True/False Films

Kick In Iran

In person: director Fatima Geza Abdollahyan

"Women are mostly rather soft, gentle, pretty and so on," a male journalist tells tae kwon do star Sarah Khoshjamal early on. "You must admit martial arts is an odd choice." That's the first time Iran's sexism pops up, but it's far from the last. Khoshjamal, the nation's first female Olympic qualifier, must brave it in both her daily interactions (a taxi driver overcharges her) and on the national stage (a religious official likens her to a prostitute). Director Fatima Geza Abdollahyan eschews the polemical in favor of the observational, but her intimate vérité portrait still proves capable of criticizing Iranian patriarchy with pinpoint accuracy and undermining our own misconceptions of Iran. In that regard, Kick in Iran represents a kick to the senses: a portrait of not just a woman at a crossroads but a nation as well. (KP)

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