Director: Kamal Tabrizi
Cast: Leila Hatami, Parsa Pirouzfar, Behzad Farahani
Sheida is a 1999 Iranian drama directed by Kamal Tabrizi, set against the shadow of the Iran-Iraq War. The film follows a wounded veteran and a young nurse whose chance meeting in a recovery ward becomes the center of an intimate, quietly affecting story about healing, endurance, and unexpected human connection.
What is Sheida about?
Farhad, a soldier blinded by a wartime injury, is moved to a temporary field hospital to begin his long road to recovery. There he meets Sheida, a nurse whose steady compassion and calm demeanor set her apart from the grief that surrounds them both. What starts as routine care slowly becomes something more layered — Farhad is struck by her patience, while Sheida finds herself drawn to his quiet resilience. The film keeps its emotional stakes understated, letting circumstance and proximity do the work that words cannot. The war remains an offscreen presence — its damage visible in Farhad's blindness, its weight carried in every corridor of the ward.
Cast & crew
Leila Hatami leads the film with the restrained warmth she brought to Iranian cinema throughout the 1990s, grounding Sheida as a character of genuine interior life. Parsa Pirouzfar plays Farhad with a controlled stillness that suits the role's physical limitations. Behzad Farahani rounds out the principal cast. Director Kamal Tabrizi, known for his work across Iranian genre and drama, brought the project to screen the same year as his beloved comedy Leili is with Me.
Context & significance
Films about the Iran-Iraq War have long occupied a central place in Iranian cinema, but Sheida approaches the subject through the quieter register of domestic feeling rather than battlefield spectacle. For diaspora viewers who grew up with stories of that era — whether from family, literature, or earlier war films — this movie offers something softer: the aftermath, the hospital room, the personal cost that outlasts the conflict itself. Romance braided through wartime recovery was a recognizable mode in late-1990s Iranian film, and Sheida fits that tradition while centering the nurse's perspective as a moral anchor. Tabrizi's direction keeps the tone measured, suited to viewers who prefer character-driven drama over melodrama.
Where & how to watch
Sheida is available to stream on K-Time in its original Persian audio. Watch on your browser, TV, or phone — no VPN required and no geo-blocking. A K-Time subscription gives you access to the full catalog; cancel anytime.