LIKE SOMEONE IN LOVE World Cinema

With his new film, Abbas Kiarostami goes to Tokyo and delves even more deeply into the world of artifice that he explored in his last film, CERTIFIED COPY, by crafting characters wrought with shame, whose emotional wounds lead them to engage in even more layered and dangerous games. The masquerade begins when Akiko (Rin Takanashi), a call girl, and her client Takashi (Tadashi Okuno), an elderly professor, pretend to be granddaughter and grandfather in order avoid the wrath of Akiko’s jealous boyfriend when they are caught in a car together. Kiarostami builds layers of secrets into the stories that Akiko and Takashi tell each other; their lies eventually become more real and powerful than the truth, and increasingly dismissive of the uninitiated third party that is Akiko’s boyfriend. LIKE SOMEONE IN LOVE is ultimately an explosive and intriguing companion piece to CERTIFIED COPY that delights in denying its desperate characters the happy ending they desire.