Review: Abbas Kiarostami’s Like Someone in Love

• October 15, 2012
• Article

15.10.2012 - Abbas Kiarostami and his films seem to belong at ADFF. The Iranian master has been a guest of the Festival more than once, and he served as Narrative Feature Competition jury president in 2009. The large local Iranian community is passionate about his films, as they are about the generation of Iranian New Wave filmmakers he has directly or indirectly mentored, and whose work is frequently shown here.

So it was no surprise to see a packed theatre for ADFF's first screening of Like Someone in Love, his latest film. The makeup of the crowd, however, far from being mainly Iranian, was decidedly diverse. Among the mixed crowd there were as many Japanese people as Persian - the film's story takes place in Japan and is Kiarostami's second international effort after the Italy-set Certified Copy. Kiarostami's work has always belonged to the world, especially as Iranian arthouse films haven't always enjoyed wide support at home, but with the director having embarked on multiple cinematic journeys overseas, that is now more true than ever.

One wonders what the audience made of the film. I referred to Kiarostami as a "master" in the first paragraph because that's what you're supposed to do, but also because he is one; the industry cliché is very useful. As it often is with a master at work, Kiarostami draws a large crowd of fans and the curious alike, but the creation on display might be challenging - or in this case, light on its feet, playful, unpredictable. Like Someone in Love does not write Kiarostami's genius in large letters - he doesn't work that way anyway, but whereas his previous film, Certified Copy (ADFF 2010), flirted with being marketable, with its classic Tuscany setting and a big star in Juliette Binoche, the new film is more abstract, its urban East Asian milieu a bit edgier. There are certainly moments when Kiarostami shows he's capable of the kind of quirky but heartfelt drama that could make him a household name if he would let it. But he insists on taking chances, changing the rules, shuffling the deck. No doubt even some Kiarostami devotees will find Like Someone in Love obtuse. But what makes it difficult also makes it thrilling.

In many ways the film is a companion volume to Certified Copy. As it that film, two people meet and form an unlikely attachment, and the story progresses through a series of enigmatic twists changes, arriving at a puzzle as to the real nature of their relationship that is left to the audience to solve. In this case the two are a young woman (Rin Tanakashi) torn between her college studies and her work as a prostitute, and an elderly sociologist and client (Tadashi Okuno). The girl's jealous fiancée (Ryo Kase) adds a dangerous piece to the puzzle. The cast, made up of more professional actors than Kiarostami has ever worked with, is outstanding.

The film's story, it almost goes without saying, proceeds in a quiet, meandering way, with no conventional narrative as such, through the long takes and long conversations (so often taking place in a car) that are the hallmarks of Kiarostami and the school of cinema he exemplifies. But again it's impressive how, well, masterful his control is. Any indie wannabe can film a long conversation, but Kiarostami pushes the boundaries of what cinema can do with each unfolding scene here, creating dreamlike fascination and a kind of simmering suspense with visual and narrative elements that would be pedestrian or even boring in lesser hands. It's placid on the surface but filled with life in its murky depths, and it's surprisingly affecting and emotional from the first scene.

The concept of "surface" is an important one for the film, not only in the expounding of the mystery at its heart, but in its visual style. It's an opaque film. Nearly every shot has some extra element to disrupt the subject  - a reflection in a window, something going on in the background, a conversation taking place offscreen. The many shots through windows, with the reflections creating an ongoing matte effect, are frequently breathtaking - Katsumi Yanagijima's cinematography is lush and brilliant in capturing the shimmering life of Tokyo and its suburbs, as is the many-layered sound design by Reza Naramizadeh. This layering and disruption creates the impression of a stream of action and meaning whirling around the protagonists and their story. It's an effect that stays with the viewer long after leaving the cinema, and the admittedly problematic final scene can't erase it.

Jim Poe