Having spent a year studying in Dublin from 2005 to 2006, I felt a special anticipation for the screening of the Irish film, Once. The film follows the tentative romance between an Irish singer-songwriter (Glen Hansard) and a Czech immigrant (Marketa Irglova singing and playing the piano) and has already played at numerous film festivals. Winning the Audience award at Sundance, the film has enjoyed spectacular success in the United States, amassing both critical and box office success for its mix of romance, realism, and some great music.

Lead actors and real-life couple. Hansard and Irglova were on hand to promote the film. In the pre-screening interview, Hansard spoke of how the film went from having a budget of two million euros to 120,000 euros. When initial lead Cillian Murphy dropped out of the film two weeks before filming started, Hansard, who was then in charge of writing the songs, stepped into the lead role. Shot in seventeen days in Dublin with two Handicams, no permits, and the crew working for no salary, no-one expected much from the film. Refused by all the major film festivals in the world, the film was screened in Galway, where all assumed it would be the first and last screening.

Following the film, Hansard and Irglova performed on the outside stage to a packed and elated audience. The couple played three songs from the film, alternating guitar and piano duties, and ended with a passionate cover of Van Morrison’s “Glad Tidings.” The sight of Hansard’s guitar, with its telltale large hole, drew laughs of recognition: it’s the same guitar he played throughout the film.

In a shrewd PR move, the TIFF organizers invited a secret guest -- the head of Takamine, the guitar company that produced Hansard’s beloved guitar. The president presented Hansard with a new guitar, jokingly prodding him to give his old one a rest after eighteen years of devoted use.

Still light-headed after the gorgeous musical performance, I headed to Shibuya to catch the Q&A session of Hafez, a film I viewed last week. Touted as the “Iranian version of Romeo and Juliet,” this Iranian-Japanese production is a visually potent but remote film that fails to achieve an emotional connection between its characters and its audience.

Loosely based on the life and works of 14th century Persian poet Hafez, and Nabat, his love, Hafez is set in present-day Iran. The star-crossed lovers are Hafez, a Koran tutor, and Nabat, his student, the daughter of a highly esteemed religious leader. They hold their lessons in separate, adjoining rooms, during which their romance is born. When Hafez commits the crime of reading poetry to her and they are subsequently caught glancing at each other, Hafez is expelled from the community, and the two are torn apart.

The film progresses slowly, with Jalili allowing scenes to unfold with little exposition, which, combined with the often wordless scenes, has a frequently disorienting effect. Jalili’s depiction of Iranian culture will undoubtedly be fascinating for many viewers, but as an epic love story, Hafez falters. The scenes of Hafez and Nabat’s courtship are so brief, their connection so intangible, after they are torn apart, the momentum cannot be sustained. Mehdi Moradi and Kumiko Aso (who, bafflingly, is Japanese) are handsomely brooding and prettily impassive, but there is a peculiar disconnection in their performances.

Jalili and Aso were present for the post-screening Q&A. The audience’s confusion about the film was palpable in their questions. One audience member asked what the final shot was supposed to establish, while another viewer asked why Jalili chose to use the poet Hafez’s words as dialogue in the film, when even Iranians consider his words difficult to comprehend. Expanding on Jalili’s previous comments, the viewer added, if his primary motive was to focus on the message of the words, why did he choose such a famously challenging text? Jalili seemed unwilling to answer, launching into an extended reply that conspicuously did not answer the question, forever cloaking the film in mystery.