Okay, we're not going to lie. When we read the description of the Iranian movie in the SF Int'l Film Fest guide as "a gorgeous minimalist portrait of a woman crushed by indecision," it made us a little nervous. We tend to like our movies maximalist and chatty! More singing and dancing mermaids, please! But we love the stark look of Iranian films (the "gorgeous" part) and the movie was only 74 minutes, so what the hey?

Well, we're very pleased to report that the movie was actually quite engaging (we had kind of a nightmare vision of 74 minutes of watching a woman stare into a goldfish bowl or something, which was not the case), and spooled out like a mystery. Why is this woman Shahrzad so unhappy?

As you follow Shahrzad through her day, it becomes clear she's got a lot on her plate: she's stressed out at work, family members are ill, there's frantic messages on her answering machine from a romantic partner that she refuses to return, a friend is pregnant, someone has died, a neighbor keeps hogging the space in her parking place -- and all she wants to do is stare off into space. It becomes clear she's gotta make her mind up about something -- but what? And why can't she do it?

We kind of wanted to shake Shahrzad (hard) as the movie went on, but we can honestly say we were never once bored. Also, Tehran looks gorgeous -- a lot like LA.

A Few Days Later...