Asghar Farhadi is one of the best directors out there that can inject suspense out of an everyday problem that people have to deal with. His Oscar-winning feature film, A Separation (a near masterpiece) deals with couples on the brink of divorce in Iran. In The Past, divorce is still involved, but more importantly Farhadi chooses to tackle unresolved feelings from a divorce that has already happened. Falling just short of his first film, Farhadi still manages to craft a tense thriller/drama with The Past; if you cannot find some moment to relate to in this film, then you are a luckier person than most.
The film opens with Marie (The Artist’s Berenice Bejo) picking up her soon-to-be divorced husband Ahmad (Ali Mosaffa) from the airport. From the start you can tell that animosity simmers below their actual dialogue with each other. Marie is resentful that Ahmad took off and never signed the divorce papers. Ahmad is frustrated that Marie has made Ahmad come home while Marie has started living with another man, Samir (Tahar Rahim) and his son Fouad (Elyes Aguis). Complicating matters more is that Marie has 2 daughters who have previous history with Ahmad, younger Lea (Jeanne Jestin) and older Lucie (Pauline Burlet), who has been staying out later at night since her mom started dating Samir. The cramped living space and anger from past events causes multiple revelations and personal history to come to the present to be dealt with and hopefully moved on from for all families involved.
The strength of The Past is its screenplay. Asghar Farhadi is already near the top of the list at creating slow developing stories that adjust the status quo from scene to scene, and The Past adds to his resume. He opens the film smartly by trying to have to characters talk to each other with a pane of glass between them (this happens repeatedly throughout the film), emphatically stating that although these people can see/understand each other, they cannot hear one another. Scene after scene, one character will dictate to another how they should react to a particular situation because that character thinks they have all of the information on hand. However, by the end of the scene, another card is on the table and the deck has to be reshuffled. Scenes like these give the actors plenty of chances to prove their action chops and for the story’s direction to constantly shift. More importantly, most of these little revelations are totally believable as we learn more about each character and their motivations. Farhadi weaves all these scenes together seamlessly from the director’s chair to build upon his theme of confronting the past and moving on, making the sum of The Past’s screenplay, directing, and acting greater that its individual parts.
The Past also excels at ground this whole story in reality. The arguments stem from day-to-day struggles of parenting and responsibility. These arguments then shift into something between the characters involved in the arguments, which then cause a revelation by coercion or to hurt the other person in the argument. Characters get right to the point; people usually feel each other out and then say what they really want to say. The Past understands this more than most stories do, and uses this everyday occurrence to drive the tension and thrills in the story.
The acting supports Farhadi’s screenplay. Berenice Bejo and Ali Mosaffa as the saddened angry patriarchs are very good. Bejo sells all the lies she tells herself and makes us feel sympathy for her being talked down to, exhibiting lots of strength as the provider for the kids. Mosaffa makes us believe he is a normally patient man but Marie increases his impatience exponentially. As someone who thinks hyper-rationally, I found myself thinking along Mosaffa’s lines. Tahar Rahim doesn’t get enough screen time, but he shines in the third act when he is needed most. Of the kids, Pauline Burlet carries emotional burdens better than most child actors, and little Elyes Aguis acts better without words than most other actors with their full arsenal of talents.
The Past is a powerful, relatable film. Anyone who has had to deal with warring family members or holds on to past burdens with hopes for a turnaround will feel a tug on the sadness in their heart after watching The Past. Asghar Farhadi is a talented filmmaker, but I hope he takes some time off and makes an equally compelling comedy so I don’t have to prep myself to be sad after watching one of his films.