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The Persian Version review: a joyful comedy spanning three generations

The Persian Version review: a joyful comedy spanning three generations

Maryam Keshavarz’s semi-autobiographical comedy spins around three generations of Iranian women and two medical complications – the patriarch (in the loosest sense) Ali Reza (Bijan Daneshmand) undergoes heart surgery as his daughter Leila (Layla Mohammadi) gets pregnant after a one-night stand with an actor. She’s queer, he’s in drag, it happens. Leila’s stylish Persian mother Shireen (Niousha Noor) rages against her daughter but the film slips back in time to her own escape from Iran and a family scandal, cued up with relish by the unshockable grandma Mamanjoon (Bella Ward). Keshavarz’s joyful film is her defiant response to Trump’s Muslim ban and her personal exile from her homeland after her first feature, Circumstance, about two Iranian teenage girls attracted to each other, was banned.


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