Children of Heaven

What is Children of Heaven?

The first time we read this writing we might think about children or anything related to the heaven. This is also one of thing that impressed me when I read those words... 

Well!  Children of Heaven (Persian: بچه‌های آسمان) is a 1997 Iranian film by Majid Majidi. It was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1998. It deals with a brother and sister and their adventures over a lost pair of shoes.

This movie became popular in Islamic word and has been translated in many languages.

This is an unique movie about children in Islam that I ever watched n be one of my favourite movies. The first time I watched this movie when I attended an activity in a masjid in my college. It was when I was an undergraduate student.  

The Plot of This Movie 

Ali fetches his little sister Zahra's pink sneakers after the shoemaker has repaired them. Ali puts down the shoes to get some potatoes at the grocer's. While he is preoccupied, a blind garbageman accidentally picks up the shoes, hidden in a bag, and takes them away. Frantic to find them, the young boy knocks over crates of vegetables and is chased away by the grocer.

Ali's family is having financial trouble, so he fears to tell his parents. The landlord argues with Ali's mother because she is five months behind on the rent, and the grocer has not been paid in a while either. Ali tells Zahra about the shoes and begs her not to tell their mother; she agrees. That night, Ali's father scolds him for not helping his ill mother when she asked. While the siblings were doing their homework, they passed notes to each other discussing what to do. They devise a scheme to share Ali's Converse sneakers: Zahra will wear them to school in the morning and return them to Ali at midday so he can attend afternoon classes. This uncomfortable arrangement leads to Ali being late three times in a row, no matter how hard he runs; the first time the principal ignores him, the second time he gives him a warning, the third time he tells Ali to leave and return with his father. Ali's teacher persuades the principal to give the boy one more chance and let him back into class. Ali does well on a test and the teacher awards him a gold-colored pen; he gives it to Zahra to partially make up for losing her shoes.

One day, Zahra notices her missing sneakers on another student's feet. After class, Zahra secretly follows her home. She later brings Ali with her for a confrontation, but from hiding, they discover that the other girl's father is blind (none other than the garbageman who picked up the shoes by mistake), so they decide to leave. When the other student does well in her studies, her father buys her new purple shoes and throws away Zahra's. Zahra is dismayed when she finds out from her new friend.

Ali's father, anxious to earn more money, borrows some gardening equipment and heads off with Ali to the rich suburbs of Tehran to find some gardening work. They try many places without success, though Ali proves to be a great help to his tongue-tied father. Finally they come upon a mansion in which a six-year-old boy named Alireza lives under the care of his grandfather. While Ali plays with Alireza, his father works. When he is finished, Ali's father is surprised and elated by how generous the grandfather is. On the way home, their bicycle's brakes fail and the father is slightly injured in the resulting crash.

Finally, Ali learns of a high-profile children's footrace involving many schools; the third prize is two weeks at a vacation camp and a pair of sneakers. To his bitter disappointment, in a hard-fought dash to the finish, he accidentally places first instead. However, there is a quick shot of the children's father's bicycle, showing two new pairs of shoes among his purchases. In the final shot, Ali is shown dipping his blistered feet in a pool. Some versions include an epilogue revealing that Ali eventually achieves success in a racing career.