A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night is an uncompromising and smartly-concentrated vampire western which also communicates bold themes on gender roles and America’s entertainment culture.
Based on her own short film of the same name, A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night is not only writer/director Ana Lily Amirpour’s shocking astute feature debut, but also the kind of film Iran has needed to make for years. An vampire western that’s decidedly its own animal, this is a genre film which not only respects its elders, but finds dynamic ways of dissecting the country’s culture and ways of life.
Centered on the ghost-town of Bad City, where junkies, drug dealers and other low-life citizens run amok, a quiet vampire known only as The Girl (Sheila Vand) pounces on the deprived men of her community. Alluring them with her beauty, she does her part to participate in a city already defined by its loneliness and criminal activity, but her practices, of course, serve a more reasonable purpose. Unfazed by her single lifestyle, her life takes an unexpected turn when she meets Arash (Arash Marandi), a cool, high-collared jacket-wearing rebel crippled by his heroin-addicted father Hossein (Marshall Manesh). Through him, the vampire discovers the advantages, and disadvantages, of kinship.
A film as cold blooded and calculated as its female protagonist, A Girl Walks Home is a chillingly observant tale, one that obediently focuses itself on switched gender roles. For as often as it criticizes American and its own Iranian culture, though, its politics never get muddled or overbearly shoved into its narrative. Rather, they find organic means of complicating and expanding upon its themes. Amirpour’s story has a great admiration for genre films of the past, communicated beautifully by its black-and-white camerawork from cinematographer Lyle Vincent. But her thoughtfully persistent modern-day themes, she gives her movie an appropriate timeliness and striking relevance.
That said, however, her heartless storytelling is both one of the film’s greatest strengths and weaknesses. By being so unremorseful, Amirpour distances herself from the overly sympathetic vampire flicks of today. This detachment from society and humanity is what has defined the genre, and it’s comforting to see the director not only know this but relish it. When trying to push forward the relationship of the leads, however, this lack of heart takes from their eventual impact, making the whole endeavor feel too impersonal to a fault. Even as the emotions as guarded masterfully and the characters develop in interesting manners, there’s no sense of attachment for their well-being.
These cuts and brushes on its arms are sadly more apparent as A Girl Walks Home progresses. While certainly talented and thematically mature beyond her years, Amirpour still needs to develop her longer-form voice. Her background in short films showcases her balance for being patient, while never becoming too methodical in her pacing. Her debut film, though, feels slim to a fault. In particular, while the nuanced developing relationship between Arash and his female companion grows organically, as the end comes along, it feels too inconclusive. It’s as if there’s a needed scene on the cutting room floor —or perhaps one never written—showing their commitment for one another and why they decide upon their final plight.
Amirpour is one of the few up-and-coming filmmakers who should expand her running time, carefully continuing to explore her characters and settings. She has a distinctly intimate vision, but also a stirringly passionate voice that somehow coincides to make a thumping pulse of invigoration and somberness. Her elegance pared with boldness should take her far in the right hands.
As a mission-driven political drama that, while occasionally laced with dark humor, is solely dependent on telling the story of its characters within this diverse subgenre, for all the technical success it brings, it would be nothing without its leads. Thankfully, Marandi and Vand are not only capable, but reliably discrete yet steadfast in their performances. As their characters’ relationship depends heavily on quiet moments together, their distilled interactions are captivating for all the reasons most romance-driven films fail. They relish the excommunicated alienation their relationship brings, but their eyes — illuminated wonderfully by Cedric Cheung-Lau’s high-contrast lightning — tells everything and anything the audience needs to know.
A Girl Walks Home’s has the swift and boldly original storytelling of a filmmaker brave and talented enough to excel and dominate. Equally as commanding is Vand, an actress to watch for in the years to come. Akin to Let the Right One In meets Persepolis, with nods to Nosferatu and Rebel Without a Cause, this debut is respectfully in tune with its peers, but decidedly its own creature haunting the night.
Rating: 3.5/5 stars
