A disappointing series by a regime-affiliated Iranian director, adapted from a widely celebrated novel.
The first major flaw lies in the fact that the screenplay is not truly an adaptation-it's more of a word-for-word copy of the book. There's no creativity, no reinterpretation-just a literal transcription of the novel into a screenplay, which completely misses the spirit of what a meaningful adaptation should be.
The performances are equally underwhelming. The lead actress, Behnoush Tabatabaei, and her on-screen husband, Milad Keymaram, both deliver unconvincing performances, made worse by their completely unfit accents for the region their characters are from. It's baffling why the director insisted on casting two actors who clearly don't belong to the cultural or geographical background of the story. The result is both distracting and inauthentic.
"Savushun" is one of the most influential novels in modern Persian literature. It deserved a thoughtful and respectful adaptation. Instead, what we get is a director trying to slap his own signature on a story that doesn't belong to him-especially disturbing given that the original author is no longer alive to defend her work. Unsurprisingly, the public reaction has been largely negative.
