Gaav
The first
film of 1968 is “Gaav” or “The Cow”, an Iranian movie.
It takes
place in an Iranian village where only a single farmer has a cow. This cow is
doted on by the owner, Hassan, who talks to it, baths it and plays with it as
if it had been his own baby. Hassan is also much admired in the village because
he has a cow.
One night
while Hassan has been away from the village the cow dies. The villagers know
this will break Hassan’s heart so they decide to hide it from him, but he still
takes it very badly and goes crazy, believing he is himself the cow. There is
no stirring him from this delusion and so in the end they take him to the city.
That is
about it.
Well, there
are some subplots. Hassan’s son is a young guy that has been living in the city
and has difficulty adapting, but he is finding a nice girl to get married to.
Also, there are some mysterious Bolouri who want to steal things, but their
role is very much unexplained, so I cannot even guess what they are. I suspect
they represent some obscure outside agent causing the misery in the village,
like a bad spirit.
I do feel
sorry for Hassan, but that is also all I really get from this movie.
The village
looks poor and the inhabitants rather bored. Not the most exciting place in the
world. Except for a few women cooking I do not think I saw a single person
actually working. Mostly they are asking what is going on and asking the
village chief, Eslam, what to do.
It won a number
of awards and was a favorite of Ayatollah Khomeini. Not really certain why.
I find it
difficult to say very much about this movie. I like cows, but I guess not that
much.
I feel like I should watch this again some day. I did this one very early--like first 10 days of my website--and I don't think I was prepared for it.
ReplyDeleteI can relate to that. I am pretty sure some of my early reviews would look very different if I had to watch the movie again and rewrite the review. And this is not an easy movie to watch.
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