The Persian Version – Film Review
by Frank L

Director Maryam Keshavarz
Writer Maryam Keshavarz
Stars Layla Mohammadi, Niousha Noor, Kamand Shafieisabet

This film bestrides two different timelines and two different cultures. The central figure is twenty-something Leila (Layla Mohammadi). She is the daughter of Iranian immigrants who left Iran prior to the revolution in 1978. Leila was brought up in New York where her powerful mother Shireen (Niousha Noor) has done well in real estate while giving birth to eight sons! While the family has embraced many aspects of Western culture at heart it inevitably retains aspects of its Iranian cultural roots. In such a family, it is not surprising that the relationship between mother and daughter will be particularly fraught and these issues are exacerbated by the fact that Leila is attracted primarily to women. Leila lives in New York taking advantage of all the diversity that that city so freely offers. On a suitably wacky night out she has a brief encounter with a gay transvestite Maximilian (Tom Byrne).  As a result, her relationship with her mother Shireen is even more fraught. But Shireen too has a past which her grandmother Mamanjoon (Bella Warda) chooses to reveal to Leila.

The film weaves these clashing ingredients to create a family where mother and daughter have more in common than they realise.

Kesharvaz (Circumstance 2011) brings the family together as the father Alireza (Bijan Daneshmand) is about to have a heart transplant. The film captures the daily essence of life in New York particularly the life of a moderately successful immigrant family, the working wiles of a successful real estate executive and the zaniness of its nightlife. This initial part of the film stands in contrast to the grind of daily life in Iran and the challenges which a young, indeed a very young, Shireen had to face. What the director Kesharvaz manages to do is to weld these two very different cultural worlds and timelines together into a comprehensible whole. While there are male figures including Shireen’s husband, her many sons, and Maximilian they are in essence bit parts to the drama of Leila’s life and her relationship with Shireen.

Kesharvaz has created, with great style, a semi-autobiographical film. It is funny most of the time but other moments are quite intense. All the complexities of mother and daughter relationships are here, heightened by the fact that Leila is the sole daughter of immigrants from rural Iran who have settled in a city as free-wheeling as New York. It is a complicated, dissonant mix. This is a film that is to be admired and enjoyed for its well-observed storytelling and the clever way it brings together its many disparate elements. Above all, it is a fine insight into the relationship between a daughter and her mother and therefore tells a story of universal relevance. It deservedly won the audience award at Sundance in 2023.