The Cineclub Más Madera will do two sessions of this film. One, on Thursday morning, for Benalmádena high school students in order to bring cinema that is outside the commercial circuit closer to young people and another, as usual, at 9:00 p.m. for the general public
Direction: Majid Majidi
Country: Iran
Year: 2020
Duration: 99 min.
Cast: Roohollah Zamani, Shamila Shirzad, Ali Nassirian, Mohammad Javad Ezzati, Tannaz Tabatabayi, Safar Mohammadi, Ali Ghabeshi, Abolfazl Shirzad, Mohammad Mahdi Mousavifar, Mani Ghafouri
Film script : Nima Javidi, Majid Majidi
Genre: Drama. Childhood. Poverty. Social drama
Music: Ramin Kousha
Photography : Houman Behmanesh
Producer: Majid Majidi Film Production
Distributor in Spain : Caramel Films
Premiere in Spain: May 14, 2021
Original version: Farsi subtitles in Spanish
2020: Venice Film Festival: Best Emerging Actor (Roohollah Zamani)
SYNOPSIS
Ali, a 12-year-old boy, and his three friends work to survive and help their families by doing garage jobs and committing petty crimes to get quick money. In a miraculous turn of events, Ali is tasked with finding a hidden treasure underground. To do this, he recruits his friends, but before starting the mission they must enroll in the Escuela del Sol, a charitable institution that tries to educate homeless children and is located near where the treasure is.
THE CRITICISM
“Majid Majidi rigorously and credibly shows the vertigo of the big city and also the hope of the school where this childhood odyssey of children forced to grow up before their time takes place”
Luxury cars, facing the most bloody poverty and helplessness. In contemporary Tehran both realities can coexist, and the director Majid Majidi shows it in Children of the Sun right from its first sequence: some street kids who steal a car tire from a shopping center parking lot, which they will resell to eat; almost like a Charles Dickens of the new millennium, like the pickpockets of Oliver Twist, where orphanhood, filth and sagacity are transferred from the days of the Industrial Revolution to the Iran of today.
The director touches and shows with rigor and credibility the vertigo of the big city: the traffic, the noise, the shenanigans, the crowded subway with separate cars for men and women. And also the hope of the school where this childhood odyssey of children forced to grow up before their time takes place, turned into miniature men who work, smoke and butt heads like adults, although without ceasing to be what they are: children. In fact, Children of the Sun could well be an adventure in the style Treasure Island, with a Jim Hawkins in search of the chest that will get him out of his poverty, but faced with the most fearsome pirates in the city. Adding drama, comedy, exploits, criminal intrigue and anguish, and protected by that group of admirable teachers who fight against a system that burns them.
Presented at the 2020 Venice Film Festival, Children of the Sun however, it would not be what it is without the presence of Roohollah Zamani, child prodigy of gestures and the ability to move, innate self-confidence, street wisdom, natural tear, unstoppable comedy. It is he who, at the helm of Majidi, steers the ship of the film to the surprising end, a remarkable finishing touch to a contemporary story with honesty as its flag.
Next screening: February 17, 2022
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