Half Moon

Unsurprisingly for a film about Kurdish people, whose "nation" crosses Iraq, Iran, Turkey and Syria, Half Moon is a film about the borders between countries, traditions, reality and the supernatural.

Bahman Ghobadi's fourth movie favours compassion and gentle humour over heavy-handed point scoring and bitterness, taking the audience on an eventful road trip through countries scarred by decades of upheaval.

Aboard a renovated American schoolbus driven by well-meaning friend Kako (Rashitani), Mamo (Ghaffari) and his troupe must navigate casual bigotry and oppression in uneasy scenes at police roadblocks populated by Turkish bully-boys, and circumnavigate the conflict burning in Iraq.

Ghobadi restricts commentary on the Iraq nightmare to a scene when the group happen across the outskirts of an ambush and hear that "the Americans are shooting anything that moves", and is more critical of the corruption and narrow-mindedness in neighbouring countries, most likely leading to its current banning in Iran.

He also has a flair for magical realism, casually dropping prophecies later realized and an angel into the lives of the twelve men and one woman (smuggled because a woman performing before men is outlawed).

Largely shot on location, local flavour drips off the screen in this land of old superstitions and yahoo.com, henpecked husbands and vicious cockfights.

Ghaffari is perfect as the crotchety, obstinate musician, refusing to die until he has returned to Iraqi Kurdistan, but forced to realize liberation from Saddam has not created a better tomorrow.

Losing its way in the middle and overlong at just shy of two hours, criticisms pale when moments such as a journey into a cliff-face city populated by banished female singers and the thrilling climax on a mountain range go beyond the mere astonishing into the transcendent.

Illuminating, surreal, tear-jerking and funny, Half Moon is an unforgettable voyage into a land little seen.

Rob Daniel