Nepali Times

Summer is here and with it a slew of classic summer blockbusters. While I am unabashedly anticipating films like Iron Man 3 and Star Trek Into Darkness, this week I would like to champion true art house, independent cinema, the likes of which are hard to find in Kathmandu.

So, imagine my delight when I stumbled across Like Someone in Love, a film by the great Iranian director Abbas Kiarostami that initially came out at the Cannes film festival last year to a great deal of acclaim and went into wider release earlier this year.

Along with other greats, like Michael Haneke, Kar Wai Wong, and Ken Loach (to name a few), Kiarostami is a contemporary filmmaker who has been working at his craft for many decades. His previous films include Taste of Cherry (1997), The Wind Will Carry Us (1999) and Certified Copy (2010), the last of which was his first venture outside his home country.

Like Someone in Love is his second film set outside of Iran and it is very much in keeping with his opaque but carefully controlled style. Set in Japan and with dialogues in the Japanese language, the story centres around a young girl called Akiko (Rin Takanashi) who is in Tokyo studying sociology at university and finances her studies through selective prostitution.

One evening Akiko is sent by her handler to the house of an elderly man, a former professor and translator. When she arrives she is emotionally wrung out having been forced to fulfil her obligations to her employer rather than be allowed to see her grandmother who is in town for the day from her village.

When the elderly professor Takashi Watanabe (Tadashi Okuno), who is the epitome of a benevolent grandfather figure, moustache, and all, receives her, it seems almost as if he is greeting a grandchild rather than a prostitute. He has cooked her a broth that is famous in her region and seems only to want to drink wine over dinner and chat. Exhausted and slightly out of it, Akiko falls asleep instead after she makes a few half-hearted overtures.

The next morning Takashi drives Akiko to university where she has an exam. As he waits for her to finish he witnesses an encounter between Akiko and her fiancé Noriaki (Ryô Kase) a violent and opinionated young man who is apt to fly into an abusive rage whenever Akiko doesn’t return his calls (which happens to be quite often).

What follows is a comedy (or tragedy rather) of errors when Noriaki mistakes Takashi for Akiko’s grandfather.

 Kiarostami has always been able to imbue even the most quotidian of scenes, in bars or in vehicles, with a sense that the larger world beyond the frame, though it may be unseen, is as fascinating as what we are seeing onscreen. His characters live and breathe their roles, even as he directs them in a language that he does not speak, a testament to his skills as a director.

Perhaps what is most extraordinary about this film, which is also its most valuable lesson to budding directors, is the sense of adventure inherent in the filmmaking process. Kiarostami’s framing is never conventional, his script seemingly meandering until the explosive end, and his understanding of his characters (he almost always writes the screenplay) exactly right.

This filmmaker knows how to make seemingly ‘small’ films that resonate far beyond their viewing length. With subtlety, extraordinary understanding and understatement, Like Someone in Love though perhaps a struggle to watch for those who might prefer more action in their films, is an art form to aspire to, a rare piece of work that speaks volumes with every frame.

Like Someone in Love, directed by Abbas Kiarostami