It’s summer and a group of young women head off for a week to a house in the country in order to rehearse a play. In the peace and quiet of their natural surroundings, which provide a refuge from the intense heat of the sun, the women go through the text and dress up in their ruched period costumes, while in easy conversation they share their secrets, and also have little adventures. This enchanting debut by Itsaso Arana, who co-wrote and starred in August Virgin (Official Selection – Competition, KVIFF 2019), provides an opportunity to stop for a moment, to breathe in the warm air and settle back in the open embrace of this company of women. After all, what kind of summer would it be without girls, a campfire, songs and a touch of magic?
源自：https://www.kviff.com/en/programme/film/63/40722-the-girls-are-alright
The story opens in Balochistan, in a small, scarcely ‘wired’ village bordering Iran and Afghanistan. Ahmad is an idealistic teacher in exile, educating the local community his partner Haseeba, however, has spent time in jail in Tehran for the very same offence against the State. The disaccord between them is not only social but also personal. Ahmad's destiny collides with that of a family fleeing the Taliban soon the intricate divisions of age and gender within that group will trigger other problems and entanglements – including a 'lovers on the run' intrigue that fleetingly recalls Murnau's classic Tabu (1931).
Across all the arresting, shifting peripeteia of its plot, Abbas Amini's film deftly dramatises the complicated question of commitment: do we commit ourselves to a political cause, a set of religious beliefs, or a person? And how do we negotiate the commitments of others, even those closest to us, when they are based on a very different value system?
With its sparse music score, densely naturalistic acting and unostentatious camera work, Endless Borders is almost a minimalistic suspense thriller (with Hitchcockian overtones), combined with a heated family melodrama – but it never loses sight of the serious and extremely timely issues that it raises.
源自：https://iffr.com/en/iffr/2023/films/endless-borders
