Abbas Kiarostami, Like Someone in Love

Like Someone in Love

The action revolves around a young student Akiko (Rin Takanashi) who is doing escort work in Tokyo, and becoming increasingly exhausted and disenchanted. When she is sent out on a job in the suburbs, her client turns out to be a gentle and grandfatherly academic, Takashi (Tadashi Okuno) who is amusingly shown distractedly taking a late-night telephone call from someone wanting some translation work done – as Akiko is coming through the door. The relationship between this ingenuous and good-natured young woman and shy old man develops in an intriguing way and Takashi winds up giving cautious advice to Akiko's garage mechanic boyfriend Noriaki (Ryo Kase) who claims to be her fiancé, and is in serious danger of finding out how Akiko picks up extra cash.

The Guardian

Zweig

Zweig, Confusion

Roland is a young student who, after spending his early university days in Berlin strolling the streets and seducing young ladies, has agreed to focus on his academic career in a provincial university. He becomes fascinated by his new professor and is inspired to concentrate on his studies. The relationship benefits both of them since Roland persuades his teacher to finish the great work of scholarship that he has been laboring at for years. Yet the professor's moods dramatically veer between enthusiasm and despair, and he disappears unexpectedly for days at a time. Furthermore, the professor's relationship with his much younger and beautiful wife is not as it should be. A puzzled Roland finds himself struggling as he tries to understand his own tenuous relationship with the couple.

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