I have finally watched "A Separation"!
First of all, let me say that I had higher expectations of it. The only element that fulfilled those expectations was the acting, which in my opinion was flawless
That basic plot is the separation of a married couple, Nader and Simin. Simin wants to leave Iran to start a better life for herself and her daughter (Termeh), while Nader wants to stay to take care of his own father, who has Alzheimer's, and so neither knows who he is (we never get to know his name) nor can he recognize his own son. So he is in many ways like Iran itself, cleverly enough. And the decision whether to leave him becomes the decision whether to leave Iran. The decision of who Termeh lives with is left to her.
Right there you have many great themes, you have the mother's protectiveness of her child, the special friendship between a father and his daughter, and the overarching theme of the loss of everything that identifies you with your father, or with your grandfather, or with your spouse, or with your country.
In addition to those, you have the friendship between the children Termeh and Somaya in the movie, who are used in the classical (and a bit too predictable) way of being a device for representing "innocence" in the film.
The film then starts to play on some dilemmas like the nature of "Morality" for the woman that works in the family's house (Razieh) which makes her fearful of helping the old man with Alzheimer's to bath and change his clothes, because she's afraid that counts as a "sin".
The film also exposes the nature of Iran's law and judiciary system that tries to fix nothing, and is only concerned with "clearing debt", much like their religious interpretation of sin, and much like the actual debts that are the main problem for Razieh and her husband, forcing her to work for Nader, now a single man - another religious dilemma for her.
These are issues that I am sure would seem new and intriguing for the western mind, but stripped down, they are not so much for me as an Egyptian.
Now, I felt that much more could have been done with that basic story, besides that, the subplots don't weave together too well. The main plot, the separation, did not underpin the subplots, it didn't haunt the other stories and wasn't even very relevant. Mere causality is not enough to tie subplots together. That in my opinion is very poor writing.
You know how in a symphony you can play a simple basic melody, then overlay that with another melody that draws from the first? Whether it's the rhythmic figure or certain notes, it has to draw something from it. It's like that with good stories.
A Separation could have easily done something like this, and beautifully, but it didn't. I just feel the director missed a lot.
Then we get to the ending. I like open endings a lot, but only when what is left open actually matters to the viewer. The question of who Termeh chooses to live with is meant to be the main question (which is left unanswered). Because of that, it should have been the focus of the movie, underlying everything and casting insight on the even more elementary question of whether the "right" choice is to stay in Iran or leave it.
But it just wasn't played up enough, the film put forth the question, then ignored it, then left it unanswered. When the film ended, intentionally leaving that question unanswered, I, the viewer, hardly cared who Termeh ends up living with, I didn't even try to imagine what Termeh would have chosen. That makes the ending trivial and ineffective.
In the same way that the movie failed to engage me emotionally, it failed to engage me intellectually as well. The film is minimalistic, and that is usually a good thing. I love minimalism, but only when it is used to drive a simple basic idea home. I didn't get that from "A Separation". Instead all I saw were a few interesting elements thrown at the viewer. This isn't my idea of a very good film.
All in all, I liked A Separation, but I didn't love it. It is a good movie, but it isn't a great one, and given the potential that it had, I must admit that I was disappointed with the overall experience.
7/10 (If it wasn't for the flawless acting, that would have been a 6)
