Dariush Mehrjui shows different ways in each of her films and has extraordinary talent in film adaptations of literature. The Pear Tree is also an adaptation of a novel by famous Iranian writer Goli Taraghi. A middle-aged man who has failed at work, family, and love comes back to his hometown holding on to writing a novel without progress. The elders of the village visit him, persistently asking his opinion on what to do with the pear tree that doesn’t bear fruit. Though uninterested at first, he soon sinks into his memories of pear trees; the pear tree becomes a medium to lead him to the memory of his first love as a child, like the scent of madeleines. The narration takes over and the film displays his life in two parts: middle-age and childhood. The unique contrast between the life of the middle-aged man filled with literary, philosophical monologues and the fluent visual expression of his first love manifests the director’s nostalgia for the past. (Mina Oak)