The Color of Paradise

From Majid Majidi, the Iranian director whose sublime Children of Heaven was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Film, comes this profoundly moving drama about a sightless 8-year-old named Mohammad (an unforgettable Mohsen Ramezani), and his "poor and miserable" widower father (Hosein Mahjoob, the only professional actor in the cast), who believes him to be a burden and therefore wants to keep him at school or send him away to better his own chances at remarriage. Set against majestic landscapes, the film's images are at once beautiful (Mohammad using his keen hearing to return a lost baby bird to its nest), haunting (the blind boy, reunited with his loving sister, touches her face and pronounces, "You've grown up so much"), and wrenching (the desperate father's rant to his elderly mother about feeling forsaken by God). Highly recommended. (K. Lee Benson)