The Kite Runner movie is definitely at the top of my favorite movies of all time. This was nominated for one academy award for best achievement in music written for motion picture. But I personally think that this movie should have been nominated for best picture and best director for academy awards. Because for me, this movie was a masterpiece.
The main character in the movie is a twenty-six years old man named Amir, who currently lives in California. The movie starts with him in his house with his wife and they were checking his new published book that he wrote. He was really happy at the beginning. It looks like life was good to him. He is married, and is a successful author. However, in the end of this scene, he reveals that he was carrying huge torment from an incident that scared him for life in his childhood.
This has made him the person he was today. This happened back at his home land in Kabul, Afghanistan. Back home when he was still a boy, he lived in a fancy house with his father Baba. They had two servants named Ali and his son Hassan and they were from an authentic minority. There was also another character that played a close friend his father named Rahim Khan. If you have seen Iron Man movie, then the actor that plays Rahim Khan will be a familiar face. Amir and Hassan were best friends growing up.
Hassan was smaller in size compared to Amir but he was fearless, he would point his slingshot against the bullies. The leader of the town bullies was Assef and he wanted to hurt Hassan so much because he was fearless. Assef believed that Hassan should bow down to him since he was a Hazara. But Amir was a coward and would always hide and run. So he never had to face anything that could hurt him.
In the beginning of the story, we see that Hassan was completely loyal to Amir. He would do anything for him. At one point Hassan says “Amir, I’m going to run that blue kite for you”. Then when Amir says “Hassan, come back with it”, he replies “For you, a thousand times”. This is where the audience realize the loyalty in Hassan. When he found that kite, the bullies get to him. Then Assef, the leader of those bullies tells Hassan to give the kite to him or they would beat him.
Hassan decline that because he promised Amir, he would bring the kite to him. At that time, Amir manages to find him. But when he saw the bullies were confronting him, he quickly hides like a coward and watch what happens. He heard what Hassan said to the bullies. He realized that Hassan was accepting this fate because of his loyalty to him but still he does nothing because he was a coward.
Then Assef rapes Hassan after beating him. It was the saddest part of the movie. But still, Hassan refused to give up the kite. Then Amir runs away and waits till Hassan returns. Then when he sees him, he asks Hassan what happened. Then he says “nothing” then the camera shows blood dropping from Hassan’s pants as he walks off. This shows the severity of what Hassan had to go through to be loyal to Amir.
This incident fills Amir with guilt. So instead of facing Hassan, he chose the most selfish way possible. He hides a watch he gets for his birthday from his dad in Hassan’s bed. Then he tells his father that Hassan has stolen his watch. So when Baba confronted Hassan and his father, Hassan says that he stole it instead of saying that he was framed by Amir. Then Amir’s father forgives Hassan. But Hassan’s father says that they will leave because life there is now impossible for them after what happened. Amir still won’t do anything when this happens. This shows his selfishness again to the audience.
Then the soviet invasion happens in December 1979. So Baba had to leave to Pakistan with Amir because of things Baba said about communists. Before they left, Baba gave the house to Rahim and tells him to take care of it till they return. But they couldn’t ever return to their homeland. They migrate to America and lives there till Amir Graduates from Community College. After that he gets married to a former general’s daughter who also was from Kabul. A while after that, Baba dies of terminal illness. Then Amir becomes a famous writer and comes the first scene when the movie began.
We see what happened at the beginning of the movie when Amir got a phone call from Rahim, telling him he’s sick. So he decides to go see him. When his wife asks him why does he wants to see him instead of going on his book tour, he says that there wouldn’t be any books if not for Rahim Khan because he was the one who encouraged him to write when he was back in Kabul. When Amir went to see him, he says that Hassan was living with his family in Amir’s old house in Kabul. Few weeks after Rahim left, Taliban has come to the house.
Then Hassan told the Taliban that he was just looking after the house for Rahim but they said that he was a liar and a thief like all Hazaras. So they ordered Hassan to leave with his family by nightfall. He didn’t leave because of his undying loyalty to Amir’s family. Because of this, Taliban shoots him and kills him. In that process they also kill Hassan’s wife too.
Then Rahim tells Amir that Hassan was his half-brother and that makes his son Sohrab, his nephew. So he has to go rescue him from Taliban. So he decides to overcome his coward behavior and decides to rescue Sohrab while wearing a fake beard like a Taliban soldier. Then he found out that Taliban has kidnapped Sohrab from an orphanage so he had to confront the leader who controls Taliban in Kabul to give Sohrab back to him. So he managed to get an appointment to see him personally.
When he went, instead of the boss, he meets the second in command. Then he tells Amir to take off his beard. After that he asks him what happened to his great Baba. Amir gets confused by that then he says he recognized Amir when he saw him in the stadium. The second in command was Assef.
Amir then tells Assef that he will not leave without Sohrab, then he says “ok, take him”. But then he tells “of course, I didn’t say you could take him for free” and starts to beat Amir up so bad. Then Sohrab shoots Assef in the eye with a slingshot and they managed to escape without getting hurt.
Then he takes Sohrab with him to America and treats him like his own son. Sohrab couldn’t get used to that calm environment at first. Then in the last scene of the movie he goes to the park with his wife and Sohrab and he gets a kite and flies it with Sohrab. When he was doing it, he described how Hassan used to fly kites and he was the best kite flyer in Kabul. Then they manage to cut off a kite with theirs.
Then Amir asks “Do you want me to run that kite for you?” from Sohrab. It was exactly like how Hassan used to ask that from Amir. Then when Sohrab nodded yes, he says to Sohrab “For you, a thousand times over” and runs toward that kite. These two lines of dialog show the audience the circle of life. Then the movie ends as he was running toward that kite.
For me personally, this was a well written movie. There was nothing wrong with it. I tried my best to find one mistake throughout the movie but I couldn’t find any. The story was not confusing at all even though it was complicated. This movie managed to capture the suffering people from Kabul had to endure because of Russia and Taliban. It shows the audience that no one could live there feeling safe.
The director also managed to capture the slaughter that happens because of Taliban in mere minutes throughout the movie. I would recommend this movie for anyone because I strongly believe that this is a must watch.
