has received largely positive reviews from critics and audiences abroad. But the reception from viewers inside Iran has been mixed.
The film premiered in January at the Sundance Film Festival in Utah and won the US Dramatic Competition Audience Award.
It was released in theaters in New York and Los Angeles August 26, drawing a “freshness” rating of 76 percent from critics and 79 percent from the audience on RottenTomatoes.com, a popular website that aggregates critics’ reviews. The film will be appearing in a total of 53 theaters across the United States this month and will open in Canada next month.
The sites can be found on https://www.facebook.com/circumstancethemovie?sk= app_208195102528120.
The movie details the lives of three teenagers in Tehran as they attend underground parties flowing with alcohol, drugs, dancing and music. Shireen (Sarah Kazemy) and her upper-middle-class best friend Atafeh (Nikohl Boosheri) find their friendship blossoming into something sexual amid their extended late-night adventures in Tehran’s underground party scene.
Their rebellious exploits are pushing the boundaries of what is socially acceptable in Iranian society, leading them into trouble with the morality police that metes out harsh punishments.
But that is hardly the biggest complication in the lesbian love of Shireen and Atafeh. Things take an unexpected twist as Atafeh’s brother, Mehran (Reza Sixo Safai), also finds himself attracted to Shireen. A former drug addict, he comes out more religious and stoic after undergoing rehab and joining the morality police.
The film’s writer and producer, Maryam Keshavarz, 36, says she wanted to introduce an aspect of Iranian society that remains hidden to many outsiders.
“With any family in Iran there is this duality, their true face and what’s under the surface, and so a kind of schizophrenia is created. There’s a whole underground world that happens in Iranian society, and that’s what I wanted to explore,” she told The New York Times.
In the movie, the two female lovers find themselves fantasizing about being together in a high-end Dubai hotel. Bodies stripped down to the underwear complement the racy scenes as the lovers play out their fantasies.
Keshavarz was born to Iranian parents in New York, and grew up navigating around Brooklyn, Staten Island and New Jersey while spending summers with her cousins in Shiraz. The film, she says, draws heavily from her personal experiences and from what she observed in Iran.
The cast of the film is also comprised of Iranians who grew up in the West, prompting some critics within Iran to question the authenticity of the Farsi they speak in the movie. Actress Kazemy acknowledged that the cast spoke a Farsi “frozen in time” from before the revolution. A dialogue coach was brought in to try to update their language.
Keshavarz admits that nothing about the movie has been easy. For obvious reasons, she shot the film in Lebanon instead of Iran. She also had to be extraordinarily meticulous in her casting.
“You had to have two nationalities. You had to speak perfect Persian. You had to be over 18 but look under 18. And, oh yeah, they had to be good actors,” she told the Boston Globe.
Keshavarz had to navigate a complex set of political factors even in Lebanon. In submitting the script to the Lebanese authorities, the team dubbed the project merely as Keshavarz’s thesis film, not mentioning that it was set in Iran. The script was submitted to the authorities in Engilsh and the cast and crew were told not to say anything about the movie – not even on their Facebook accounts.
All this led to more than just a few close encounters with Lebanese authorities as they visited the set during the filming.
Iranian authorities wouldn’t allow the movie to be screened in Iran but, like most banned movies, it has made its way into the country illicitly. The first few Iranians who have seen the movie gave it mixed reviews.
“The relationships appear exaggerated and this confused storytelling makes the film unbelievable to the point where it seems that squeezing sex and the government’s suppressive violence and similar subjects is intended to make the film more exciting, as opposed to trying to approach a serious subject in Iran,” rights activist Mahboubeh Abbasgholizadeh told the Daily Beast.
The movie did resonate with some Iranian lesbians despite its shortcomings. “The scene where the woman she loves [Atafeh] marries her brother, and [Shireen] suffers for this is very real for me, as I experienced it in my own life,” said Maryam, whom the Daily Beast identified as an Iranian lesbian.
The film’s tackling of subjects taboo even in more open Western societies won it accolades among certain sections in the United States. It won the jury ward for best film at the LGBT-themed film festival, NewFest.
The 107-minute movie is rated R and has English language subtitles.