Le Passé (The Past)

An anxious Marie (Berenice Bejo) arrives at the airport, picking up her estranged husband Ahmad (Ali Mosaffa) so that they can finalise their divorce. She spots him, a hint of bittersweet acknowledgement adorns her face, she moves closer to him but finds a soundproof wall dividing the pair. No matter; she gestures to another, they get his attention and after a few gestures, they're on their way, running to her car and out of the rain. However, a number of walls remain built up around Marie, and they follow her everywhere she dares to go.

Le Passé (The Past) is Asghar Farhadi's follow-up to the unanimously praised A Separation, a film which claimed almost every Foreign Film award you can imagine in 2011. And knowing he struck a winning formula, Farhadi sticks with what he knows, invoking a number of the same themes in this piece, a brilliantly-told narrative surrounding Marie and the relationships in her life.

Farhadi moves out of his native Iran for this piece, instead setting  the film in France; a change of culture perhapps, but certainly not of the human condition. Loss, change, separation; they are all still pertinent issues in Le Passé. We see Marie take Ahmad back to a house they shared four years earlier before he left, but now Marie's new partner Samir (Tahar Rahim) and his son Fouad (Elyes Aguis) have moved in, and with it, a number of other issues as well.

As always, Farhadi's treatment of the narrative is as objective as possible; he allows his audience to view the situation from as many perspectives as possible and without trying to impart any judgment. This lends itself to the ensemble being able to enjoy an exceptional level of freedom within their performances, and this leads to great accomplishment throughout. Bejo is particularly exceptional as lead Marie, a woman who is struggling with moving on, hampered down by her past as well as the history of the other characters in her life. Rahim is also tragically wonderful as her new partner, whose truth the whole film centres around. As the film progresses, the audience are exposed to new information surrounding his past, and the revelations are handled as well by Rahim as they are by the wonderfully-written screenplay. Pauline Burlet is also great as Marie's eldest daughter Lucie.

The narrative here unfolds masterfully, with Farhadi balancing all these perspectives whilst allowing the film to reach boiling point slowly, washing just enough over his audience to keep them hooked. The only criticism I could level at the film is that by the end, it isn't as tight as it was at the start, perhaps because it offers too much of a slow boil, or potentially because it is so level-handed. Nonetheless, the powerful ensemble maintain such a stronghold on the material, and the power in the story never fades; the film never becomes tedious, it remains as commanding as ever. The camerawork is as imposing as ever, and its scope allows the audience to remain very much involved in the action without ever losing the equal-handedness that Farhadi wants throughout.

Farhadi has created another wonder here; Le Passé is an incredibly well-written, beautifully told story of how we can never entirely get away from our past. This resounding idea is brilliantly captured by Farhadi and his ensemble, and its cogent focus on this never wavers. The human frailty in a way only Farhadi can tell it: vividly, skilfully, brilliantly.