The Persian Version is a multigenerational immigrant story that bites off a huge chunk of content that maybe it doesn’t have time to swallow. It primarily (usually) follows the Iranian-American daughter of immigrant parents and how she relates to her mom and deals with her own issues as we also learn about their family history.

This is a difficult film to review since there’s a lot right about it but there’s also too much of it. There are flashbacks that go on for a long time and have pretty poor pacing issues. But they can’t be removed since they are the exclamation point on the film’s generous heart. But it’s often hard to see the film’s point for all the trees we have to stumble through.

There’s so much story here and not enough time to tell it… but this shouldn’t have been a longer film due to pacing issues. It either needed to be pared back just enough to retain its message or turned into a generous season of tv.

And I was deeply bored at unfortunate times, just waiting for the digressions to get to the point. And they don’t always manage that. This feels like such a personal (if not downright autobiographical) film that the writer/director couldn’t remove anything. And maybe she shouldn’t have had to… but something felt like it needed trimming.

I want to give this movie three stars but I can’t. But at least I’m not giving it the two stars I thought it deserved at times. That’s a testament to the final moments of the film (and the great Girls Just Wanna Have Fun dance number… can’t forget that).

Score: 74