Border Café (aka Café Transit/2005/Global Lens Collection/First Run Features)

 

Picture: C-    Sound: C+     Extras: C     Film: B-

 

 

The idea of food and relationships in film has developed into a cycle, from Big Night to the grossly underrated Waitress, but food in that way often surfaced in European cinema and it has now traveled all the way behind the Islamo-fascist walls of Iran with Kambozia Partovi’s Border Café (aka Café Transit/2005) where an exceptional cook at a truck stop greasy spoon can cook with exceptional skill and takes over her husband’s business altogether when he dies.

 

His brother wants to marry her out of cultural obligation, but a Greek trucker is more sincerely interested and a unique love triangle, mixed with politics, oppression and power plays kick in.  Instead of being constantly vindictive, it becomes a comedy, cultural study of the country and a bit of a character study overall.  That it is a Greek man in a restaurant throwing the society out of wack is an in-joke that would almost be racist if the film were not saying it might take someone with guts to shake things up in a believable way.  All in all, it is a good watch if you are interested in the subject matter.

 

The letterboxed 1.85 X 1 is very soft and poor, maybe due to getting a master through the unacceptably repressive Iranian Government, but it is nicely shot and despite softness, color poorness and major problems with detail and depth, you can tell is it shot well.  The Dolby Digital 2.0 sound is barley stereo, but you can tell is a recent recording, even if it was done on a limited budget.  Extras include a PDF discussion guide and two pieces on other entries in this impressive series.

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo