Author: KickingK
Date: Thursday September 10th, 2026
A Persian Hermione Grainger
A day, a long day, in the life of Ziba, as she celebrates her exam results with her friends. Ziba wants the day to be perfect (and has planned it in meticulous detail) before the end of the day and...
The film sets the stakes out right from the start but then let's Ziba make the choice to put all that to one side to spend her day with her friends. She doesn't want to be pitied, the film doesn't want us to pity her. The outcome isn't important, the day is, the day has to be perfect.
And, in a way, it is. It's long and never-ending, in the way that teenage days and teenage years are. Like it's going to last forever, only realising much, much later that it was all over in a blink of an eye.
Ziba and her friends are enjoyable company. Incredibly smart, impossibly beautiful, ridiculously giddy. So enjoyable that the film is comfortable letting us enjoy the day with Ziba, the drama isn't the focus, the day is, the experience is.
Part of that experience is the soundtrack. Part urban, abstract pop, part dream-like Iranian-flecked score, it's a constant, lush presence throughout the film.
But you can only hold back the rest of your life so long, the inevitable has to crash in before the end of the day. Reality bites, childhood ends, A lusher depiction of a teenage summer you'll struggle to find.
