Movie Review: The Persian Version

 

Michael's Movie Grade: D-

An unfocused and meandering comedy-drama. 

The main problem with this film is that it simply tries to do too much and ends off biting off more than it can chew. By constantly changing the complete tone of the movie, the focus of the story, the time it takes place in and even who the main character is, it becomes hard to emotionally connect with anything that is going on. While there is nothing wrong with telling a story that switches between time periods and from multiple points of view (after all this is what Citizen Kane does), it has to be done well or it can simply be off-putting. It is not done well here. The problem here is that unlike the best movies that use this type of storytelling, here it distracts from rather than adds to the story. Sometimes a plot thread will just start and then right afterwards, we will jump to a flashback and not get back to that plot thread in what seems like forever. Sometimes these flashbacks feel like they belong in a completely different movie from the modern-day (well early 2000's) scenes. For instance, there is a long flashback that tells us about the mother's backstory. This flashback is completely different tonally and goes on long enough to feel like an unrelated short film was placed in the middle of this feature film. Not only this but all that was needed from this flashback to help tell the modern story could have been given in a couple brief moments. There is also the fact that this film goes back and forth from being about our main character being pregnant to being about her relationship with her mom. This is done to the point where you almost forget that she is even pregnant, because the focus drifts so far from this for a long time. The exploring of the relationship between the daughter and mother even falls flat because even though a theme is the film is that the two had to grow to understand each other, we never feel like we truly get to know the mother. We get quite a bit of her backstory, but we still don't understand why she acts the way she acts. The movie also suffers from an overreliance on narration. Throughout the movie the action is constantly interrupted by the characters stopping to narrate what is happening. While one gets the idea that this is supposed to make the film feel quirky and therefore make it stand out, it doesn't work. It instead gets annoying and distracting as well as feeling like a storytelling crutch. 

Another major problem with this film is the humor. This is supposed to be a comedy-drama. However, I didn't laugh even once watching this. The humor continually fell flat and like it was simply trying too hard. It doesn't help that the humor is not well balanced with the comedy. Instead of the two being intertwined they feel at odds with each other. At one moment the film will feel like an out and out quirky comedy and then the next moment will be a completely serious drama. You never know when these complete tonal shifts will happen and every time, they do it takes you completely out of the movie. 

 Admittedly this movie often has clever ideas, but these ideas seem lost in poor execution or the pure excess of the storytelling. 

I came into this movie sure I would like it but frankly it turned out to be a complete disappointment. There is a good movie buried in this film somewhere, but it will take a lot of digging to find it.