The Iranian film, A Separation (2011), is as splendid as all the critics have said it is.  It is skillfully directed and shrewdly, fascinatingly written by one man:  Asghar Farhadi.  The drama–all about a shattering conflict involving two families–is full-steam-ahead and tragic, but not despairing.

One of the movie’s themes is the human inclination to use lies for protection, for a refuge.  By no means does Farhadi condone lying, but he shows us circumstances in which people either lie or they are doomed.  Another theme is that which the title points to:  separation between family members, between husbands and wives, and what is wrought by this.

Not surprisingly, the Oscar for Best Foreign Film of 2011 went to A Separation.  How come American filmmakers failed to produce anything even approximating this work?

Image via Wikipedia

(In Persian with English subtitles)

The Washington politicians in Atlas Shrugged, Part 1 (2011) want a basically socialistic system for the U.S.–and they want greater power than they already have.  They lead the nation in adopting the following view:  altruism good, big-business bad; but this does nothing to restore a blighted America.  The widespread use of passenger trains which I believe to exist in Ayn Rand’s novel exists in this film too, but here, in 2016, the trains are used because no one can afford air travel.  The pols are letting the country slip into economic hell, with the worst possible legislation gradually forthcoming.  For example, an “equalization” law prohibits people like steelmaker Hank Reardon from owning more than one business.

I’ve seen Atlas once in the theatre and once–and half of it twice–on DVD, and I’m ready to make my pronouncement:  it’s a good film.   Yes, it’s full of two-dimensional characters and it shovels out more information than your average person can absorb (which is why it should be seen more than once), but it’s also fresh and properly paced and near-cerebral.  It’s talky, but not without overt drama.  The allegation that the movie is ineptly made is largely false.  Even most of the acting is more successful than I originally thought.

Here’s one more thing:  Yep, leave it to Congress to come up with a name as banal (and stupid) as “anti-dog-eat-dog law” for a piece of legislation.  Hopeless.

Directed by Paul Johansson.

(Photo:  Taylor Schilling as Dagney Taggart)

I am inspired by the success of The Artist to write about an even better silent film–1927’s It.

The title refers not to a sci-fi creature but to that dazzling human quality which entices members of the opposite sex, and herein Clara Bow enacts (outstandingly) a comely character with It.  She’s a frisky salesgirl who falls for her handsome boss, and vice versa.  Because of a misunderstanding, the boss thinks the salesgirl has been non-virginal enough to have given birth to a child and so he spurns her.  The Bow character is taken aback by the boss’s failure to give her the benefit of the doubt . . .

Directed by Clarence Badger and an uncredited Josef von Sternberg (why did it need two directors?), it’s a well-made, charming, amusing rom-com and a perfect vehicle for Bow with her wholesome face and killer eyes.  It’s very much a girl-in-love role.

Available on DVD.

Clara Bow (Image via RottenTomatoes.com)

A mostly silent film made in black and white, The Artist (2011) is a novelty piece which ought to have had a better plot.  Its value lies in its details and its cast (Jean Dujardin and Berenice Bejo are as self-assured and winning as it is possible to be).  There is another asset too:  The Artist is moving.

No, I don’t believe it’s a masterpiece, but I’m glad I saw it.

Written and directed by Michel Hazanavicius.

Since I am displeased with the review I wrote for the 2008 French film, The Class (or Entre les Murs), I wish to supplant it with the following:

During the Aughts, Laurence Cantet adapted a French novel titled Entre les Murs for the screen.  Called in the United States The Class, it’s a gem of a picture, set in a Paris inner-city school, which has no faith whatsoever in multiculturalism and very little in urban public education.  The novel was written by the schoolteacher, Francois Begaudeau, who plays the lead role–that of schoolteacher Francois Marin–in this film.  Though dedicated, Marin is not nearly as effectual as a pedagogue should be:  the school is a multiracial semi-horror.  There is constant disrespect and constant egalitarian sensibility.  Absurdity involving meetings and student representatives paves the way for Marin’s losing his temper and telling two misbehaving girls, the student reps, that they behave like “skanks.” He never apologizes.

The movie invites us to wonder just what kind of country France will be in the future.  The liberalism underlying multiculturalism seems unsustainable.  Yes, you can get a student expelled from Marin’s school, but can you get a satisfactory education re-admitted?

Cover of The Class (Entre Les Murs)