"It Must be Heaven" was directed by Elia Suleiman, who was born in Palestine in 1960. Prior to this, many of his films were shortlisted or won European Film Festival awards. Elia Suleiman has its own unique self-deprecating humor style, whose works are ridiculously funny. Sometimes it is serious, and poetic. His work often let me feel like that he is Chaplin, Jacques Tati, Buster Kee Dunton and other senior comedy masters, "It Must be Heaven" still continue the above style.
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The film is using himself as storyteller, telling Suleiman to leave his native Palestine and find a new home , where he is no need to encounter daily violence, roadblocks and identity checks. Thus, he went to Paris, New York, but things were not as simple as he thought. He gradually discovered that these cities had similar plots with their hometowns. The film was filmed in Paris, New York and Palestine. The subject matter of the film involved identity, nationality and belonging. These topics look like a dull narrative. After carefully looking at each bridge sections, it contains many metaphors about politics. And descriptions of symbolization are everywhere. The absurdity is ironic, but at the same time there is no shortage of warm-hearted people.
At the same time, as the starring and directing director, Suleiman has almost no words, and uses the eyebrows instead of words. Suleiman plays an "observer" in the film, sharing his own perspective as a Palestinian in the language of video. It leave a lot of room to express his own thoughts. The audience followed him and listened calmly to the impetuous and uneasy world. The rhythm of the film is smooth, using symmetrical aesthetics and three-stage structure. The political issues are visualized, and the color matching is comfortable and natural. Even the characters are paired in pairs, especially for patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder. The picture is extremely harmonious!
I believe that if you are in New York, you will see the "stalk" in the film and will feel the same. As a audience, I deeply feel that Suleiman's control of the details is very accurate, interesting and thought-provoking. So what is New York in the eyes of Suleiman, what is Paris? What is the connection with his hometown of Palestine? Suleiman returned to the big screen after ten years and used the wide screen to capture the absurdity of the world. Such a politically meaningful film, at first glance, seems to be a very funny "global travel vlog", but the metaphors and references are thought-provoking. Palestine, France and the United States are all paradise. At same time, these three places are not paradise.
My Score is 5.3/10
Movie URL: https://www.themoviedb.org/movie/539531-it-must-be-heaven?language=en-US
Critic: AA
영화: https://www.themoviedb.org/movie/539531-it-must-be-heaven?language=ko-KR
별점: AA