Emotionally moving

Rating: Null/10 (14 August 2012)

Crafted with care and simplicity, Children of Heaven proves that less is more. Using children as its primary emotional reference point and motifs such as shoes and goldfish to convey deeper themes, this movie explores the range of human emotions as portrayed by one Iranian family struggling to economically and emotionally survive. While the need for shoes seems to drive the plot, this symbolizes the larger issue of poverty that the family faces and brilliantly allows the story to be told from the perspective of a child. The gravity of the themes discussed in this film are represented with style and simplicity--a girl envies another girl's shoes, a brother and sister use the same pair of shoes for school, a boy enters a race for which the second place prize is a pair of sneakers. The motive of basic necessities that drives the movie's plot evokes emotionally-charged performances from all of the actors, especially the children. Consequentially, Children of Heaven ranks among the most emotionally-moving films I have ever seen.
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