Films with world premieres at large festivals are the first ones to grab the attention of film critics and audiences who hope to discover something new and exciting, and spread the word about it. We do occasionally forget that the new doesn't necessarily equal good, but if a film happens to be competing in a program pompously announced as the new greatest thing, finding out it is not up to the mark has a particularly bitter aftertaste.
In case of Reza Jamali's contender “A Childless Village”, by erasing the existing- and inserting another more fitting adjective, one could justify the attempt to sell it as a comedy. Competing in the program section “Critics' Picks” freshly added to the already heavily competition oriented Tallinn Black Nights festival, this is a movie with a kind of humor that stopped being funny already in the 1980s. It is hard to say if it's deliberately stranded in the politically incorrect waters, or if it's only echoing a type of humor accepted locally, which is a crying shame considering the director's honest intentions to show how societal expectations impact marriages in a small, tight-knit community in Azerbaijan.
The story of this alleged comedy centers around an amateur filmmaker called Kazem (Hamdollah Salimi) who is eager to correct the injustice his documentary from 20 years ago did to the women in the village. The problem is that none of them wants to speak to him, and as they avoid him like a plague, he has to seek help from other male villagers to shoot a new documentary.
This will introduce us to a number of middle-aged men who start working on the film together with Kazem. One of them is Moslem, his right-hand and newly appointed assistant director without any experience with films but ‘talented to operate the clapper bard' who comes closest to a comedy role.
For a script that is supposed to mock the fragile male ego, female characters are bleak and even caricatured with the exception of the medic that takes care of the whole community. When they are given a chance to speak (there is obviously a film in the film), the women (most of them amateur actresses) recite their destinies in front of the camera in the way a child would do it in a school play. There is also great clumsiness in the representation of people with disabilities.
“A Childless Village” has some undeniably great technical aspects. The cinematographer Abdollah Shokri will make you want to sit through the 81 minutes of a movie that feels like it lasts twice as much. Every single of his takes looks like a postcard you would send to everyone you know, to make them jealous about your exotic trip to a destination they will never visit. The picturesque setting does make things easier, but it's Shokri who makes sure you explore every corner of his frames for the beauty of their representation.
