Rating: R | Runtime: 107 minutes
Release Date: October 20th, 2023 (USA)
Studio: Sony Pictures Classics
Director(s): Maryam Keshavarz
Writer(s): Maryam Keshavarz

You weren’t gay on Halloween.

Living between two cultures at constant war with each other since birth, Leila (Layla Mohammadi) ultimately provides both conservative America and Iran something upon which they can agree … to hate: homosexuality. It’s why she’s estranged from her mother (Niousha Noor’s Shireen) and why neither is willing to even consider the process of reconciliation. If not for the news that her father’s (Bijan Daneshmand’s Ali Reza) name came up for a heart transplant, there may not have been an excuse to try. Or, more accurately, to be forced to acknowledge the other’s presence at all.

An autobiographical comedy writer/director Maryam Keshavarz crafted as an emotional balm for the political powder keg that is Arab-American and Muslim existence in a post-9/11 world, The Persian Version uses its idiosyncratic structure (multiple timelines, a second narrator taking over, fourth wall breaking, and Cyndi Lauper dance interludes only scratch the surface) to really put its focus on the mother-daughter relationship at its center. The whole living between New York and Shiraz thing is more anecdotal flavor than anything else. A lot of what’s on-screen is. Everything except Leila v. Shireen.

As such, things can get a bit narratively reductive despite just how much content Keshavarz packs in. Some of that’s intentional (Leila’s seven brothers being labeled stereotypes and then living up to the caricatures). Some of it isn’t (it’s nice to see a positive representation of sexual fluidity in a film, but it always seems to be a punch line here rather than an empowering portrayal). Ali Reza is there as a catalyst. So is Mamanjoon (Bella Warda and Sachli Gholamalizad depending on timeframe) and “Hedwig” (Tom Byrne). That’s not to say they aren’t also relevant. They simply find themselves disappearing when it’s convenient to let their actions drive Leila and Shireen forward instead.

That’s kind of the game, though. Leila and Shireen are the women cutting their own paths. Succeeding despite the male-driven world to which they were born. That they let men’s actions push them to be better, stronger, and more resolute is part of the message. The lesson, however, is that you can’t also let that anger and determination blind you from each other. It’s the same conservative norms Shireen battles against that put her at odds with her daughter’s sexuality. And it’s Leila’s rebellious nature that prevents her from seeing her mother hasn’t adopted those traits as much as exploited them for success.

The result is entertaining and not without its dramatic reveals. A long-kept secret is partially responsible for the hostility between these women, but, much like Leila realizing her mother didn’t single-handedly ruin her marriage to Elena like she wants to believe, it’s really just an excuse to ignore Shireen’s own guilt in the matter. Those revelations come quick. I would even say they’re rushed to the detriment of the whole despite that speed helping the emotional resonance of some sentimental heartstring tugs surrounding an abrupt fade to black. So, while a good time was had, I can’t shake the sense that there was potential for so much more.

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Layla Mohammadi as LEILA, Niousha Noor as SHIRIN in THE PERSIAN VERSION. Photo credit: Yiget Eken. Courtesy of Sony Pictures Classics.