Amina Maher

Letter to My Mother

Amina Maher

A daughter pushes at the bounds of her relationship with her mother as she unpicks the psychological consequences of the violence she suffered.

Ten

Abbas Kiarostami

Mania Akbari, Amina Maher

A visual social examination in the form of ten conversations between a driving woman and her various pick-ups and hitchhikers.

10 + 4 (Dah be alaveh chahar)

Mania Akbari

Mania Akbari, Amina Maher

After casting painter and video artist Mania Akbari as the central figure of his groundbreaking Ten (2002), and then witnessing her outstanding debut as a feature film director in 20 Fingers (2004), Abbas Kiarostami urged her to direct a sequel to the film. In Dah be alaveh Chahar (10 + 4), though, circumstances are different: Mania is fighting cancer. She has undergone surgery; she has lost her hair following chemotherapy and no longer wears the compulsory headscarf; and sometimes she is too weak to drive. So the camera follows her to record conversations with friends and family in different spaces, from the gondola she had famously used in her first feature to a hospital bed.