French critic writes on ‘Rona, Azim’s Mother’

French critic Claudio Marchi has published a review on Iran-Afghanistan co-production ‘Rona, Azim’s Mother’.

Marchi believes that the movie, written and directed by Jamshid Mahmoudi, is an exploration of Afghan refugees’ daily life in Iran. The movie, delicately and at the same time mercilessly, portrays the life of these refugees.

In the critic’s view, this is the story of a man who faces the question of life and death. The life of Azim and Farough is torn between the past (cultural and family heritage) and a better future (European dream and integration in Iran’s system). Indeed, both their past and future are a hostage of a bureaucratic context.

The mentioned review reads: “media constantly screen pictures of mass immigration; but what we soon forget is the stories behind those faces which are present in the photos. Neither a dreamed future for the refugees nor the bridges to the past, which they have to break, are reflected in these stories”.

Marchi adds: “Mahmoudi in this movie which is his second feature film narrates one of these stories. Mahmoudi’s Mise-en-scène style and selected themes (which are refined and have a hue of neorealism) remind us of his previous film ‘A Few Cubic Meters of Love’ (2014)”.

‘Rona, Azim’s Mother’ is the story of a family who has fled the war and faced a lot of hardships.

The 89-minute flick narrates the life of Azim, an Afghan refugee who lives in Tehran along with his family and works at Tehran municipality at night.

Being the family’s head, he must choose between his own life and his mother’s whom he claims is the most important one in his life, as he found out that she is in dire need of kidney transplant.

The movie which was selected to represent Afghanistan at the 2019 Oscars was screened at the seventh Iranian Film Festival in Paris. The fest was held from June 12-18.

The flick that is a co-production of Iran and Afghanistan has received a number of International awards including the Grand Prix of the International Jury and the INALCO (Asian Studies University in Paris) award at the 25th Vesoul International Film Festival of Asian Cinema in France. It also went on screen at the 29th Annual Festival of Films from Iran in Chicago, the US.

The film stars Mohsen Tanabandeh, Mojtaba Pirzadeh, Fatemeh Hosseini, Fereshteh Hosseini and Fatemeh Mirzaee.

PR/MMF