THE WIND WILL CARRY US

THE WIND WILL CARRY US (1999) ***1/2

Reviewed 3/4/00

Abbas Kiarostami's latest film, The Wind Will Carry Us, starts off with a series of extreme long shots depicting a lone vehicle winding along hillside roads while its inhabitants amusingly discuss how to locate their destination. These people come alive for us before we ever see a face, and this is a tactic Kiarostami utilizes throughout the picture. As a matter of fact, we will only ever see one of these journeymen up close, a certain Behzad (Behzad Dourani), initially identified as an "engineer." These men reach a provincial village of white buildings couched in a small valley, but what are they doing here? Why are they concerned with the health of a sick old woman? And who is Behzad anyway? Kiarostami is slow in offering up answers, and ironically the film is more interesting before we get them around the midway point.

The film takes its title from a poem recited within it, and refers to how certain things are beyond our control and is simply dependent on nature. Like Kiarostami's Taste of Cherry, the theme of The Wind Will Carry Us is life and death, but more specifically our governance over death and exploitation of life. To this end, Kiarostami injects technology into the mix. The village Behzad finds himself in resists the use of his cell phone in a comical manner, and the villagers resent his camera. Both embody the conflict of technology with a specific culture, a way of life. Metaphorically, Behzad and we, the audience, are continually unable to see many of the people Behzad encounters. The sick woman never appears onscreen, a milkmaid refuses to show her face, and the most we glimpse of a hole digger is his feet.

Kiarostami's camera placement and use of space is extraordinary here. His cinematographer, Mahmoud Kalari, perhaps Iran's foremost director of photography, deserves praise for capturing landscapes that practically glow. Some of Kiarostami's metaphors are overburdened -- a turtle turned over on its back, a dug-up leg bone -- and the film becomes a little overlong and repetitive, but for the most part, Kiarostami makes nigh a misstep in producing one of his best films yet.

* The Wind Will Carry Us will open for U.S. release in the summer.