MY FAVOURITE CAKE Discovery

Barred from traveling internationally and facing a court case as a result of making this film, Iranian filmmaking duo Maryam Moghaddam and Behtash Sanaeeha (BALLAD OF A WHITE COW) bravely imagine the possibility of freedom and pleasure within their homeland’s repressive regime. Seventy-year-old widow Mahin lives a solitary lifestyle with her daughter having emigrated long ago and friends too busy to keep up with regular dinner parties. At the encouragement of her friends at one of these rare get-togethers, Mahin finally ventures outdoors to find love from a chance encounter. Defying the sanctioned image of the Iranian woman, Moghaddam and Sanaeeha fearlessly show the reality of Mahin’s true spirit — a woman who lives a rich interior life, who dances and drinks in her apartment without a hijab and asserts herself against the morality police. Winner of the FIPRESCI Prize and Prize of the Ecumenical Jury at the Berlin Film Festival, MY FAVOURITE CAKE tenderly embraces a vision of vitality, however brief. –Anna Li