Children of Heaven

Wow, what can I say? Every bit of this film is so warm! It really looked at the world from a child's perspective. Every single scene is inundated with sweetness and the innocence of children. How they share one pair of shoes was amazing...and heartbreaking. How the little sister had no confidence in her brothers shoes was shown in such a warm and effective way. The ultimate despair Ali felt when he won was also so heartbreaking. Ali and his sister are both so cute and they can really act. This film can easily move one to tears. Do watch it!

Majid Majidi's Children of Heaven is such an extraordinary work of movie-making that it is in a realm of movies that are able to connect with anyone who remembers (or is amidst) their childhood, regardless of what country they come from. (Note: Films that have a universal appeal aren't necessarily better than films that only appeal to people from one or two countries, but making a film with a universal appeal is no easy task.) A boy named Ali (Amir Farrokh Hashemian) loses his sister Zahra's ((Bahare Seddiqi) running shoes; Zahra threatens to tell their father (Mohammad Amir Naji). Petrified at his father's temper, Ali promises his sister that he will get his sister some new shoes as soon as possible. In the meantime, the two work out a tight shoe-switching schedule. The plot is inventive and provides some decent chuckles-good writing and comic timing. Hashemian is likable and relatable though he milks the babyish whimpering to an annoying extent. Naji is able to give us a stronger feeling that we are watching a real person on screen than any of the other actors in the film. It is not until the last ten minutes of the film, however, that we are swept up in a crazy whirlwind of emotion, jolting from despair to joy to suspense (though not in that order) and the last ten minutes can make a movie great. Majidi gives us homage to The Four Hundred Blows. The ending to Majidi's movie is somewhat similar to that of Francois Truffaut's; both movies contain the feeling of extreme desperation, but Ali has a goal in his life while Antoine Doinel (Jean-Pierre Léaud) is boldly going nowhere. Truffaut's film concludes with brilliant ambiguity, leaving us wondering whether Doinel's last five minutes on screen were triumphant or pathetic; Majidi does something quite similar (less ambitiously) in a way I would not dream of revealing.

This film is not to be considered as more a novelty of an exotic country, as many productions of the third world are. Actually, it's superior to the smashing majority of the American films. It is touching in its simplicity, true in the feelings that it focuses, blinding in the sublime form as it approaches, starting from the simple story of a poor Iranian child, such universal subjects. Just extraordinary.

What a marvelous thing film can be. It can touch us and open our hearts to a culture that is both different and familiar to ours. CHILDREN OF HEAVEN, a film by Iranian filmmaker, Majid Majidi, takes us into the world of a little boy and his sister, letting us feel the love and trust that they have in each other. The boy, through no fault of his own, loses his little sister's newly repaired school shoes the day before she needs them. It becomes their secret. They try sharing a pair of his sneakers -- the girl wearing them in the morning and he in the afternoon to school. The wonderful, innocent faces of the beautiful Iranian children and their code of honor, even in poverty, provides the bases for a very uplifting tale of children trying to overcome a crisis. The direction, cinematography, music are all outstanding -- but it is the children that you will fall in love with. Well worth picking up on DVD (though there are no "Extras" to speak of).

Children of Heaven, which is Iran's selection for best foreign film at the Academy Awards, is a very good movie mainly because anyone in this world can relate to the topic of family and showing love to each other no matter the living circumstances. As an Iranian film, it is definitely played safe but a film with such an universal theme and elegantly told as here should really not be missed, especially by movie-lovers.

Majid Majidi's film is about a young boy named Ali who accidentally lost his sister Zahra's shoes. But their family can ill afford to buy new shoes, Ali decides to share his shoes with his sister until he can get new ones for her and so he can avoid punishment.

The acting is pretty good, and pretty heartfelt. There is no questioning the chemistry between Amir Farrokh Hashemian as Ali and Bahare Seddiqi as Zahra. Reza Naji who plays as their father is also good as the man who is trying to do all he can to provide food for his family.

Overall, Children of Heaven is a simple film but it displays a strong message about the bond of family. There are some talented films from the Middle East and this is one of them. It's a strong film about courage and about doing what's right. My favorite scene is where the father and the son leave their poor slums as they head uptown to the rich neighborhoods. This film shows how American kids are vastly different than kids from these parts of the world.....and not exactly in a good way. This film is a little too simple for me, but there is no denying how powerful this film is. I rate this film 8/10.