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Tehranto 2023 Movie Review
Two students from very different Persian backgrounds begin a complicated relationship in Tehranto. Sharon Moridi (Mo Zeighami) is young woman, who has had a very westernized upbringing by Iranian-immigrant parents Fred (Ali Badshah) and Tessa (Mahsa Ghorbankarimi), complete with Sharon using a westernized form of her real name Shirin. Sharon is also being groomed by her parents for a career in real estate, despite her artistic ambitions. One day Sharon literally runs into Badi Alavi (Sammy Azero), a pre-med student who has deeper connections with his Persian heritage, having only immigrated from Iran 13 years prior. Despite initially disliking each other, Sharon and Badi soon begin a relationship, however their cultural differences threaten to divide their union.
Tehranto is a Persian-Canadian romantic comedy from first-time writer-director Faran Moradi. As explained by the film’s quirky Narrator (Navid Negahban), there are two types of Iranian immigrants – those who came before and after the revolution in the country. It is these cultural differences that sets the stage for the very Romeo and Juliet romance between Sharon and Badi, during which they both also learn to grow as individuals.
While Tehranto follows many of the cliches of romantic comedies, the film also acts as a social commentary about what it means to be an immigrant living in Canada. There is even one point in the film, where Badi questions the hypocrisy of Canada saying they are a multicultural country, despite the history of cultural genocide against the First Nation’s people. Obviously the cultural divide between Sharon and Badi eventually drives a wedge between them, but Tehranto ultimately ends up being more about the protagonists’ individual growth, despite the very ambiguous final moments.