Director: Kaveh Mazaheri
Cast: Azadeh Abadpour, Mohammadhossein Ziksari, Sonia Sanjari
Retouch is a 2017 Iranian short film directed by Kaveh Mazaheri, running just twenty minutes yet delivering one of the most quietly unsettling portraits of a marriage in crisis that Iranian cinema has produced in recent years. The film premiered internationally and earned widespread attention on the festival circuit.
What is Retouch about?
Maryam is a woman living inside the suffocating silence of a marriage that has long since hollowed her out. One ordinary afternoon, an accident inside their apartment places her husband in sudden, desperate need of her help. In that frozen moment — a few seconds that stretch into an eternity — Maryam makes a choice. She does not reach for the phone. She does not move toward him. She simply stands and watches as events take their course. The film unfolds with almost no dialogue, letting gesture, space, and stillness carry the full weight of what is happening and what has already happened, long before this afternoon began.
The K-Time take
Mazaheri constructs the film with a rigorous economy of means: fixed camera, sparse sound design, and an exceptional lead performance by Azadeh Abadpour that communicates years of accumulated feeling without a single word of explanation. The restraint is the point — the film trusts its audience to feel the moral complexity rather than spelling it out, and that trust is exactly what makes it linger long after the screen goes dark.
Cast & crew
Kaveh Mazaheri, the director, has established himself as a sharp observer of domestic life and gender dynamics in contemporary Iran. Azadeh Abadpour carries the film entirely on her performance, conveying interior life through physicality alone. Mohammadhossein Ziksari and Sonia Sanjari round out the small cast in this tightly contained chamber piece.
Context & significance
Short films have long been a proving ground for Iranian filmmakers who navigate the particular pressures of state production culture, and Retouch belongs to a distinguished line of Iranian shorts that use domestic space as a pressure cooker for social commentary. For diaspora viewers who grew up watching the silence around gender and marriage treated as something to be managed rather than examined, this film can land as both recognition and catharsis. It speaks directly to the experience of women whose inner lives have been made invisible — a theme with profound resonance for Iranian communities wherever they have settled.
Where & how to watch
Retouch is available on K-Time with original Persian audio. No VPN is needed and there is no geo-blocking — watch on the web, your TV, or your phone. A K-Time subscription lets you cancel anytime.