Shayda

Shayda is an astonishing debut film. It lays bare the complex and at first subtle ways the husband tries to use and manipulate his 'beloved' wife and daughter, and the enormous resilience, strength, courage, adaptability, and intelligence the women, including the wife, the 6-year-old daughter, the shelter owner and the other women and children living there, require and display as they fight hard to preserve their joy and inner peace and retake control over their lives. The best possible performances, directing, cinematography, and writing. Incredibly inspiring and empowering despite the painful subject matter.

Best performance by Selina Zahednia child actor. Premiered at Sundance, Shayda centers on an Iranian woman trying to preserve normalcy during Nowruz for her 6 year old daughter in Australia, while trying to escape the manipulations of her separated, abusive husband. Shayda immediately feels personal, and it is director/writer Noora Niasari telling the story of her own mother. While the movie centers on the mother, the daughter's own eyes and experience are brought to life. A brief sequence filmed from the child's perspective is particularly chilling. While this story is intimate and personal as a moment, it also feels timely as Iranian women today courageously protest and risk their lives for rights .

Directed by Noora Niasari, Shayda narrates the experience of an Iranian immigrant (played well by Zar Amir Ebrahimi) in danger of losing her daughter to a possessive and violent husband (Osamah Sami). Supported by friends in a women's shelter run by the sympathetic Joyce (Leah Purcell), Shayda must carve out a new life for herself and her daughter Mona (Selina) free of the constraints of past. The story takes place over the celebration of the Iranian New Year (Nowruz).

The film was submitted to the Academy as Australia's entry for best International Film. It wasn't selected but it was nominated for nine AACTA awards and won for Best Casting. It's an impressive debut feature film from Niasari who won the Best Direction award from the Australian Directors Guild in 2023. Films like this have an important role to play in helping us understand the experience of migrants as well as breaking down prejudice. Broken relationships and their outcomes are common human experiences knowing no national, racial, political or religious boundaries.

Premiered at Sundance, Shayda centers on an Iranian woman trying to preserve normalcy during Nowruz for her 6 year old daughter in Australia, while trying to escape the manipulations of her separated, abusive husband. Shayda immediately feels personal, and it is director/writer Noora Niasari telling the story of her own mother. While the movie centers on the mother, the daughter's own eyes and experience are brought to life. A brief sequence filmed from the child's perspective is particularly chilling. While this story is intimate and personal as a moment, it also feels timely as Iranian women today courageously protest and risk their lives for rights richly deserved. Performances are stellar by Zar Amir Ebrahimi and child actor Selina Zahednia.

Shayda and her six-year-old daughter, Mona, attempt to find their freedom and footing in the world after fleeing from Iran to Australia to escape Hossein, an abusive husband and father. Shayda and Mona live in a secret shelter for women as the divorce and visitation rights are worked out. Hossein doesn't give up easily though. He uses all the considerable powers at his disposal to lure the mother and daughter back. Tricks, false promises of change, violence, and threats are all on the table as Hossein journeys from Iran to bring the women back. He will lure Mona alone if needed.

Writer and director Noora Niasari, present at this Canadian premiere screening at the Toronto International Film Festival, draws upon her own childhood experiences to craft this heart-rending and captivating thriller. Zar Amir Ebrahimi (Shayda) won the Best Actress award at Cannes for last year's Holy Spider. As Shayda she plays a similar role as in Holy Spider; a lone woman fighting the might of an authoritarian and male-dominated society (if she tackles Australia, next she can battle Iran, LOL)! Again, Zar Amir Ebrahimi is spectacular.

I wish that Niasari was better able, through imagery and dialogue, to emphasize her themes of rebirth, the Persian new year, and the fires of joy and love that burn away pain, but the results are good enough. May we always recognize such scumbags as Hossein from the beginning so that we can avoid them before they sink their claws into us. The film helps us recognize them with their hollow promises and their disguised yet unempathetic nature.