Berken's May 30 Days, 30 Countries Challenge Film nº 15 - Iran

Sib is a dramatized documentary about two girls who were locked up since birth and are "rescued" by the social services after a complaint filed by their neighbours.

With the principal characters played by themselves and some actual real footage, this film feels very real. The girls, the parents even the neighbours feel very alive.

The innocence of the girls making friends and wandering about for the first time really lights the mood for an actually very dramatic story about a really poor family, struck by misfortune and religion fundamentalism, with almost no education.

What's more interesting about this film is the showing of a story without judging anyone. The girls were locked up by their parents but specially the father is never shown like a real villain.

Sib is a really wonderful movie really worth watching.

There's something about the sound of this film, the simplicity of almost everyone's words and actions, repetitive, like the banging of spoons, that achieves a musical and rhythmic quality. I like films that have that element to them, that are a bit hypnotizing in the way they sound.

Maybe the best film directed by an 18 year old (although she had her dad's help), but more metaphorical than aesthetically inventive. Rides the line between exposing the fictive elements of documentary, the documentary realities of narrative, and straight up exploitation pretty hard.

Getting harder to write reviews of everything. Not sure how Sally does it.

This was kind of hard to watch, it really touched me.
To me, ignorance is one of the worst's evils of life, it's sad and tough to see.
What conforts me is that that the world still have people caring for each other and taking care of each other =).

soooooo good 💔💗💞

This gets one star only for Ice Cream kid

Interesting exercise.

“You’ve been locked up for 11 years?”
“Yes”
“Well that’s no excuse to not pay for your ice cream!”

Lost in the emotional nuance of childhood, masquerading as simplicity, crashing into the dense bedrock of adulthood, painted by mistakes. The line between reality and construction is blurry, at best. I’m still trying to find the balance. 

Iranian cinema never disappoints.

as virgens suicidas versão Irã

Beyond the subject matter it is a brilliant intersection of real and scripted narratives.

10/10

The Apple is the feature film debut from then 18-year-old Iranian director Samira Makhmalbaf. An influential cog in the machine of Iranian New Wave, as well as part of a family of filmmakers (her father is equally influential director Mohsen Makhmalbaf), Samira Makhmalbaf’s first film delves into the nuanced world of children raised in isolation in a docudrama style. Using a real-life family as both actor and subject, Makhmalbaf captures on film a fictional reality of two children first entering society at the age of 12 at the same time that the real-life children were first engaging with the world outside their home.

Greetings reader! Check out the full, in-depth review of The Apple here: cinefilesreviews.com/2016/04/04/the-psychology-philosophy-of-the-apple-1998-abusive-paternalism/