A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night
2014
**½
Director: Ana Lily Amirpour
Cast: Sheila Vand, Arash Marandi, Marshall Manesh, Dominic Rains, Mozhan Marnò, Rome Shadanloo
A young man, whose father is a heroin addict, loses his beloved car to a drug dealer. Walking on the city's nocturnal streets, he meets a mysterious lonely woman, unaware that she is a vampire. Ana Lily Amirpour's dreamy Iranian vampire spaghetti western is set in an unspecified time and place. Everyone on screen speaks Persian but this city, with a population of about six, looks nothing like Iran. The film has a quiet and melancholic mood, a quirky soundtrack, and carefully designed black and white visuals, which reminded me of the works of Aki Kaurismäki and Jim Jarmusch. Although Amirpour's unusual concoction has an attractive surface, it has no substance whatsoever. When the characters move in stylised slow motion for 90 minutes, the lack of a proper story becomes glaring, not to mention sleep-enducing.
