willwoodmill The Iranian director Asghar Farhadi exploded onto the international film scene with the release of his 2011 film A Separation, the film received endless critical praise, topping countless critics list for the best of the year, and A Separation became the first Iranian film to ever win the Academy Award for best foreign language film, and was even nominated for best original screen play. So naturally there was a lot of hype for Farhadi's next film. People were dying to know what his next film was going to be, and if he could top A Separation. The answer to the first of these two questions is The Past, and the answer to the second is no, Farhadi was not able to top A Separation. At least not yet.The Past begins with Ahmad (played by Ali Mosaffa) returning to Paris to finalize the divorce with his wife Marie. (played by Berenice Bejo) Because Marie would like to move on and marry the owner of laundromat, Samir. (played by Tahar Rahim) Whose former wife tried to kill herself, but now lies in a comma at a hospital. Samir and his young son, Fouad (played by Elyes Aguis) have already moved in with Marie and her two children from a previous marriage, the elder of the two being Lucie (played by Pauline Burlet) a teenager who doesn't get along with her mother or Samir, and instead prefers her step father Ahmad. The film follows all these characters as they try to work out all of there differences and resolve all of the things they did to each other in the past. And as the film goes on we discover that all of the characters have more than a few skeletons in their closets.Asghar Farhadi has a very distinct and unique style, he has a strong focus on realism and showing things as they are. He stripes the film down to their basics, removing any fancy/stylized cinematography, like A Separation The Past does not have a score or soundtrack. His style is very similar to that of The Dardenne brothers or Abbas Kiarostami. But Farhadi instead has much more of a focus on the complexities of the human emotions that well can all feel and relate to. There are no heroes or villains in his films, instead there are just people trying to do their best. Farhadi relies a lot on his actors, they have to have dramatic range and be able to show several different emotions at once in order for the point of his film to come across. And while every single actor in A Separation was spot on, there are some weaker performances in The Past.But the acting is really only a tiny issue most of the actors are great there are just a few wishy-washy ones. The biggest problem I have with The Past is that the plot is so complex and confusing that it does gets hard to tell who's mad at who, and why they're mad. Which is something that we need to know if the film is going to have an impact on the audience. If you pay close attention you will easily be able to track with the plot just fine, but there are so many different characters and they all have intricate relationships with each other, that it becomes difficult to get emotionally invested when you are still trying to figure who did what to who and why. I want to be clear The Past isn't a bad film because it has a confusing plot, it's just a weaker film because it relies on you getting emotionally involved in the film, and it's confusing plot makes it difficult to get involved. Several great films have much more confusing plots, but those films don't put a lot of emphasis on emotional connection, at least not in the same simple way in which Farhadi does.In the end I would say that the Past is not as good of a film as A Separation. It's not as emotional or as groundbreaking as that film, and a lot of The Past ends up feeling like A Separation, which obviously means that it's going to be good, but just not as good as A Separation. But it is still worth seeing especially if you liked A Separation, there good performances and several different scenes that have the simple beauty of A Separation. 6.8/10

Claudiu Constantin Strugar Le passé (The past) by Asghar Farhadi "The past is never dead. It's not even past."― William Faulkner, Requiem for a NunThe past, that thing that is holding us down everyday , the thing that is stopping us to think with hope and joy about the present and the future. Probably each one of us would like to change something from their past , either is a reply said in a bad moment , a deed that we shouldn't have done it or something that we were supposed to do but we were afraid what might happen afterward.In Asghar Farhadi's movie , the past is a weight on the characters's shoulders, on their conscious , even on the little ones , who are supposed to be free from any moral weight , because thats what make childhood wonderful isn't it? The entire story is a jigsaw for the characters , and for the one that is watching the movie , who , like a sherlock tries to combine all the clues and facts that the story is giving us in order to unlock the mystery behind it. The movie is based mostly on the theory of chaos , where a reply said in the wrong moment , a gesture or even a look can have really bad results in the future , and that is what Asghar Farhadi is exemplifying with great skill.The storyline is simple at the beginning , gets more complicated as we watch further and starts to untangle as the movie reaches its final. There are few characters , each one of them defined well , even the one that doesn't appear until the end. The music is fine , nothing notable , and same about the places, which doesn't really matter in this particular movie . I gave 9/10 because I found myself enjoying the thrill of every moment , even for some people those moments could mean nothing. To better understand what all of this means you have to watch it , it's a sincere movie about life and the consequences of our decisions in life. I hope this might be useful regarding your decision to watch or not the movie Le passé by Asghar Farhadi.

SURAJ Asghar Farhadi has once again proved how talented he is with the family dramas. The movie right from the start keeps offering viewers something about their lives that adds to the whole picture of the situation. It very nakedly expresses how indecisive humans can get and how unknowingly we become a part of complexities that exhaust us. The movie very diplomatically points at no one as the villain or the hero, very much like his last film or like many of the acclaimed dramas that have come out over the years. The quick sands of relations that pull us deep so slowly and the next moment we are stuck as much as we try to move. The layers are intertwined in a poetic fashion that help us deeply understand each one of the characters and their ordeal and yet blame no one for the situation. The acting stayed flawless throughout, justifying every inch of the master piece writing. The editing was sharp and keeps us focused without letting us realize any of the transitions with major gaps in the tensions. The beauty of the direction lies in how Asghar succeeds in turning a drama with elements of a thriller. The sheer consistency in his direction makes us viewers wait for his next with as much anticipation that he left us with after his last Oscar award winning drama, "A Separation".

johnnymurphy15 After the Oscar success of 'A Separation', Iranian Director Asghar Farhadi was left with the difficult task of following up such a well received Film. To make things more difficult, he decided to make the film in France. Although I have never seen 'A Separation', I am happy to say that on it's own merits, 'The Past' is an excellent film for many reasons.Asghar Farhadi manages to weave together a complex family drama dealing with a myriad of feelings and reactions to a tragedy without being difficult to follow or without the self aware ambiguity which is now becoming a cliché. The story focuses on Marie (Berenice Bejo) who is divorcing her Iranian husband Ahmad (Ali Mosaffa) as she has entered a new relationship with Samir (Tahar Rahim). Samir is a conflicted man whose wife is in a coma after an attempted suicide which may or may not be the result of his affair with Marie. The possible reasons for her suicide are slowly revealed in the many beautifully scripted scenes. Marie's daughter Lucie (Pauline Burlet) is heavily involved in the whole debacle as she reveals initially to her adoptive father Ahmed that she exposed the affair to Samir's wife. Blame is shifted to a number of people involved as these revelations come to light and the issue of all this past trauma is making it difficult for all the characters to move on with their lives. In Marie and Ahmed's case, there is still a little something in their relationship, even though they are getting divorced, and in Samir's case, he may be still in love with his unconscious and possibly dying wife. The film ends with a lasting image that is subtly heart breaking, but with a hint of hope for a few characters who have resolved their issues and have moved on.Each character is well formed and very believable with excellent performances by everyone to match. You feel for every character in the film, including the young children who are played brilliantly by the evidently talented young actors. The film is very dialogue driven and reveals itself at a leisurely pace giving way to some emotionally hard going scenes without resorting to many obvious cliché's. It is a well balanced film which shows how tragic events of the past can effect peoples lives in the present. It is certainly one of the surprise gems so far this year and will hopefully get the praise it deserves because it is outstanding.See my Film Review Blog - www.projectionistreview.wordpress.com