.png)
Hoping to save up enough money to find a decent flat so that he can be reunited with his estranged son, a Pakistani immigrant, whose wife had died a year previously and who was once something of a pop star, works long hours selling coffee and bagels on a street corner, as well as undertaking other assorted odd jobs. Focused, but emotionally numb, he also somehow manages to form friendships with a wealthy Pakistani businessman and a pretty young Catalan woman, who works on a newsstand. However, tragedy and bad luck are never very far from this young man’s life. Sensitively shot, with a heartbreaking central performance, Bahrani’s devastating character study only feeds us the merest of background detail, leaving much to the imagination, and in so doing creates a bond between film and viewer that few film-makers ever manage to achieve.
