
Like Someone in Love
2012, Drama, 1h 49m
102 Reviews 2,500+ RatingsWhat to know
critics consensus
In his second film outside his native Iran, director Abbas Kiarostami maintains the mysterious, reflective mood of previous triumphs. Read critic reviews
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Cast & Crew
Akiko
Takashi Watanabe
Noriaki
Hiroshi

Student
The Neighbor
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Critic Reviews for Like Someone in Love
All Critics (102) | Top Critics (50) | Fresh (85) | Rotten (17)
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The one thing that's for sure is that this masterly filmmaker is sufficiently open-minded to work wherever he chooses without compromising the integrity of his questions.
April 4, 2018 | Full Review… -
Favouring long, oblique takes, this is 'slow cinema' so slow that, an hour or so in, even one of its protagonists nods off.
September 5, 2017 | Rating: 3/5 | Full Review… -
Like Someone in Love... is like a puzzle that takes an eternity to complete and yet still somehow contains too few pieces to be taxing.
June 28, 2013 | Full Review… -
[Kiarostami] almost throws up something magical, here.
June 22, 2013 | Rating: 3/5 | Full Review… -
This is an intriguing, elliptical affair, the emphasis on reflective surfaces (and off-screen voices) reminding us that we are only ever seeing an opaque refraction of the whole picture.
June 22, 2013 | Full Review… -
The septuagenarian's most playful tendencies have been liberated and he has started to make films that look like the work of a younger director raised on vintage Kiarostami.
June 21, 2013 | Rating: 3/5 | Full Review…
Audience Reviews for Like Someone in Love
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Sep 28, 2014Liked this mostly. Very interestingly filmed and looks great. I particularly like the part where she drives around Tokyo in the taxi. The opening scenes in the club are also interesting and leave you wondering exactly what's going on. Once she meets the elderly gentleman, it becomes a little less intriguing, but I still liked it. My complaints echo others - a little too abrupt to end and would have liked a little more tied up or explained. For example, did she sort her life out? What happened to the old man at the window? However, I get that this is more art than blockbuster, and like real life, maybe didn't have a clear ending or resolution.Nicki M Super Reviewer
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Sep 11, 2013This being my first Abbas Kiarostami film, I was unsure what to expect, and completely unprepared for what I got. With his latest, Like Someone in Love, Kiarostami manages to fill an artful, carefully paced, intimate drama with a tensity and unease typically reserved for Hitchcockian thrillers. This is a non-traditional narrative full of style, strong performances, and intriguing themes. If you're willing to find your 'in', I highly recommend this film. ~ B+Brad S Super Reviewer
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Apr 07, 2013Despite her engagement to young garage owner Noriaki (Kase), Akiko (Takanashi) moonlights as a high class prostitute to fund her college studies. One evening, her plans to meet her visiting grandmother are disrupted when her pimp orders Akiko to spend the night with retired sociology professor Takashi (Okuno). When she arrives, she finds a nervous elderly man who seems more interested in being a father figure to the young woman than indulging in any sexual activity. The next morning Takashi drops Akiko off at her college and encounters her irate fiance. Pretending to be Akiko's grandfather, Takashi finds the young man pouring out his emotions to him, but quickly discovers he possesses a violent streak. Not since the thirties, when central Europe's greatest film-makers fled fascist persecution to work in Hollywood, has cinema seen the level of cultural cross-pollination of the last few years. English actress Kristin Scott-Thomas has become French cinema's leading female star, appearing in more Gallic productions now than Anglo-Saxon ones. Earlier this year we saw the Australian director Cate Shortland working in Germany for the WWII tale 'Lore', despite not speaking a word of German. 'Like Someone in Love' is possibly the most curious example, a Japanese drama written and directed by an Iranian film-maker. While it doesn't quite feel like a native Japanese film, (there's far too much dialogue), Kiarostami's film seems like it could be based on a short story by someone like Haruki Murakami. This is both the strength and the weakness of 'Like Someone in Love'. The three characters are all interesting but Kiarostami's exploration of them would be far better served as a piece of literature rather than a motion picture. It's an excessively talky picture, with much of the dialogue serving as thinly disguised exposition. That said, there's enough to keep you engaged, thanks mainly to the performances of Takanashi and especially Okuno, who has the most interesting and pleasant face you'll see on any elderly gent. I'm forever arguing the case of ambiguity but even I found the ending of this film irritating. There's ambiguity and there's abruptness. Kiarostami opts for the latter in this case.The Movie W Super Reviewer
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Mar 06, 2013Another mediocre film from the over-rated Iranian filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami.William D Super Reviewer
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