Leila's Brothers

Leila Jourablou (Taraneh Alidoosti) is a middle-aged woman looking after a family of particularly low achievers, including five brothers bonded together by a shared sense of failure and cluelessness. Her father Esmail (Saeed Poursamimi), craves a high standing with respect to the larger extended family, at great financial cost. Alireza (Navid Mohammadzadeh), Manouchehr (Payman Maadi), Parviz (Farhad Aslani) and Farhad (Mohammad Alimohammadi) are mostly either unemployed or barely scraping by, but Leila hatches a plan with Alireza - the most intelligent brother - which involves the whole family pooling their resources together to buy a shop in a busy shopping district so they can lift themselves out of poverty. Esmail has other ideas however, and is determined to give everything away as a wedding present so he can officially become the "patriarch" of the wider clan. Poor decision making on all fronts see them all lurch from one disaster to the next - with growing fractures threatening to tear this brood apart. In the meantime, Iran's economic situation starts to bite. Leila's Brothers is a sad tale based around a dysfunctional family, but above and beyond all of that it's a film about familial love and the trials related to leading your thirsty horses to water, even if not a one of them will drink.

There's something about Iranian films that rouse me, and get my passions all stirred up. Leila's Brothers, a wonderful recent cinematic beauty from Saeed Roustaee, did more than just that, because it delivers on various different levels. For an Iranian film it can be particularly lighthearted and funny - at times you could almost call it a comedy. Their are certain kinds of stupidity, and it seems that Leila's brothers have been blessed with all of them - it's always a lot of fun when a good director knows how far to play that angle without losing the audience and the grounded feeling of a serious dramatic film. There's also plenty of heartbreak to be had - but apart from this family's awful patriarch the finger is pointedly aimed at point-scoring, cynical politicians who let ordinary people around the world feel the brunt of their rash and ill-considered decisions. Once you've been screwed it's then demanded you sign a piece of paper which says you were quite happy to get screwed - don't sign and you'll be punished even further. Do the little guys ever win anyway? Are they allowed to? From Leila's perspective it's hard to say, because her family doesn't seem to be able to pull in the same direction - therefore they go nowhere, and are subject to the caprices of the rich and powerful.

I loved this movie - all 164 minutes of it. Luckily, the pace and explosive narrative surprises are so engrossing that the considerable length isn't felt all that much - at least it wasn't for me personally. Leila's Brothers takes it's time to warm up, but the temperature keeps on rising until all is a raging fire and shockwaves are felt on levels that equate to how intimately we get to know the Jourablou family. Hooman Behmanesh's cinematography was fantastic, and rises a level during the wedding sequence which seems to aim for lofty heights - a very nice set piece which also proves to be a crux moment in this compelling story. The screenplay was very well balanced, and all of the younger actors were very well equipped for high farce and wry one-liners, rolling with the punches along with emotional highs and lows. Like seasons we drift in and out of different moods and tones as the film's narrative twists and turns - getting deeper underneath what at first we only see on a surface level. Shaping all of this is Iranian culture. Despite being the driving force behind the family, there's so much Leila can't actually do, being a woman in Iran. The bumbling force doing the actual work are her less savvy and more accident-prone brothers, who always act on the rather bad ideas they have instead. This goes for her father as well, but cultural factors should also always be considered in the way they shape behaviour.

Iran's distinct cinematic style and output has always impressed me a great deal, especially since the regime that rules the nation with an iron fist is so restrictive. Of course, Saeed Roustaee was sentenced to 6 months in jail - he and producer Javad Noruzbegi apparently screened the film without the government's approval. It almost seems like you can't really call yourself a real filmmaker in Iran until you've been thrown in jail on some flimsy pretext. Despite all of that, Leila's Brothers is a film that can really speak to all of us in what seems an uninhibited way, and once in tune with it's ebbs and flows I really connected to it's characters in a way that had me feeling I was a part of Leila's family. It's the kind of film I almost have to shake off like a particularly lucid dream and remind myself of who I am, just to distance myself from the heartache that lingers after it's finished. To me, that's a sign of an exceptional film, and although I haven't seen Saeed Roustaee's other films I hear that they're quite good - I'll have to check them out, and keep an eye out for what he does next. Taraneh Alidoosti's performance as Leila - with her long, sad, desperate and searching stare - was also another factor in this film's favour. She came to prominence in Iran after appearing in the lead role of Asghar Farhadi's The Salesman.

Overall it's a movie I don't want to say too much about, because anyone reading this who hasn't seen it should really get to experience each sudden shockwave as this family does - unexpectedly. You can really waver as to whether you love or hate some of the characters, and surely Esmail will test everyone's sympathy, despite what he has to endure during his lowest of low moments. It's a film about decisions - ones that are based on love, and how they often conflict to the point where choosing becomes an impossible, painful act of blind faith in that love. Of course, that doesn't mean the decision you make is the right one. It's a film about knowing who to trust, and striving for dignity in a vicious, money-oriented dog-eat-dog world where love isn't really worth a dime and worse - can cost you everything. It resonated with me on a deep and abiding level once it had all sunk in, and takes a little investment time-wise - but it's a wise investment. What's tragic is, if Leila had of been a man, she may have been listened to with more respect and seriousness. She has to fight twice as hard to be heard, even though she's the only wise and smart member of her entire family - and she has to fight with one hand tied behind her back. On the other hand, the so called patriarch is one in name only, and surely not spirit. Throughout, Leila's brothers must grope through life like lost sheep, blinded by a cruel world that holds out a little hope but offers a never-ending supply of grief and pain. It's a tale that in the end reaches deep down in ways only the best of films can.