70
Has striking moments comparable to the best of Neshat's potent imagery. But the script jettisons most of the book's more powerful sections.
What are people saying?
What are critics saying?
80
Neshat employs dialogue that is often didactic, but that weakness is forgiven in the face of stellar acting from the ensemble and gorgeously composed and shot images.
70
Shirin Neshat, best known for her video installations, makes her feature directing debut with this elegant, often moving story of four Iranian women trapped by their circumstances in the turmoil preceding the 1953 coup.
83
Entertainment Weekly by Lisa Schwarzbaum
Stronger on beautiful imagery than on narrative flow.
50
New Orleans Times-Picayune by Mike Scott
Unfortunately, on the way to delivering that message, it becomes weighted down by its own dreary self-importance.
50
The Globe and Mail (Toronto) by Rick Groen
Although the entire film is beautifully framed and shot, especially the surreal sequences, precious little coheres into anything resembling a compelling narrative.
80
The New York Times by Stephen Holden
With its intense chiaroscuro and meticulous manipulation of color that ranges from stark black and white to richer, shifting hues in scenes set in a metaphorical orchard, the film surpasses even Michael Haneke's "White Ribbon" in the fierce beauty and precision of its cinematography (by Martin Gschlacht).
70
Boxoffice Magazine by Wade Major
A powerful and provocative look at the seismology of the Iranian social order and the connective tissue that sustains Iranian women in particular.