Director: Reza Mirkarimi
Cast: Tooraj Alvand, Lale Marzban, Ali Akbar Osanloo, Safoora Khoshtinat, Mohsen Kiaei
Negahbane Shab is a 2022 Iranian drama film directed by Reza Mirkarimi, following a displaced rural man who takes a night-watchman post at an abandoned construction site and slowly discovers that the silence around him conceals something deeply unsettling.
What is Negahbane Shab about?
Rasoul is a farmer uprooted by drought, arriving in the city with little more than the hope of steady work. He lands a position as the sole guardian of a large construction complex after dark — a job that seems simple enough on the surface. But as the nights pass, small disturbances accumulate: sounds that should not be there, presences that flicker at the edge of visibility, and a mounting sense that the site harbors more than concrete and steel. Isolated from the world outside the perimeter walls, Rasoul struggles to separate rational explanation from creeping dread. Mirkarimi builds the tension incrementally, letting the environment itself become the antagonist as a man already worn down by life confronts forces he cannot name.
Cast & crew
Reza Mirkarimi, one of the most respected voices in Iranian arthouse cinema, both directs and shapes the material with his characteristic restraint. Tooraj Alvand carries the film's emotional weight as Rasoul, supported by Lale Marzban, Ali Akbar Osanloo, Safoora Khoshtinat, Mohsen Kiaei, Vishka Asayesh, Kiumars Pourahmad, and Fahimeh Hormozi in the surrounding ensemble.
Context & significance
For the Iranian diaspora, Negahbane Shab arrives bearing Mirkarimi's distinct signature — patient storytelling rooted in working-class Iranian experience, where social displacement and psychological unease are intertwined. The film sits within a proud tradition of Iranian social drama that uses understated genre elements to examine how ordinary people survive when the ground shifts beneath them. Diaspora audiences who carry memories of rural Iran, of migration to Iranian cities, or of the precarity that can follow drought and economic hardship, will find the film's emotional register immediately familiar. At 118 minutes, Mirkarimi gives the story room to breathe, trusting viewers to sit with ambiguity rather than demanding resolution.
Where & how to watch
Negahbane Shab is available on K-Time in its original Persian audio. Watch on the web, on your TV, or on your phone — no VPN needed, no geo-blocking, cancel anytime.