- Damnation (Karhozat) (1987)
Damnation (Karhozat) (1987) is directed by the great Hungarian auteur Bela Tarr. It is set in an unnamed town in which a man named Karrer is in love with the local bar singer, but she’s married. They have an affair for a while but then she leaves him. Karrer is offered a smuggling job by the bartender of the same bar but he gives it to the singer’s husband to get him out of the way. But things dont go as he expects and he faces a few hurdles.
The film has minimal dialogues and it is full of Bela Tarr’s signature style of long takes of mundane things. For example, there is a three minutes long take just of our lead staring out of his room’s window. The film is shot in black and white and has this sad and bleak atmosphere. The cinematography and framing are impeccable. The film deliberately moves at a snail’s pace. The shots are slow and winding. In this film, the camera’s movements are more important than the plot. The film delivers the plot visually. One of my favourite scenes was one in which our lead characters are fighting, and the crying baby’s noise in the parallel room acts as the background score. I dug the upbeat classical music throughout. It showed how the hopeless inhabitants of this town try to find joy by dancing and partying.
This film is more about the mood and the atmosphere. It’s a film about nothing but I was absorbed. I felt like I was there in this rainy and muddy shithole of a town where everything was dark and gloomy. Showing the mundane lives of these people reminded me of the films of Michaelangelo Antonioni. The topics that our characters talk about are full of philiosophy and subtext, they are deep and powerful.
Damnation is a highly stylized film that is not for everyone. The film progresses at a snail’s pace. But I didnt mind it because I was hypnotised by what I saw. I loved how the plot of the movie is told visually and the way it shows this sad and dreary world. This film is more of a sensory experience that I had a blast with.
- Close Up ( 1990)
| In Abbas Kiarostami’s Close up (1990) a guy named Sabzian impersonates director Mohsen Makhmalbaf and convinces a rich family that he will take them in his next movie. He runs this ruse for a while but eventually his truth comes out and he is taken in by the authorities. The film revolves around his trial.
Close Up is based on a true story and the people involved in the real story are playing themselves, this is so unique! The film is a reenactment of the real events. It is shot like a documentary so it comes under the category of docufiction.
The way Kiarostami has captured human emotions and motivations of the character, is really beautiful. The convict is shown in an empathetic light and you are made to understand his motivations. You even side with him and just hope that the judge grants him a lighter sentence. He loves the arts and cinema and he relates to the suffering that director Makhmalbaf shows in his films. So he wants to make a film about his suffering.
There is also commentary on the class divide in Iran – how impersonating this director made people treat Sabzian respectfully, and that made his life worth living.
I loved how the film portrays humanity and society in general, and takes us to the depth of human nature. It also talks about compassion and forgiveness.
Close Up is often considered to be the best film to come out of Iran. It is a film about a film buff like us. This movie is so uniquely made that I’ve never seen anything like this. |
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