User reviews

A beautiful film that tells an emotionally complex story of alienation and longing with the minimum of dialogue.

That is all I wanted to say really, but it seems brevity is not a virtue sort by IMDb. I understand the ten line minimum; IMDb does not want to be overwhelmed by vacuous one line reviews. But surly my well chosen 18 words are a triumph of economy and concision, and through these excellent qualities are exempt to such a well meaning yet indiscriminate prohibition. Furthermore there can be little danger of "It's Winter" being overwhelmed by reviews of any sort... My vain blathering seem to have taken me over the quota...

A bleak vision in a bleak environment, It's Winter gets determinedly bleaker like the onset of the cruelest season. An Iranian filmmaker who trained in London, Rafi Pitts tells a story of the barrenness of trying to scrape together an existence in an unforgiving modern world. Set in Tehran among an impoverished underclass, the lives of two men are overlapped in a fatalistic way that is reminiscent of the themes of Abel Ferrara (of whom Pitts once made a documentary): when things are really cr*p, they will generally get much worse. When the road ahead is unwelcoming and the snow is freezing, what else do you do but hunker down in our collar? Imagine trying to philosophise with someone in such a situation - their bottom line is not your ideas but whether you can put bread in their mouth.

Mokhtar, unable to find work, leaves his wife and child to find employment in more distant lands. After seeing him on to a train we pick up with another man, Marhab, at the end of his journey. The dislocation is such that it takes a while to realise that Marhab has arrived in the same area that Mokhtar has just left. Marhab is also struggling to find and keep work, but still manages to get married in a short space of time - to Mokhtar's wife (whose former husband is believed dead).

Whatever joy there is in these people's lives is consigned almost to a footnote. We are not given the excuse to believe they are really OK because they can enjoy the odd cup of soup. Such a false projection of happiness would let us off the hook too easily, whereas the reality of the such people in modern day Iran is all too realistically portrayed. An ingenious and very nihilistic coda rams home the message that there is little to look forward to - even less than hope might suggest.

Set against the austere and unwelcoming environment is a haunting and exotic song whose words mirror both the opening scenes and the sense of isolation. "They won't answer your greeting for their heads are lowered into their collars . . . for the cold is too bitter, too harsh." As well as providing a themic beauty that rises above all we see, the song maybe lends a useful insight for Westerners. Because of its strategic position, Iran (Persia) has always been the target of political machinations, but its long history had for many years - longer than many civilisations - held the promise of colourful mysteries, ancient civilisations and inexplicable ways. The latter has gradually been eroded, but the former still holds true, the present world forces being one of 'encouraging democratisation,' poverty-increasing sanctions, and demonisation as a hotbed of terrorism. Yet it is not incumbent on Iran to understand western values (except for its own survival) - it is for the West, with greater resources at its disposal, to understand Iran. Although non-political, this frosty window into a country that has become almost closed to Western eyes, easily conveys the futility of winning hearts and minds through rhetoric. In purely cinematic terms, it has a quiet, stark beauty and a fragility of construction as one character unknowingly supplants another, only to repeat a cycle that has as its end in unthinkable personal despair. It is a style that is not easy to relate to but one that is as fresh and crisp as anything that has come out of land that cinema has sometimes almost forgotten.

I did deliberately choose to watch this on the same night as MAN PUSH CART, since they sounded similar in plot, style and tone. Marhab is a mechanic looking for work in Tehran. He becomes fascinated with a woman whose husband has just left Tehran (on the same train Marhab arrived in) to look for work elsewhere. The film tracks their struggles over the course of a year, from winter to winter, suggesting the cyclical nature of life is much like the changing seasons. What goes up, must come down... Marhab befriends another mechanic who finds him a job, but problems soon develop. Things change, only return to their previous state, or a revamped version of it. Although bleak (like the dirge that recurs on the soundtrack), the mood is not entirely dour. The protagonist is impulsive and free-spirited, which often leads to conflict, but also provides him with joy and triumph. He's an interesting, complex character, done very well by Ali Nicksaulat. Pitts frames the dingy landscape delicately, finding beauty amidst the grime. There are also some intriguing editing/scripting choices, leaving out key transitional moments, allowing the viewer to fill in the blanks while concentrating on the emotional framework. A delicate, resonant film. Iran continues to live up to its reputation as a wellspring of interesting filmmakers. I will be checking out more by Rafi Pitts.

This is perhaps as close to the Italian NeoRealists of the Fifties as the Iranian New Wave has yet got. Its low-life milieu, the struggle for survival in the big city, the impartial cruelty of fate, all these elements are strangely comforting to any aficionado of the post-war shakeup, although any sense of comfort is at odds with the barren cold of Tehran in the dark months.

The director took the scenario rather than a literal narrative, from a book, 'Safar' (The Trip) by Mahmoud Dowlatabadi, and much of the colour from a poem, 'Winter', by Mehdi Akhavan Saless. The poetry acts well as a framing device, pulling the story closer together as an iconic statement instead of a collection of interconnected images.

Khatoun (Mitra Hajjar) is left with a granny and daughter to keep while her husband (Hashem Abdi) leaves on the train to seek work; simultaneously another man, Marhab (a Brando-esquire Ali Nicksaulat) also looking for Something Better, arrives. He falls in love with Khatoun, strikes up a friendship with Ali, (Said Orkani) a mechanic and small-time pimp, finds work, but as this is intended to be a reflection of real life, where the bus will not necessarily come just because there hasn't been one for an hour, nothing is that simple - life is shaped by an accumulation of little accidents, and if anything changes it will not be where it was expected. The constant in this story is Khatoun: the men are blown around her like snowflakes as they strive to survive. Pitts has said that he feels men seem to live more in a dream world, while making the decisions, but the women have to deal with the facts. When it came to shooting he describes his technique as setting the circumstance for a particular actor or 'non-actor' to slip into one piece of action and then capturing the magic.It works well, and added to that are the particular aesthetics of the snowy landscapes, the medina and the rusty, funky garage heaps. He wanted to create an Iran that was timeless - it's more than that - it could be anywhere, too. And bleak though it may be, it is not unremittingly so. After everything there remains a little hope. CLIFF HANLEY

I wanted to like this film I really did. For me it had the perfect ingredients - it was from a country I knew relatively little about, it was bleak and gritty and the actors were almost frighteningly believable. What's more the cinematography and direction were impressive - I loved the beautiful scenery and the contrasts with the grim realities of urban Iran. The problem was that it was just so so slow. I didn't want an action film; I love thoughtful, quiet films but at one point I was almost begging the writer to give us something, anything, just to maintain a flicker of interest and stop us falling asleep. There was almost no conversation and that which there was I found dull and awkward. I can honestly say that without exaggeration I was utterly stunned when the film finished and my DVD player stated clearly that it had been running for less than 90 minutes. It was genuinely so painfully slow that it seemed to have been running for 3 hours or more. To this day I swear that my DVD player was playing tricks on me....

... but not overdue. I was curious to why people here on IMDb loved this movie more than me so I read another review that held this movie high. I respect his view and his vote, but on the other side I can say: Do I have to know the Iranian way of film-making? And what does that even mean? The other Iranian contender at the International Berlin Film Festival was much better, at least one of the top five movies there.

Funnily enough the other movie wasn't well received in Iran (look for the movie "Offside" here on IMDb). But let's concentrate on this movie. The idea of showing a poor country and how people cope with that, is a good one. And thus it's a shame, that there is not a better film here to review. Do you have to make a pessimistic situation more depressing? Do you have to show long dull shots of nothing happening? (that's a tricky one, because I do think that you might need this at least once or twice, but not make the whole movie feel like it's saying nothing ... if you want a "silent" movie that says something, go and watch "Bin-Jip", a masterpiece with little to none dialogue). Is it really a good statement from the director, that he doesn't show us a dialogue here and there (instead opting for long shots, often also showing nothing)? A tragic situation does need to be emphasized (nor does a dull moment, of which there are quite a few here)! Letting the main character repeatedly talking about the same thing, without him doing it, is beyond the point of tolerability.

The movie feels overbearing and pretentious, but I can only speak for myself, when I say that I wouldn't recommend this movie at all.