Film Review: Certified Copy

There are plenty of reasons to watch Certified Copy, but if I were to give just one it will be Juliette Binoche's outstanding performance, which won her the award for best actress at Cannes earlier this year.

The film is all about characters and Binoche excels in making hers alive, interesting and gripping. You cannot but admire her beauty and charm.

I will urge you to forget about analysing the sometimes confusing plot and focus on the characters, so they can guide you through what director Abbas Kiarostami's film has to say.

Although it starts like a simple narrative where Binoche, a Frenchwoman living in Italy, meets James (William Shimell) at a signing for his book about copies in art, the film gets more intense by the minute and keeps the audience with a sense of mystery.

The tension between the main characters is remarkable. Only when the film ends, you realise how deep it is — so philosophical yet real.

The characters in Certified Copy stop being themselves and become us. They represent every human being with the struggle inside them (and in their relationships) between logic and feelings, alienation and intimacy.