Believe it or not, the people who really like the film and find it subtle and intriguing don't agree that it's badly written. And they've gone into lots of detail as to why they think the film's narrative choices were made. And yet you keep asserting this 'badly written' judgement as if it's some objective truth. All you've offered as proof for the supposedly terrible writing is that 1) you didn't like it (and more specifically that it didn't answer a barrage of nitpicky questions about the characters' back-stories) and 2) it doesn't conform to the rules laid down by Robert McKee and David Mamet. Well, thank heavens for that!
You're either belabouring the irrelevant or ignoring the obvious. Let me count the ways:
Actually, we're all pretty fine with it, thanks, so you don't need to express this as some kind of pseudo-objective divine pronouncement.Kiarostami's fundamental mode of characterization [. . .] doesn't seem to be working so well in this new film
Good grief! Isn't that enough? She's in a dangerous domestic situation which gets more dangerous as the film progresses. Would it satisfy you more if you knew that her older sister has been (sob) killed be a violent pimp, or that the rock that comes through the window at the end was a special gift from her real grandfather, given to her on his deathbed when she was only fourteen, and only after she made a solemn promise not to fuck any other old men? Your fantasy version of this film sounds the flattest, dullest thing imaginable, and would make for a bad script. The ambiguities in the film are subtle and they're what animates the entire thing - which is basically the same for all of Kiarostami's fiction films.It's hard to know what's at stake for her in the film at all beyond keeping her prostitution job secret and then, at the end, fleeing the boyfriend.
Well, this at least is telling. If 'characters you care about' is essential for you, then I could compile a long list of films that you should avoid like the plague. In fact I've got one pretty much prepared already that I'm going to submit for the next round of the 60s List.The excellent direction and strong acting did their job making me like him and care about him.
No, you're asserting that the writing didn't go anywhere interesting with it. Plenty of people here disagree.I'm arguing that the writing didn't go anywhere interesting with that strong identification.
You're really being deliberately obtuse here. It's the day when the girl's precarious lifestyle comes crashing down around her. It's sort of the entire point of the film and provides the explosive climax. We see it already happen in miniature near the start when her lifestyle (and her shame about it) forces her to betray her grandmother, then the risks gets steadily higher, the shakiness builds to crisis point with every little lie, and then it explodes in violence. Maybe if you'd been less obsessed about what book the old man was writing, or what grades the girl got in her studies, or whatever other irrelevant business was distracting you, this might have sunk in.What makes this day different from all other days? (Why start the story here, now, with these particular characters?
See above. And above. And above. See the film, even.How is the specific choice of the ending reinforcing the careful structure of the whole piece, dramatically and thematically, etc.?
As far as I know, Like Someone in Love is not a graduate of the Sundance Screenwriters Lab.Which is also to ask: Who are the main characters of this film? What are their problems? What do they want? What are they trying to do or to get? How do they end up getting or not getting what they are after in the end?
I am very glad that I have never seen any of these alleged Kiarostami films. The ones I've seen are all richly ambiguous about character motivations (The Wind Will Carry Us, anybody?) and leave us to make up our own minds about what motivates and rewards the characters.These are questions that Kiarostami usually posits pretty lucidly in his other films, and the answers he ultimately offers up or complicates or refuses us still provide a clear connection to the film's beginning, to the main character(s) central problem(s) and an illumination of their whole journey.
I could go on, but I resign. Wake me up when some fruitful discussion about the film is occurring. Just throw a rock through my window.