Le goût de la cerise

This is a little more interesting when you know that most of it was improvised with Kiarostami sitting in the driver's seat talking to the other actors. But like most purely improvised films, there's a rather low ratio of insights to the amount of screen time spent struggling to come up with something interesting. (Actually, only one of the characters really manages to be interesting at all.) Likewise, some of the shots of Mr. Badii driving around aimlessly have a certain Antonioniesque hypnotic effect, but most of them look no more interesting than random video you might have shot yourself in the industrial part of town.

There are critics who call this kind of untouched-by-art realism genius, who say that Kiarostami is making us think, reconsider the very nature of cinema, and so on. To my mind, the message of the film-- the taste of cherry makes life worth living-- is no more or less profound than, say, Woody Allen rattling off a few of the things that make life worth living in Manhattan, or the epiphany the kid in American Beauty gets from a plastic bag. (Likewise the message that it's all only a movie. Never woulda guessed.) And critics who find such a message shallow in a piece of slick entertainment, but deep when it's in a deliberately unentertaining art film, need to reexamine their critical principles, or lighten up a little-- or at least go see again the work of real art Kiarostami alludes to in his title, Wild Strawberries, which has more depth of characterization and emotional richness in any five minutes than this manages to scrounge up in an hour and a half.

"I understand how difficulty you have comprehending the last scene of this movie. I sympathize with you. But this has been deliberate on my part. In "Taste of Cherry" I have tried to keep a distance between my spectator and the protagonist. I didn't want spectators emotionally involved in this film. In this film, I tell you very little about Mr. Badie, I tell you very little about what his life is about, why he wanted to commit suicide, what his story is I didn't want the spectators get engaged in those aspects of his life. For that purpose I had to keep Mr. Badie away from the audience. So he is a distant actor in a way. First I thought to end the movie at the point when he laid down on his grave but later I changed my mind. I was uncomfortable to end it at that point because I was very concerned, and am always concerned, about my spectators. I do not want to take them hostage. I do not want to take their emotions hostage. It is very easy for a film-maker to control the emotions of spectators but I do not like that. I do not want to see my audience as innocent children whose emotions are easily manipulable.

I was afraid that if I ended the movie where Mr. Badie laid down on his grave the spectator would be left with a great deal of sadness. Even though I didn't think the scene was really that sad, I was afraid that it would come out as such. For that reason I decided to have the next episode where we have the camera running as Mr. Badie was walking around. I wanted to remind spectators that this was really a film and that they shouldn't think about this as a reality. They should not become involved emotionally. This is much like some of our grandmothers who told us stories, some with happy and some with sad endings. But they always at the end would have a Persian saying which went like this "but after all it is just a story! . . . The very last episode reminds me of the continuation of life, that life goes on, and here the audience is confronted with the reality they had hoped that Mr. Badie would be alive and there he is a part of nature and nature still continues and life goes on even without Mr. Badie. And if one could really think about being or not being present in life, or if one thinks about it in terms of the real implication of such presence, one might not in fact engage in committing suicide at all. The person committing suicide might think that s/he is taking revenge from the society, nature, life, powers to be, and so on. But s/he don't realize that after a suicide life still goes on and things stay the way they are. I could interpret this in a different way. If my audience is as creative as I imagine them to be, they can take this in a variety of interpretations and I can sit here and every time make a different interpretation of it, as every time one can creatively reinterpret the reality. "

Although I've seen many movies from other Iranian and Middle Eastern directors, this is the first I've watched from the late director, Abbas Kiarostami. And like some of those others - Nuri Ceylan from Turkey comes to mind - Kiarostami, in this story, exclusively concentrates on questions about the human condition. Specifically, it's about the self-destructive urge by one man. And it is here that Kiarostami inverts the whole idea of helping those who contemplate suicide.

Suicide, in itself, is a ready and obvious turn-off for many viewers, probably. And coupled with the apparent treacle-like pace of the narrative and the repetitive scenes of a lone man, Badii (Homayoun Ershadi), driving in and around hills outside Tehran, this story gives a whole new dimension to the idea of going over the same ground, again and again, to prove a point. And all the while we, as viewer, are inside the auto for most of this movie, up close and very personal....

But to avoid seeing this movie would be a big mistake, in my opinion.

I say that simply because the idea of suicide has probably occurred to most people, including myself, at some time in their lives. Whether that idea was part of Kiarostami's motivation for making this movie, we will never know, of course. I dare say it occurred to him, though.

At the first frame, we're in Baddii's well-worn Range Rover as he drives, his face set, his gaze wandering here and there, searching for a likely assistant for his plan to kill himself. In sequence, he stops a variety of men - a seminarian, a young soldier, a security guard; each man and Badii converse about his need to have somebody help him to suicide, Badii describing what a helper must do. Each time, Baddi has no success until, with a blindingly quick jump-cut, an old man, Bagheri (Abdolrahman Bagheri) is in the car, a helper who finally agrees to abide by Badii's wishes.

So, after taking Bagheri to close where he lives, Badii drives off, content that he has secured a deal; rapidly, however, he drives back in a fluster, as doubts creep into his mind. Frantically, he walks around the area until he finds the old man Bagheri to seek further assurance he will indeed help Badii next morning. Somewhat annoyed, the old man again gives his solemn promise. And stalks off.

Slowly then, Badii returns to his home/apartment, makes his final preparations, makes a point of turning off all the lights as he leaves, locks the door, leaves his car, and then takes a taxi back to the cherry tree, he had previously selected, at which he will terminate his life during the night, and as thunderstorms - a much-overused trope perhaps - begin.

It is there, then, that I will leave you to find out why Bagheri decided to help, and about Badii's fate that night. And about an absolutely unexpected ending.

It's a bleak story, but one that is played out in too many ways by thousands every day, more or less in every country on the planet, probably. Perhaps then, Kiarostami is urging us to think upon that more often as we all traverse our own daily ups and downs - and especially in relation to those who are nearest. Once seen, this is not a movie to forget.

Recommended for all, except toddlers obviously. Give it eight out of ten.

I have watched many films dealing with the theme "life & death". But this is the greatest one. The story is simple (even incomplete) but I think Abbas tells us too much.

Through the dialogue between different people from different classes, everyone has his own attitude about "life & death". I think we can't say which is right & which is wrong. Abbas only gives it to us & let us think for ourselves.

Every scene is simple & ordinary, but has a certain strange fascination. I have seen "Through The Olive Trees" before (also directed by Abbas). To be honest, I don't like it, although it's said to be a good film. But this one is different. "Go see it" is what I want to say.

This is film at its simplest: pure cinema. And then he pulls out the rug from underneath you. The director removes the event from the film, in doing so calls attention not to what the protagonist's action will be, but rather the reason for the action. Nor does he make the reason specific, though the concerns are human, universal, which transcends the specific. Foremost this film is about cinema, cinema and the what it means to be, to exist.