Luisa Trujillo: Analysis of Children of Heaven

Children of Heaven (Bacheha-Ye aseman)
Directed by: Majid Majidi



Do people need to see starving children with huge bellies filled with worms? Is the poverty always a reflection of an ugly and untidy scene?

The film “Children of Heaven” is a good art work, but I will say that the beauty of this is not exactly in its digital resources. The wonderful is in the basic story, in the script, and of course in the fantastic performances of the two children who make even the stronger person suffer with the human pain. The social poverty and inequalities are main topics but they are not showed in terms of morbid scenes of human degradation, instead it is a cute history narrated and vivified by two innocent children who ignore how much injustice exists in the world.

Basically “Children of Heaven" narrates the story of a poor family who resides in the suburbs of Tehran, capital of Iran. But although all the family is struggling, the experience of the two children, Alí of ten and Zahra of nine, is the one that catch all the attention from beginning to end. A single remarkable story developed around the loss of old shoes of Zahra, just repaired, that Alí misplaces. Without the shoes his sister will not be able to go to school.

If we take a fast look to what is said before, it is easy to find out how simple is the story, it does not have anything confusing, but still is interesting because of the way it is being told. By the way, performances are great in this film. Both kids Ali and Zahra have a complexity in their faces, they are children and children reveal innocence, but at the same time their eyes reveal pain of what they have suffered and they do not understand.

The story becomes more interesting when Ali, after running and running all day in order to get the shoes for his sister, decides to participate in a running championship because the second prize is a new pair of shoes. And here we have a good point in the script, why the second prize and not the first prize? It is a significant concern because the human being has been always taught to fight for the first position, and encouraged to be the best. Ali was not looking for win the highest prize, not even the acknowledgement of people; he was just looking for his own goal, a pair of new shoes for her sister. And he could not get them, because he won. There is the paradigm to winning is on the other side of wishing.

The film is a good drama but not like a river of empty tears. However make us to wake up some deep feelings like Melancholia, frustration, rage and disappointing. The film is playing straightly with our emotions and ii does not distinct if we are women or men, yellow or white. Everybody feels affected by the fact that closer or further we all have a sense of how many injustices exists in the world, and then we realized this film is just a little drawing of what is everywhere. So finally the film gets its objective, that is to make people conscious of a reality, and at the same time show the attractiveness those living in that reality.