The Willow Tree

Directed by Majid Majidi

Lincoln Plaza Cinemas

Broadway between 62nd & 63rd

212-757-0359

 

Review by Sara Hottman

 

Vivid images, dramatic angles, vibrant colors and carefully orchestrated scenes tell a blind man’s poignant story in Academy Award nominee Majid Majidi’s “The Willow Tree.”  The Iranian director explores the power of sight from the perspective of a man who for decades was deprived of it. From his own reflection to raindrops on a car window to his mother’s face, everyday scenes are given paramount importance as the protagonist, through a miraculous surgery, regains his ability to see, and journeys into the corrupted world of sight. 

 

Youssef (Parvis Parastui) is a blind university professor who lives happily in Iran with his wife, Roya (Roya Taymourian), and daughter, surrounded by loving family and admiring students. Health concerns take him to a French treatment center for the visually impaired, where Youssef desperately beseeches higher powers to allow him the gift of sight. Doctors eventually determine that a cornea transplant will repair Youssef’s damaged eyes — which were burned by sparklers as a child — and allow him to see again. 

 

Eyes Wide Open: Thanks to a cornea transplant, Parvis Parastui sees the world — and his hot cousin — for the first time in Majid Majidi’s “The Willow Tree.”

 

After an apparently successful operation, Youssef returns home and instantly experiences the dangers of sight when he first sees his beautiful cousin, Pari (Leila Otadi). Lustful feelings toward Pari lead Youssef to feel trapped in the life he chose as a blind man, and deprived of the life he could have led without his impairment. Through a succession of intense outbursts, Youssef ostracizes his family. When post-operative complications arise, his world and sight gradually disintegrate until Youssef becomes completely alone and blind once again.

 

The powerful journey from blindness to vision and back again is masterfully portrayed by Majidi’s dramatic, vibrant scenes that strategically lace each crucial moment in the film.  While the majority of the cast needed only to perfect a teary gaze, Parastui skillfully portrays a blind man — from his jerky gait to his hesitant grasps at thin air — as well as a confused newcomer to the world of sight.

 

“The Willow Tree” is a heavy concentration of intense emotions that question the relevance of sight to happiness, while its astonishingly vibrant images remind viewers why vision is indeed a treasured privilege.