Movie: The Song of Sparrows

If you're looking for a sweet and funny comedy this well-directed film by Persian director Majid Majidi is simply charming.  Beautifully set in the Iranian countryside it is a story as much about family as it is about the contrast between city values and the simplicity of rural life.  It will make you laugh; it will certainly give you something to be optimistic about, and it might even make you want to become an ostrich farmer.

The hero of this movie is Karim who works on a farm to support his wife and three kids.  After losing one of the ostriches he is entrusted to take care of he is quickly fired.  It is around this same time that Karim finds out that his daughter requires a new and expensive hearing aid.  By chance while he is visiting Tehran he ends up working as a taxi driver to earn a living.  It is here, that the combination of financial pressure and his seemingly first confrontation with the wealth of the city, that his good nature quickly channels into an increasingly hostile and unethical one.  It takes an accident for him to finally realize the nature of his ways and the endearing and creative ways with which his kids are trying to help him.