Close-Up (also by Kiarostami), The Second Circle (Sokurov), Days of Heaven (Malick—for the long shots of rural labor), or the meta-films of Charlie Kaufman.
Alone, on a quiet evening, with no distractions. Let the olive trees work their slow magic.
Through the Olive Trees is essential viewing for students of film form, lovers of slow cinema, and anyone who believes that art can be simultaneously self-aware and deeply sincere. It is not an easy film, but it is a rewarding one—a gentle, profound, and ultimately mysterious work that lingers in the mind like the last light over a hillside. Kiarostami doesn’t give us the answer to whether Hossein and Tahereh end up together. Instead, he gives us something rarer: the courage to live with the question.
