- Children of Heaven
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Children of Heaven 
US release posterDirected by Majid Majidi Produced by Amir Esfandiari
Mohammad EsfandiariWritten by Majid Majidi Starring Amir Farrokh Hashemian
Bahare SeddiqiMusic by Keivan Jahanshahi Cinematography Parviz Malekzaade Editing by Hassan Hassandoost Studio The Institute for the Intellectual Development of Children & Young Adults Distributed by Miramax Films Release date(s) April 22, 1998 (Singapore)
January 22, 1999 (US)Running time 89 minutes Country Iran Language Persian Budget USD$180,000 Box office USD$933,933 (US only)[1] Children of Heaven (Persian: بچههای آسمان) is a 1997 Iranian adventure comedy-drama film written and directed by Majid Majidi. It was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1998. It deals with a brother and sister and their adventures over a lost pair of shoes.
Contents
Plot
Ali (Amir Farrokh Hashemian) fetches his little sister Zahra's (Bahare Seddiqi) pink shoes after the shoemaker has repaired them. Ali puts down the shoes to get some potatoes at the grocer's. While he is preoccupied, a garbageman accidentally picks up the shoes, hidden in a bag, and takes them away. Frantic to find them, the young boy knocks over crates of vegetables and is chased away by the grocer.
Ali's family is having financial trouble, so he fears to tell his parents. The landlord argues with Ali's mother (Fereshte Sarabandi) because she is five months behind on the rent, and the grocer has not been paid in a while either. Ali tells Zahra about the shoes and begs her not to tell their mother; she agrees. That night, Ali's father (Reza Naji) scolds him for not helping his ill mother when she asked. While the siblings were doing their homework, they passed notes to each other discussing what to do. They devise a scheme to share Ali's Converse sneakers: Zahra will wear them to school in the morning and return them to Ali at midday so he can attend afternoon classes. This uncomfortable arrangement leads to Ali being late three times in a row, no matter how hard he runs; the first time the principal ignores him, the second time he gives him a warning, the third time he tells Ali to leave and return with his father. Ali's teacher (Dariush Mokhtari) persuades the principal to give the boy one more chance and let him back into class. Ali does well on a test and the teacher awards him a gold-colored pen; he gives it to Zahra to partially make up for losing her shoes.
One day, Zahra notices her missing pink shoes on another student, Roya's (Nafise Jafar-Mohammadi), feet. After class, Zahra secretly follows Roya home. She later brings Ali with her for a confrontation, but from hiding, they discover that Roya's father (Mohammed-Hasan Hosseinian), the garbageman, is blind, so they decide to leave. When Roya does well in her studies, her father buys her new purple shoes and throws away Zahra's. Zahra is dismayed when she finds out from her new friend.
Ali's father, anxious to earn more money, borrows some gardening equipment and heads off with Ali to the rich suburbs of Tehran to find some gardening work. They try many places without success, though Ali proves to be a great help to his tongue-tied father. Finally, they come upon a mansion in which a six-year-old boy named Alireza (Mohammed-Hossein Shahidi) lives under the care of his grandfather (Kazem Asqarpoor). While Ali plays with Alireza, his father works. When he is finished, Ali's father is surprised and elated by how generous the grandfather is. On the way home, their bicycle's brakes fail and the father is slightly injured in the resulting crash.
Finally, Ali learns of a high-profile children's footrace involving many schools; the third prize is one week at a vacation camp and a pair of sneakers. To his bitter disappointment, in a hard-fought dash to the finish, he accidentally places first instead. However, there is a quick shot of the children's father's bicycle, showing two new pairs of shoes among his purchases. In the final shot, Ali is shown dipping his blistered feet in a pool. Some versions include an epilogue revealing that Ali eventually achieves success in a racing career.
Cast
- Amir Farrokh Hashemian as Ali
- Bahare Seddiqi as Zahra
- Amir Naji as Father
- Fereshte Sarabandi as Mother
- Dariush Mokhtari as Ali's teacher
- Nafise Jafar-Mohammadi as Roya
- Mohammed-Hasan Hosseinian as Roya's father
- Mohammed-Hossein Shahidi as Alireza
- Kazem Asqarpoor as Grandfather
- Christopher Maleki as Salt seller
Production
The film was shot in Tehran. It was attempted to keep the filming secret in order to capture a more realistic image of the city. The production costs have been estimated at US$180,000.
Critical response
Children of Heaven premiered in February 1997 at the Teheran Fajr Film Festival and was awarded several national film awards. It opened in the US on January 22, 1999, and earned a US box office total of $933,933.[1]
Critical response to the film was very positive. Some critics compared it to Vittorio de Sica's 1948 Bicycle Thieves. The few negative voices found fault in a too-simplistic storyline and unanswered questions. Roger Ebert's review in the Chicago Sun-Times called it "very nearly a perfect movie for children" that "lacks the cynicism and smart-mouth attitudes of so much American entertainment for kids and glows with a kind of good-hearted purity".[2]
In 1998, it became the first Iranian film to be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, losing to the Italian film Life Is Beautiful by Roberto Benigni. After the film had become well-known worldwide due to the Oscar nomination, it was shown in several European, South American, and Asian countries between 1999 and 2001. It was successfully shown in numerous film festivals and won awards at the Fajr Film Festival, the World Film Festival, the Newport International Film Festival, the Warsaw International Film Festival, and the Singapore International Film Festival. It was nominated for the Jury's Grand Prize at the American Film Institute's festival.
See also
- Similar films
- Homerun, a 2003 Singaporean film by Jack Neo, is an adaptation of Children of Heaven. Unlike Children of Heaven, Homerun's theme is friendship and the film is set in 1965 Singapore. Homerun received two nominations at the 2003 Golden Horse Awards, for Best Theme Song (拥有) and Best New Performer (Megan Zheng). Zheng, then 10 years old, became the first Singaporean to win a Golden Horse Award, sharing her Best New Performer award with Wang Baoqiang, who plays a miner in Blind Shaft.
- Bumm Bumm Bole, a 2010 Hindi film by Priyadarshan, and starring Darsheel Safary, is entirely based on Children of Heaven.[3]
References
- ^ a b Children of Heaven Box Office Mojo
- ^ Roger Ebert Review of Children of Heaven Chicago Sun-Times
- ^ Bumm Bumm Bole bollywoodhungama
External links
Categories:- 1998 films
- Iranian films
- Persian-language films
- 1997 films
- 1990s adventure films
- 1990s comedy-drama films
- Children's films
- Films directed by Majid Majidi
- Films set in Iran
- Films shot in Iran
- Independent films
- Miramax Films films
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