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Deserted Station (2002)
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Reviews Counted:21
Fresh:21
Rotten:0
Average Rating:7.8/10
Theatrical Release:Dec 3, 2004 Limited
Synopsis: Based on a concept the director and Abbas Kiarostami developed on a photography trip together, a man and a young woman (Leila Hatami of Leila) are stranded in a remote village after their car... Based on a concept the director and Abbas Kiarostami developed on a photography trip together, a man and a young woman (Leila Hatami of Leila) are stranded in a remote village after their car breaks down. The photographer and the sole adult male inhabitant, a schoolteacher, leave to get help while the young woman, herself childless, bonds with the children whose parents are nowhere to be found. -- © First Run Features [More]
Starring: Leila Hatami
Starring: Leila Hatami
Director: Alireza Raisian
Director: Alireza Raisian
Studio: First Run Features
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Reviews for Deserted Station
Heavy on symbolic visuals and told in slowly and quietly unfolding nonevent action, it's a moving and gentle study of lingering grief and sexual politics.
Kiarostami and Raisian conjure up the oppressive miasma clinging to women and kids in patriarchal Iran . . . offers startling images . . . [a] stubbornly ambiguous film.
The film's relaxed pace, unassuming tone, and respect for its characters all recall the films of Abbas Kiarostami, who provided the story idea, but director Ali Reza Raisian adds a slightly more dramatic and emotional edge.
A spare plot that's 'relaxed' if 'relaxed' means that it moves as quickly as molasses climbing up a tree in January.
Melancholy, tender, and charged with rich symbolic power, it's a muted yet strangely fragile film that's as much about Middle Eastern womanhood as the horrors of parental bereavement.
It's a simple enough setup, but Raisian packs so much into it that multiple viewings may be necessary.
For filmgoers who like dramas that are spare yet evocative, that focus on the subtleties of relationships, and that feature foreign settings completely off the beaten path, Deserted Station will be a masterpiece.
A sweet, little unpretentious slice-of-life flick from Iran which, while highlighting the arid region's visually-arresting, utter desolation, ever so subtly hints at the tension between a simmering feminism and traditional Muslim values.
This deeply humanistic drama is strongly reminiscent of the earlier, less self-referential films of Abbas Kiarostami.
It is filled with feeling and far from sentimental or cloying, with a beautiful score enhancing the melancholia.
Hardcore Kiarostami devotees may miss the master's harsher clarity, but Hatami, best known for her starring role in Dariush Mehrjui's Leila, makes her character's inner transformation both subtle and palpable.
Excessively enigmatic, Deserted Station nevertheless provides an allegory for modern-day Iran.
It's not often you encounter a film that's simultaneously as tedious and moving as The Deserted Station.
Like all of Iranian cinema, Deserted Station is marked by unaffected, neo-realist performances, particularly by Nezam Manouchehri as the testy and uncertain husband, and Leila Hatami as his quietly sad wife.
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