Taste of Cherry (1997)

Director: Abbas Kiarostami
Stars: Homayoun Ershadi, Abdolrahman Bagheri, Afshin Khorshid Bakhtiari
Runtime: 95 minutes

Synopsis: An Iranian man drives his truck in search of someone who will quietly bury him under a cherry tree after he commits suicide.

Verdict: Oddly enough, my viewing of “Taste of Cherry” reminded me of my first time watching “Requiem for a Dream”. If you’ve seen Abbas Kiarostami’s 1997 drama about a man’s search for someone to assist his planned suicide, you’ll probably find the comparison peculiar. Darren Aronofsky’s highly energetic film centered around drug use may be the technical polar opposite of the minimalistic Iranian modern classic, but they both seize the opportunity to denounce the subject serving as the foundation of the narrative. I understand that they do it in vastly different ways, but this is just a thought that hit me as I was taking in the many conversations held between Mr. Badii and his guests in his old jeep.

Right off the bat, I’ll issue a warning that “Taste of Cherry” is not for everyone. Roger Ebert himself famously featured it in the list of his most hated movies and criticized it as being “excruciatingly boring”, and I can see a lot of people agreeing with him. A quick description won’t do it any favors either as it is a collection of monochromatic long takes mostly taking place in a single location and centered around an individual we know next to nothing about.

But summarizing it like so would be simplifying it to a deceitful degree. Because its slow and simplistic nature does not get in the way of how powerful it ultimately comes across. Kiarostami crafted a blank slate onto which anyone can project themselves, especially those who have suffered from or are experiencing suicidal thoughts. He created an environment so realistic and sincere that quickly grabs your hand and pulls you through the screen, placing you in the protagonists’ shoes or at the very least in the car with him.

I’m still not entirely certain of how I feel about the very last scene, which raised in me so many questions that I almost didn’t want to ask myself as it distracted me from what had come before it. Maybe that’ll change in the future but, as of now, I’d label the ending as the only aspect of the film that didn’t work for me at all. If slowly-paced movies don’t bother you, I’d recommend seeking this one out.   

FINAL GRADE: 8/10