A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night is being marketed as “The first Iranian Vampire Western.” It has elements of film noir, Western, horror, and romance. It’s finally available on iTunes and will be available on DVD April 21. I adored this movie – it’s a quirky romance as well as a subversive feminist horror movie with minimal gore but lots of suspense and an amazing amount of dry humor.

The plot is pretty simple. A Girl With No Name walks the streets of Bad City at night, her open chador billowing behind her like a cape. She watches the actions of the other characters, who include Arash. Arash is introduced slouching along walls, Western movie music playing in the background, in jeans and a white T-Shirt, talking tough about his fancy car. He might style himself after James Dean, but he’s all sweetness and fragility. He’s a puppy (not literally). Arash is saddled with a junkie Dad who is in debt to a gangster named Saeed. Saeed is so incredibly skeevy that he has the word “SEX” tattooed across his throat. He’s a joy to loathe. Saeed is a drug dealer who doubles as a pimp for Atti and who cheats her and abuses her. Atti is lonely, bitter, and worried about getting older. There’s also a plot moppet with a skateboard who, like The Girl, sees all kinds of things that he shouldn’t. Oh, also, there’s a cat, known as Mr. Cat. The movie is worth watching just for Mr. Cat.

 

The Girl’s ruthlessness is matched only by her empathy, and she has a hell of a time getting much to eat since she’s choosy about it. Actress Sheila Vand has very few lines of dialogue, but she an incredibly expressive face, and each encounter between her and other characters is suspenseful. Will she hug them? Talk to them? Have sex with them? Kill them? She often seems so precariously poised on decision that she really could go any direction, which means that we are always in suspense.

Arash and The Girl meet cute (SO CUTE OMG) and they begin a very strange and delicate relationship. They barely talk at all. They both like music. They both keep odd hours. Other than that, there’s no particular reason to root for them as a couple, but you do anyway, because Arash’s emotional generosity, and their mutual loneliness, and her tentative trust, are so endearing. This is very much a movie about loneliness, and Arash and The Girl offer each other an out. It’s a beautiful relationship because it’s so tenuous, and because they are both people who might never have hoped for an escape, so they see this as an unbelievable, miraculous possibility – one which they both crave and doubt.

 

No one in this movie gets a backstory and there are many unanswered questions. What’s The Girl’s name? How long has she been alive? Does she travel a lot to get food? Does she have the usual vampire weaknesses? We don’t know, which I rather liked. She’s a figure of mystery from start to finish.  You should also know that the movie is slow paced. People take what seems like years to turn their heads slightly to the side. The dialogue is minimal and it’s all in Persian. There’s very little gore and not much in the way of jump scares. It’s a movie about emotion, not action.

It’s also a movie in which imagery is used to sublime effect. This film is shot in gorgeous, carefully composed black and white. Every single frame of the movie looks iconic. There are visual and musical traces of Western, noir, and horror, and it’s all set in a story of subversion of gender roles and expectation. The Girl who indeed walks home alone at night is not the person in peril. The chador both conceals and menaces (one of my favorite shots is of The Girl riding a skateboard with her chador flowing out behind her).

 

The Girl is an avenging angel but she and Arash are also both damsels in distress (in a manner of speaking).  They are both lonely souls permanently poised on the brink of disaster. Another character, Rockabilly, never speaks, but dances joyfully with a balloon. What’s Rockabilly’s story? What’s her purporse in the narrative? I see the character as a symbol of unexpected joy and beauty, and of seizing the chance to be who you want to be.

The fun of this movie lies in the constant surprises, the gorgeous music and visuals, and the after-effect. When the movie is over, you will want to talk about it. I love movies that lead to discussion and there are so many ways discussions of this movie could go. It’s a movie to make you laugh, cringe, dream, and think. Just be prepared to take your time – the movie isn’t long, but everything takes place slowly and quietly.

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A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night is available to rent or buy at iTunes and Amazon Instant Video. The DVD and Blu-Ray will be released on 21 April in the US; you can pre-order at Amazon, BN, and other retailers.