Album Reviews
Movies
Concert Reviews
Movie Resources
Concert Reviews
Book Reviews

Top 10
Resources
Contact Us

According to Hollywood, summer kicked off last weekend. Auspiciously, too, with X2 raking in over $80 million in its opening weekend. The studios hope they'll see more of the same in the coming weeks, as The Matrix Reloaded, Bruce Almighty, and Charlie's Angels 2 hit the screens. I'm hoping you'll look past the hyper-marketing and see some smaller, less formulaic pictures this summer. And two great places to start are with movies coming out this Friday: Under the Skin of the City and Lilya 4-Ever.

Though one is an Iranian film and the other a Swedish movie set in Russia, the two have more than quality in common. They both feature characters you don't often seen in George W's world, people who are just a small mistake away from disaster. Under the Skin of the City, the Iranian movie, features Tuba, the mother of a family of four. Her youngest daughter Mahboubeh is a teenage student in high school, while her youngest son Ali spends more of his college days passing out flyers and pushing for political reform. Her oldest daughter Hamideh is married with a young child, but often flees back home to escape her abusive husband. And then there's Abbas, Tuba's oldest son, who has made something of himself as an errand boy to a successful
businessman. Abbas brings home presents for his family and takes them out to eat, but he has bigger dreams. Tuba herself works in a textile factory that worsens her asthma, but she owns her house, her children are well, and she's as happily married as she can be.

Lilya, the central character in Lukas Moodysson's (Together) new film, is in a more tenuous situation. At the movie's outset, she thinks she's leaving Russia for America with her mom and her mom's new boyfriend. She
taunts her acquaintances with dreams of newfound wealth and comfort, and she packs up her favorite belonging--a picture of an angel leading a small child. But it turns out Lilya isn't going with her mom, at least not right away. She's going to stay behind in Russia with her aunt until her mom is "settled." But that situation deteriorates considerably when her aunt, a mean old hag, kicks Lilya out of her flat into a dirty, ugly, and much
smaller apartment. But the 16-year-old Lilya is an irrepressible soul, and she spends her days skipping school, hanging out with friends, and dreaming of America.

Despite Lilya's carefree ways, the tone of the movie is of undisguised dread. Reminiscent of films such as The War Zone and Requiem for a Dream, Lilya 4-Ever is a disaster waiting to happen. So when Lilya's best friend
Natasha invites her to a club where young women dance with older men, we can imagine the end result. That it also involves Lilya losing her best friend and being an outcast in her own circle makes it that much worse. Even the arrival of a "nice guy" only seems like a detour on a road to hell.

Under the Skin is not as grim. This is in part because of the cohesive family structure that Tuba has created. If you've avoided my many Iranian film recommendations because you thought they'd be too inaccessible, this
is the movie for you. Tuba's family feels just like an American family. True, the women dress in the long robe and head covering we see so often in Islamic cultures; but the way Tuba interacts with her husband and children, the way the siblings care for and bicker with each other, and the hopes and dreams the family have of success will be familiar to all. But here, too, there is an undercurrent of fear. Abbas wants to sell the family home so he can partake in a Japanese business venture. If it works out, he'll be rich and can buy five homes, but that seems like a big 'if.'

So why should you take two hours out of a beautiful May weekend to see a possibly depressing story? In part, because both movies feature tremendous performances from their female stars. Golab Adineh, who plays Tuba, gives one of the best acting performances you'll see all year. Her towering portrayal is both strong and subtle. You believe this woman has these four children and done her best to be a model Iranian woman. Oksana Akinshina, as Lilya, feels exactly like a teenager--whimsical, light-hearted, unaware of the dangers around her. She is completely convincing as a young woman in desperate need of an angel's guiding hand, and that portrayal makes what follows even more powerful. The secondary acting in both movies lives up to their stars' strong example. I particularly enjoyed Mohammed Reza Foroutan's turn as the protective but showy Abbas as well as Baran Kowari's young daughter Mahboubeh. And Artiom Bogucharskij as Volodya, Lilya's one friend who doesn't desert her, is great as a love-struck, young boy.

But the real stars are the films' directors. Lukas Moodysson has already made a name for himself with movies like Show Me Love and Together. Though the bright emotion of those films isn't appropriate for Lilya, his
direction is still assured and unrelenting. He again uses a song-laden soundtrack to set the emotional stage, and he crafts his narrative for maximum impact. His decision to shoot the inevitable sex scenes from Lilya's point of view makes for a disturbingly powerful inversion of the normal male voyeuristic gaze. And his use of Christian spirituality adds an even deeper element.

Rakshan Bani-Etemad, one of the most prominent female directors in Iran, hasn't had a film released in the U.S. until Under the Skin, but she's certainly no stranger to the camera. I was particularly impressed by her
bold use of establishing shots; she lingers over parts of the city, parts of the factory, parts of the home--reminding us that the place where a person lives or works can have an enormous impact on who they are. She also has a wonderful way with telling a story. Though the movie has several characters besides the family, each one receives its due, each story fits with and amplifies the others. It feels strangely like a Dickens novel with its emphasis on place and people struggling to live. In that way, it's like Lilya 4-Ever, which echoes Oliver Twist in places.

And this brings me back to my remark about President Bush, which was not an idle pot-shot. As I finished both movies, I had the deep desire that he and other people in power see them, to see how people in another culture live, how they try to get by and sometimes don't succeed, how injustice often wins because the powerful do nothing, and how much alike we all are despite our differences. And maybe that's why I urge you to see them as well. Our media and particularly Hollywood pretend as if the poor and the foreigner don't even exist, as if the mutants of X2 were somehow more important than the destitute and forgotten, as if Fox News really can give you "the world in 80 seconds." There's an amazing scene in Lilya where Lilya remarks that she has the same birthday as Britney Spears. Volodya turns to her and wonders what would've happened if they had been switched in the hospital. "Then you'd be Britney Spears," he laughs. That Britney's ridiculous life gets infinitely more coverage than the Lilyas of the world is a point we are supposed to ponder.

The beginning of Under the Skin of the City shows Tuba being interviewed by a camera crew. She's asked about the upcoming parliamentary election and how the women in her factory feel about it. She stumbles through, not knowing what to say and instead mouthing platitudes. At the movie's end, the camera crew returns, and her fury  is astounding. She chastises them for their uselessness when all around her life has fallen apart. What is the point, she shouts. "Who do you show these movies to?"   

By J. Robert Parks 5/5/2003

Under the Skin of the City

Lilya 4-Ever