Sundance 2023: Mommy Dearest

Two Sundance premieres consider the trials, tensions and tribulations of motherhood.

The Sundance Film Festival, North America’s biggest and splashiest celebration of independent film returns to the mountains in Park City, Utah for the first in-person gathering since 2020. Buzzy titles, sub-freezing temperatures and a galaxy of stars popping down Park City’s ever busy Main Street are some of the sights that have made a comeback. Also making a welcome return to the programming is a title like The Persian Version, the kind of inclusive, feel-good but emotionally piercing dramedy that the Sundance Institute through its various artist programs has been known to support.

The Persian Version is the latest title from Iranian-American director Maryam Keshavarz who made a big splash at Sundance in 2013 with her feature debut Circumstance. This boundary pushing drama about teenage lesbians in Iran displeased pearl clutching officials and the film was promptly banned in Iran, with Keshavarz unable to visit the country since then. Keshavarz had previously won the Gold Teddy and Jury Prize at the Berlinale for her documentary short The Day I Died. This latest which Keshavarz dedicates to the women of Iran fighting and protesting for their rights, is her answer to popular immigrant stories of cinema such as The Godfather and Crazy Rich Asians. Only she updates the tropes with her biting culture commentary and political worldview.

Charming, complex yet lovingly detailed, The Persian Version playing in the U.S Dramatic competition could be described as a funny, often autobiographical look at an Iranian-American family in the New Jersey suburbs. But more specifically, it is the women in the family whom Keshavarz is more interested in and trains her empathetic gaze on. The film opens with Lelia, a young woman (Layla Mohammadi) attending a costume party in a scandalous self-made Burkini. This brash opening is direct commentary on the politics and culture of Iran and instantly sets the stage for the kind of racy romp Keshavarz is going for. One that involves fourth wall breaking characters, dizzying editing and a narrative that juggles multiple character arcs while jumping back and forth in time.

In lesser hands, The Persian Version might have collapsed on itself or resorted to cheap gags to score easily available points. It is a testament to Keshavarz’s skillset and firm grasp of the details of what it means to exist between cultures that the film soars instead. The Persian Version is something hard and soft at the same time. Keshavarz celebrates the universal complexities of mother daughter relationships while commenting on family dynamics and the specific struggles of immigrants and their spawn.

Where The Persian Version is ultimately warm and endearing in its pursuit of joy, Bad Behavior, another cross-cultural drama about a mother and her daughter seems structured to keep audiences at a firm distance. Directed by Alice Englert who also stars alongside Oscar winner Jennifer Connelly (Top Gun: Maverick), Bad Behaviour is an off-putting yet weirdly sweet two-hander. The film centers Connelly’s Lucy, a toxic middle-aged woman forever in search of an ever elusive zen and her daughter Dylan (Englert) who apparently has a lot of healing to do from maternal inflicted trauma.

While Dylan is at work- she’s a stunt coordinator on a film set in New Zealand- Lucy, a former child actor is on her way to yet another semi-silent retreat in the United States where she hopes to unpack some of her despair. Bad Behavior, playing in the international dramatic competition is constantly shifting tones and character motivations as the two difficult protagonists push each other’s buttons looking for any kind of response. They do this first from a distance and then eventually in the same space. Shuttling between New Zealand and Oregon, Bad Behavior deconstructs and reconstructs the relationship between Lucy and Dylan while eliciting the dangerous ways that trauma is handed down across generations.