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Half Moon
Silkroad Production


9.0

based on 9 reviews
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based on 2 votes
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FILM:

MPAA RATING: Not Rated

Starring Golshifteh Farahani, Ismail Ghaffari, Allah-Morad Rashtian, and Hedye Tehrani

Mamo, the old renowned Kurdish musician, has begun a journey to Iraq to perform a music concert after the fall of Saddam Hussein. The Old of the village has predicted that Mamo should not go on the trip because as the full moon comes, something awful will happen to him. Mamo persists on continuing his journey because it's the first time he's been allowed to work in many years. (Miji Film)

GENRE(S):	Comedy \| Drama
WRITTEN BY:	Behnam Behzadi Bahman Ghobadi
DIRECTED BY:	Bahman Ghobadi
RELEASE DATE:	DVD: March 4, 2008 Theatrical: December 14, 2007
RUNNING TIME:	114 minutes,
ORIGIN:	Austria / France / Iran / Iraq
LANGUAGE(S):	Kurdish / Persian

Alternative Title: Niwemang

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

The New York Times Jeannette Catsoulis

Fateful and funny, haunting and magical.

Los Angeles Times Sheri Linden

An eloquent and audacious lament.

Empire David Parkinson

An unflinching and affecting depiction of the region’s tragic lunacies.

New York Post V.A. Musetto

By terms moving and funny, the story reaches its apex when Half Moon, a beautiful young woman played by Golshifteh Farahani, makes her appearance from out of nowhere. Is she real, or perhaps an angel? You'll have fun trying to come up with an answer.

LA Weekly Scott Foundas

In a boom time for movies about the scars of the battlefield, Half Moon reminds that the unending strife and religious fundamentalism of the Middle East kills not just people but culture too.

Chicago Reader Andrea Gronvall

The suspicion and contempt the band encounters along the way symbolize the Kurds' historical sufferings, but the movie has many comic moments courtesy of the eager bus driver, who keeps putting his foot in his mouth. The nonprofessional cast is highly persuasive under the sure hand of director Bahman Ghobadi (A Time for Drunken Horses).

The Hollywood Reporter Kirk Honeycutt

Ghobadi always uses non-pro actors but you would never know. In fact, professionals wouldn't do theses roles justice since the recruited performers are partly playing themselves and partly playing people Ghobadi has known since he was a boy.

Village Voice Aaron Hillis

Writer-director Bahman Ghobadi's picturesque road trip is less about preserving a musical heritage than accepting one's fate, a mythic trek that's both heartrending and boisterous--often as hauntingly absurdist as a Kusturica carnival.

Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern

This is a road movie unlike any other, the comical and mystical odyssey of old Mamo (an extraordinary performance by Ismail Ghaffari), a venerated musician who heads for Iraq from exile in Kurdish Iran with a busload of his musician sons to give a concert after Saddam's fall.

The average user rating for this movie is 9.0 (out of 10) based on 2 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

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Half Moon Silkroad Production

Half Moon
Silkroad Production