Gradually (2006) User Reviews

Simple story of a man who goes looking for his disappeared wife

[rasecz · 7/10 · 29 April 2007]

Seyed Mahmoud is a welder working in laying out new railroad tracks in the south of Iran. One day at work, he is informed that something happened to his wife. He returns to his town to find the wife has disappeared several days ago. The bulk of the film is his search for her.

Eventually we learn what happened to the wife but the narrative of those events is incomplete. That poses a thorny problem to the husband. At this point the film rushes to a closure. It's a happy ending but abrupt. Disappearing redux. Disappearance replayed on a larger scale. Vanishing without a trace to find happiness.

This is the director's second feature.

The Vanishing

[J_J_Gittes · 10/10 · 18 January 2011]

Another Iranian film that tries to deal critically with the difficult situation in 2005, and reflects on the importance of belief in a different way than one would have expected.

Mahmoud is a railroad engineer who has to stay away from his wife Pari and her daughter for extended periods of time. But Pari isn't satisfied with her simple role as a housewife, always waiting for her husband, and she is also under constant medication, due to depressions that may stem from her position as an Iranian woman (this is later hinted at). At one point she mysteriously disappears, and Mahmoud who loves his wife very much, has to cope with the situation during a 48 hour leave permit he has been granted by his employer. During this time, he gets to experience the disdain of the Iranian society - in Iran it is a dishonor if your wife leaves you - in countless ways. Being unable to find out any helpful information about the disappearance of his wife, he is devastated when he is informed of a corpse who's description could fit his wife...

There are many more twists and surprises waiting for the viewer in this very compressed film, that deals with faith and the power of compassion, in a highly original way. After everything is over Mahmoud - and with him the (male) viewer - will have to decide how to deal with the whole event. And the positive outcome of the film may offer a ray of hope in relationships that often seem to stand in front of an abyss.