Revel in Ana Lily Amirpour's ‘Bad City' where the luscious chiaroscuro of depravity meets style and substance in the first ‘Iranian vampire western' -coined by the UCLA graduate with her feature directorial debut. Like a deconstructed horror film, “Agwhaan” glides across a spectrum of genres in a way that presents some incredibly visceral iconography that feels eerily familiar but also hauntingly avant-garde all at once.
In the stillness of the night, Arash (Arash Marandi) toils to make ends meet supporting the ills of his heroin-addicted father Hossein (Marshall Manesh). A clash with the village ne'er-do-well, Saeed (Dominic Rains proving the point with the word ‘sex' tattooed on his neck), leaves the former without his car as payment for the arrears Hossein owed the drug dealers. After obtaining some jewellery in unscrupulous ways, Arash seeks out the drug-dealing wise guy to get his car back, only to find the man dead,...
In the stillness of the night, Arash (Arash Marandi) toils to make ends meet supporting the ills of his heroin-addicted father Hossein (Marshall Manesh). A clash with the village ne'er-do-well, Saeed (Dominic Rains proving the point with the word ‘sex' tattooed on his neck), leaves the former without his car as payment for the arrears Hossein owed the drug dealers. After obtaining some jewellery in unscrupulous ways, Arash seeks out the drug-dealing wise guy to get his car back, only to find the man dead,...
- 4/24/2023
- by Leon Overee
- AsianMoviePulse
Sony Pictures Classics has secured distribution rights to “Shayda,” which won the Audience Award at Sundance’s World Cinema Dramatic Competition last month.
The distributor holds all media rights in North America, Latin America, Benelux, Eastern Europe, Portugal, the Middle East, and Turkey.
Executive produced by Cate Blanchett’s Dirty Films, the first feature by writer-director Noora Niasari follows Shayda and her six-year-old daughter Mona, two Iranians living in Australia. After divorcing her husband Hossein, Shayda moves them into a women’s shelter, where she struggles to adjust to her new life while trying to create one for Mona. Encouraged by the start of the Persian New Year, Nowruz, to embrace her newfound freedom, Shayda is thrown off when Hossein wins visitation rights, raising the possibility that he’ll attempt to take his daughter back to Iran.
Also Read:
Zach Cregger and New Line Biggest Deal Not Made at Sundance...
The distributor holds all media rights in North America, Latin America, Benelux, Eastern Europe, Portugal, the Middle East, and Turkey.
Executive produced by Cate Blanchett’s Dirty Films, the first feature by writer-director Noora Niasari follows Shayda and her six-year-old daughter Mona, two Iranians living in Australia. After divorcing her husband Hossein, Shayda moves them into a women’s shelter, where she struggles to adjust to her new life while trying to create one for Mona. Encouraged by the start of the Persian New Year, Nowruz, to embrace her newfound freedom, Shayda is thrown off when Hossein wins visitation rights, raising the possibility that he’ll attempt to take his daughter back to Iran.
Also Read:
Zach Cregger and New Line Biggest Deal Not Made at Sundance...
- 2/14/2023
- by Harper Lambert
- The Wrap
It’s a Sunday evening in London in early February and two-time Oscar winner Cate Blanchett is freshly changed from an award show when she logs onto a Zoom with Noora Niasari, the writer and director behind “Shayda,” the powerful Sundance award-winning film executive produced by Dirty Films, the production company co-founded by Blanchett.
“I’m so happy. It’s fantastic. It’s great for Todd [Field], it’s so great for the film,” Blanchett says as she fields congratulations on accepting the London Critics Circle’s best actress prize. “And I just read that Viola Davis became an Egot!”
The topic of awards is the conversation du jour this time of year because awards are capital in the entertainment business — and Blanchett knows a thing or two about this topic, with eight Oscar nominations to her name. Ultimately, the accolades help a film reach audiences far and wide. In the case of “Shayda,...
“I’m so happy. It’s fantastic. It’s great for Todd [Field], it’s so great for the film,” Blanchett says as she fields congratulations on accepting the London Critics Circle’s best actress prize. “And I just read that Viola Davis became an Egot!”
The topic of awards is the conversation du jour this time of year because awards are capital in the entertainment business — and Blanchett knows a thing or two about this topic, with eight Oscar nominations to her name. Ultimately, the accolades help a film reach audiences far and wide. In the case of “Shayda,...
- 2/14/2023
- by Angelique Jackson
- Variety Film + TV
Maryam Keshavarz, Noora Niasari and Sierra Urich have films at Sundance this year, two narrative features and a doc, wrenching and joyful family stories of the Iranian diaspora threaded with longing, regret and rebellion. None deal with ongoing civil unrest there, but it colors the filmmakers’ work and life.
“The woman-led revolution in Iran broke out while we were directing the film and it really propelled us to finish it. [It] gave us a unique energy so that we could amplify the stories of Iranian women,” said Niasari. Her film Shayda follows an Iranian woman living in Australia who flees to a shelter with her frightened six-year-old daughter to escape her husband, Hossein, whom she wants to divorce. Shayda is Niasari’s mother. “My mother’s story, my story, are [like] millions of our stories, and I just hope our...
“The woman-led revolution in Iran broke out while we were directing the film and it really propelled us to finish it. [It] gave us a unique energy so that we could amplify the stories of Iranian women,” said Niasari. Her film Shayda follows an Iranian woman living in Australia who flees to a shelter with her frightened six-year-old daughter to escape her husband, Hossein, whom she wants to divorce. Shayda is Niasari’s mother. “My mother’s story, my story, are [like] millions of our stories, and I just hope our...
- 1/22/2023
- by Jill Goldsmith
- Deadline Film + TV
Within the unassuming exterior of a suburban house, the central setting in Shayda, a handful of women are working to reclaim their lives. The title character is one of them, determined to leave an abusive marriage with her young daughter and not return to their native Iran. Unfolding in 1995 Australia, Noora Niasari’s debut feature is drawn from her experiences as a child in such a shelter and is at its core a tribute to the writer-director’s mother. Fueling the drama is the quiet ferocity of Zar Amir Ebrahimi’s performance and her tender chemistry with Selina Zahednia as 6-year-old Mona.
Early scenes are thick with shadows, a sense of danger lurking. Four years earlier, Shayda moved to Australia with Hossein (Osamah Sami) and their toddler daughter so that he could attend medical school. A student too, she has stopped wearing the hijab and embraced the relative freedoms of a Western woman,...
Early scenes are thick with shadows, a sense of danger lurking. Four years earlier, Shayda moved to Australia with Hossein (Osamah Sami) and their toddler daughter so that he could attend medical school. A student too, she has stopped wearing the hijab and embraced the relative freedoms of a Western woman,...
- 1/20/2023
- by Sheri Linden
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Writer-director Noora Niasari’s debut feature, Shayda, is a deeply personal tale of trauma and tenacity. With a script mining from Niasari’s lived experiences, the film centers on the titular character Shayda (Zar Amir Ebrahimi), an Iranian woman living in an Australian women’s shelter with her 6-year-old daughter. With the Iranian New Year upon them, Shayda attempts to forge a new life for them after her recent divorce from abusive husband Hossein. However, when a judge grants him visitation rights with his daughter, Shayda becomes increasingly concerned that her ex-husband will kidnap Mona and flee back to their native Iran. Cinematographer […]
The post “I Opted for a Low-key Chiaroscuro Look”: Dp Sherwin Akbarzadeh on Shayda first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
The post “I Opted for a Low-key Chiaroscuro Look”: Dp Sherwin Akbarzadeh on Shayda first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
- 1/20/2023
- by Filmmaker Staff
- Filmmaker Magazine - Blog
Writer-director Noora Niasari’s debut feature, Shayda, is a deeply personal tale of trauma and tenacity. With a script mining from Niasari’s lived experiences, the film centers on the titular character Shayda (Zar Amir Ebrahimi), an Iranian woman living in an Australian women’s shelter with her 6-year-old daughter. With the Iranian New Year upon them, Shayda attempts to forge a new life for them after her recent divorce from abusive husband Hossein. However, when a judge grants him visitation rights with his daughter, Shayda becomes increasingly concerned that her ex-husband will kidnap Mona and flee back to their native Iran. Cinematographer […]
The post “I Opted for a Low-key Chiaroscuro Look”: Dp Sherwin Akbarzadeh on Shayda first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
The post “I Opted for a Low-key Chiaroscuro Look”: Dp Sherwin Akbarzadeh on Shayda first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
- 1/20/2023
- by Filmmaker Staff
- Filmmaker Magazine-Director Interviews
Five years ago, Noora Niasari asked her mother to write a memoir in order to fill in the gaps of some fuzzy childhood memories. The Iranian Australian director had been just five years old when her mother fled an abusive relationship and left her entire community to raise Niasari on her own in a foreign country.
An early draft of “Shayda,” which opens the World Cinema Dramatic Competition at Sundance on Friday, was based on that memoir and tracks Niasari’s mother’s life from her arranged marriage in Iran as a teenager to finding independence in Australia with her child. The resulting film stars “Holy Spider” breakout Zar Amir-Ebrahimi as Shayda, and Selina Zahednia as her daughter, Mona.
“There are a lot of fictional elements within the current version of the film, but it’s very much grounded in the emotional truth of our experience,” the Melbourne-based Niasari tells Variety.
An early draft of “Shayda,” which opens the World Cinema Dramatic Competition at Sundance on Friday, was based on that memoir and tracks Niasari’s mother’s life from her arranged marriage in Iran as a teenager to finding independence in Australia with her child. The resulting film stars “Holy Spider” breakout Zar Amir-Ebrahimi as Shayda, and Selina Zahednia as her daughter, Mona.
“There are a lot of fictional elements within the current version of the film, but it’s very much grounded in the emotional truth of our experience,” the Melbourne-based Niasari tells Variety.
- 1/19/2023
- by Manori Ravindran
- Variety Film + TV
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