Children of Heaven

Children of Heaven takes place in Iran and involves a hard working poor family who live a honest, humble, and modest lifestyle. The Mandegar family has a hard time making ends meet. They’re a few months late on their rent payment, and even their groceries need to be put on a tab to pay later. Ali the young boy in the film, goes to the store to grab groceries. When he puts his sisters shoes down, they get picked up and they are gone for good. Ali goes home and tells his sister Zahara the bad news and tells her that they can share his shoes until he can get her another pair. Zahra soon discovers her lost shoes are worn by Roya, a student at her school. After school, Zahra brings Ali to Roya's house where they witness Roya's father is blind and that their family has the same economic hardship as they do. Ali, being the unselfish brother gives away anything he has to his sister Zahra. He talks to her with a great deal of respect, kindness and love. He is affectionate towards his sister and tries to make her as happy as possible. Ali refuses repeated invitations from the neighborhood boys to join them in a soccer match; he tells them his mother is ill. Ali is a hard working student and earns top grades in the class. Zahra is a responsible, hard working daughter and sister. She worries that she will be late to give the sneakers to Ali and runs to meet him for the exchange. Sometimes it doesn't work out and Ali is consistently late to school, where one of the teachers tells him he will send him home and eventually does before another teacher saves him. Amir, the father and the man that makes all the money of the Mandegar family, tries to seek a more reliable, higher-paying job. He currently serves tea at male gatherings, but the small income doesn't pay off the debt and bills. Ali goes along with his father to find a job at an upper class town. Amir dreams of a better life after finishing a yard job. He talks about items to purchase for his family. Ali only asks his father to purchase new shoes for his sister. On the way home, the brake to their bike breaks and getting Zahara a new pair of shoes is out of the question. Theres sign ups at school for a race where the third place winner get a new pair of shoes, Ali doesn't see it in time and misses the deadline. After begging and crying to his teacher he is aloud in the contest and finishes in first place. I didn't enjoy this movie as much as others because it has a small plot and is a very slow boring movie. It is definetly a quality family movie that i think a lot of families would enjoy. The movies is a heart warming meditation about real goodness in humanity—helping balance the negative prejudices that most Americans project towards Iranians.

Central Station

The 1998 film, Central Station is about Dora (Fernanda Montenegro) a cynical and selfish former schoolteacher who earns a living writing letters for the illiterate in Rio de Janeiro's busy railroad station. Viewing most of her clients as trash, she never even mails their letters. Nine-year-old Josue (Vinicius de Oliveira) comes to the station with his mother, who has Dora write a letter to his father in a faraway town. Then his mother is struck and killed by a bus. With nowhere to go, Josue sleeps in the station. Dora reluctantly takes him to her small apartment where he finds the letter with his father's address. But the next day, she sells him to some people who claim to be in the adoption business. She buys a new television with the money she recieved by selling Josue. Her friend Irene is horrified at her selfishness. The boy, she warns, is in real danger of being killed for his organ parts. Dora decides to rescue him and return him to his father. The two get on a bus and flee the city. Central Station depicts the slow opening of Dora's heart as she and Josue travel across Brazil. After she tries to abandon him once, and he loses all the money she gave him, they are picked up by a friendly truck driver. Dora becomes attracted to the man from her loneliness, but he rushes off once he realizes she is interested in him physically. The miraculous growing of Dora's heart occurs when they end up in the middle of a rural religious pilgrimage. Once again, the old woman becomes a letter writer, but now she approaches it differently. This movie is so powerful as it shows how one little boy could change everything that Dora believes in. Being a a drunk like the kids father, she knows that the chances he will come back are slim to none. She develops a bond with the boy that makes you believe she could mother him. Once they meet up with the boys brothers she realizes that the best thing for him is to stay with his brothers. She leaves the boy with a note and a little picture thing, the note saying whenever you need me just look through the picture view finder. Once the boy reads the letter he runs forever symbolizing him chasing after her. When he realizes that she's gone he stops and looks through the view finder and smiles. The movie is not that long so for a slow story it is the perfect amount of time. I personally loved the movie, kept me wondering if they will ever see the boys father, and if at the end Josue would go live with Dora. Both of those things didn't happen so it made for an interesting ending.

Totsi

Totsi is a South African film by Gavin Hood which is an adaption of the book "Totsi" written by Athol Fugard. The film won the 2005 academy award for Best Foreign Language Film. The movie is about David who goes by the name Totsi. He is the leader of a gang which includes his friends Butcher, Aap, and Boston. After committing a murder, Totsi and Boston get into a fight which leaves Boston badly injured. After that Totsi runs away, when he realizes how far he has run he decides to hijack a car driven by Pumla. When he gets into the car he realizes that there is a baby in the back, so he decides to strip the car and take the baby. This is the first sign we see from Totsi that he does have a caring heart because he doesn't leave the baby to die. Pumla survives the attack and while being treated at the hospital she gives a police description of Totsi.

Realizing that he has no idea how to take care of a baby, he sneaks up on Miriam who is a single mother who he holds up at gunpoint and brings her back to her place where he forces her to breast feed the baby. When he visits her a second time she talks him into letting her take care of the child and he can visit whenever he wants. Totsi decides to take care of the injured Boston. Boston is called Teacher Boy by his friends because they believe he took the teacher's test. Boston explains to his friends that he never took such a thing. The gang decides to raise some money so that Boston can take the test, meaning they will have to commit another robbery. They go to Pumla's house, following her husband John as he leaves the hospital. They tie him up and raid the house. When John activates the alarm, Butcher attempts to kill John but Totsi kills Butcher and the rest of the gang heads out before the alarm company arrives. When Totsi goes back to Miriam's house she tells him she knows where he got the baby and begs him to return it. When Totsi goes to return the baby, the officer assigned to the house calls for backup and Totsi is arrested as the movie ends. I liked this movie alot because it begins as a Gangster film but it develops into a coming to age film where you see the heart of Totsi grow because of the smallest thing, a baby. Having all the trouble he had as a kid with his mom being extremely sick and his dad being a drunk who kills Totsi's dog right in front of him; he develops this new state of mind that i believe ultimately saves his life. A dark but uplifting movie that i would watch again and again.