‘Another Time – Nahid Hassanzadeh’

In the presence of Nahid Hassanzadeh, the Director & Fery Malek-Madani, the producer

The film’s lingering imagery of a bleak and snowy Iranian countryside intensifies the tale it tells of rigid traditionalism impounding itself upon a young set of shoulders. Ghadir, a chemical plant worker, arrested for protesting against being unpaid for over a year, returns from his prison sentence and is confronted with the fact that his daughter, Somayeh, has given birth to a child out of wedlock. He is forced into conflict with the immoveable traditional morality of his rural community, which condemns Somayeh on all sides, and with unapologetic hostility. Somayeh’s young body and mind are dragged through a maelstrom created by these age-old laws, beautifully portrayed by actress Shaghayegh Kamandi and director Nahid Hassanzadeh, while her father, standing solitary on a windswept hill above the town is torn by his loyalties to community versus family. Uncomfortable scenes of religious conservativism, physical violence, misogynist slander are offset poignantly by quiet moments between young mother and child in this bare, defiant film.