Marooned in Iraq

San Francisco Chronicle Jonathan Curiel

Ghobadi infuses his movie with a humor that can almost be called Seinfeldian, and it's this mix of laughter with tears that gives Marooned in Iraq its big impact.

Time Richard Schickel

You'll have to seek it out in its limited release, but no current movie is more worth the effort.

Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt

A mix of war film, road movie, and romantic comedy-drama, this peripatetic yarn is less resonant than Ghobadi's beautiful "A Time for Drunken Horses," but it has enough energy to keep your eyes popping and your toes tapping.

Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum

Nothing I've read about Iraq or seen on TV in the past few weeks has felt nearly as real and intimate as this commanding fiction.

The New York Times Dave Kehr

If Mr. Ghobadi's dominant theme is the devastation of the Kurds, his subdominant tone is one of strength, resistance and fertility.

Washington Post Michael O'Sullivan

Mostly, though, it's a film about that hollow feeling that hits you when the tears have all dried up and your face hurts way too much to even crack a smile.

Village Voice J. Hoberman

This lusty, heartfelt movie has a near Brueghelian visual energy and a humanist passion as contagious as its music.

LA Weekly Henry Sheehan

Occurring as it does amid a surge of tragedy and bitterness, its comic effect is powerfully mitigated.

Boston Globe Janice Page

As full of joy as pain, it's a perspective we need to see more often.

TV Guide Ken Fox

On a miniscule budget, Ghobadi conveys the terror of war, while the beautifully edited sequence in which Iranian villagers make bricks resembles nothing so much as a choreographed dance number.

New York Post V.A. Musetto

Eventually turns somber, with stark depiction of mass graves and suffering refugees. The final scene will break your heart.

New York Daily News Elizabeth Weitzman

It's part grim Beckett-like drama, part joyous picaresque, and all quite mesmerizing.

Los Angeles Times Kevin Thomas

Even though the film's tone grows ever more elegiac, it stubbornly remains a celebration of the Kurdish capacity to endure.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Scott Tobias

Ends with horrific revelations that are made all the more powerful by the lightness that precedes them. Simultaneously sad and hopeful, Ghobadi suggests the resiliency of a culture in which war is part of the fabric of everyday life.