtatious remarks about her night time activities and after the birth of the tenth child inquires if "the factory is still operational". The woman gives a coyish smile replying she doesn't know. In another scene, the Engineer asks a woman for some fresh milk. As she milks a cow, the Engineer asks a lot of personal questions and begins to quote a poem to her written by the famous Iranian poet, Forugh Farrokhzad, which is how the movie gets its title.
So many films from this part of the world - from Kiarostami's "Ten" to Jafar Panahi's "Offside" (2006) - are often about women's role in society. And it may explain the interactions between the Engineer and these women. The dialogue and the situations may have been meant to test the censorship of the Iranian government. For example, the poetry of Farrokhad was banned after the Islamic Revolution for its feminist themes.
Assured by the Engineer that the old lady will die in a few days, the crew grows impatient when a miraculous thing happens, the lady's health improves. Taking on somewhat dark comical tones, "The Wind Will Carry Us" hits on a theme Western audiences may be most responsive to - an appreciation for living. While the villagers become happy for the lady's health, the crew and a producer become anxious putting pressure on the Engineer. How much longer will they have to stay in the village? All of their plans will be ruined if the lady doesn't die. The Engineer even missed a funeral of his own family member in anticipation of the lady's dying.
I am sure there is meaning behind the lead character's occupation, a journalist, and a commentary on moral responsibility. The journalist has come to the village not to ease the old lady's suffering but to witness it from a distance. Journalists and the media witness much pain and suffering and yet there is a feeling they must remain impartial. They cannot be active participants or they will disrupt the "natural flow of things". Nevermind that by his mere presence the Engineer / Journalist is disrupting this village, altering its own natural flow.
Life and death were important subjects for Kiarostami. His film prior to "The Wind Will Will Carry Us" was the Palme d'Or winner, "The Taste of Cherry" (1998) about the taboo topic of suicide. Near the end of "Cherry" a character delivers a monologue, hitting at the heart of the film, about the meaning of life and its beauty. So too does the Engineer learn of the beauty of life and his surroundings, all symbolically captured by the presence of a turtle.
A film like "The Wind Will Carry Us" and an artist like Kiarostami's may test its audience with its visual presentation. As accurately pointed out by Michael Wilmington in his Tribune review, "Kiarostami is the natural heir of the great traditions of Italian neo-realism". Kiarostami was a filmmaker from a different time with a different sensibility. His films were exercises in moods and rhythms. They were experiences and if you could fall into their rhythms they were rewarding and unforgettable. But their slow moving pace could lead some to declare nothing happens or the films are boring.
Kiarostami was too great an artist to make a "boring" movie and with "The Wind Will Carry Us" his aesthetic allows him to illustrate one of the film's main themes - communication and barriers. Kiarostami creates spatial barriers for us, often having action and characters off-screen. We hear the Engineer before we see him. We see glimpses of the young girl milking the cow but never her face. We hear the Engineer speak to his colleagues but never see them. We never hear the voices on the other end of the Engineer's phone nor do we see the ditch digger he strikes up conversations with when he is atop of the mountain.
But the world Kiarostami's film wants to leave us with is one where barriers are broken. A world where we can appreciate the joy and beauty of being alive and learning to live in the "now". A world full of humanity. And while this uplifting message is similar to the one in "The Taste of Cherry" its feels equally as rewarding and earned. It is not a cheap or overly sentimental ending. It is a natural and fitting destination of this different kind of road movie.
Hopefully as exemplified in this review, Kiarostami was one of my favorite modern filmmakers and yet over the sixteen years of this blog I have only reviewed one of his films, "Certified Copy" (2011) and have only name dropped him on various year end "top ten" lists. With this being the year of "Was I Right"? - a year long look at films I have placed on top ten lists to determine, was I right about them - it seemed like a good time to take a look at "The Wind Will Carry Us" which I placed on my list of the best films of the 2000s but not on my list of the best films of the year 2000. So, was I right? I was right to include it among the best films of the first decade of the new century but I was wrong not to include it on my list of the top ten best films of 2000. Twenty-four years after seeing this film it has stayed with him. It's memory has lingered in my mind more than some of the film choices I did end up selecting on that year's top ten list. Obviously signifying the staying power and emotional impact the film had on me.
Despite his ability to divide audiences, this Kiarostami film was able to garner much critical acclaim. While it was nominated for the Venice Film Festival's the top prize - the Golden Lion - it did win the festival's runner up award, the Grand Special Jury Prize. In addition to appearing on Michael Wilmington's list of the best films of 2000, it was Jonathan Rosenbaum's choice as the very best film of the year, as well as one of New York Press critic Godfrey Cheshire's selections of the best movies of 1999.
"The Wind Will Carry Us" is a spiritual and reflective film about the joy of life, the inevitability of death, the breakdown of communication in society, and the clash between modernity and ancient tradition. It stands as one of Kiarostami's great films and one of the finest films from the first decade of the new century.
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