Inside Amir (Daroon-e-Amir) Film Review

Amir Azizi’s Inside Amir is a semi-biographical story that recounts the protagonist’s final days in Tehran before emigrating to southern Italy.

The montage that follows the opening scene introduces the audience to his everyday life, made up of small but meaningful moments with his friends around the city he has lived in for all of his life. As Amir experiences what are meant to be his last few days in Tehran, the question of whether to leave or stay becomes more and more pressing and difficult to make. 

The way the phone calls are incorporated into the story is especially fascinating. During the course of the film, we often see Amir on the phone with his girlfriend. While they do at times see each other through video calls, the audience only hears her voice, representing the promise of what life in Italy will look like for both of them. She is one of the driving forces that pulls Amir in two opposite directions: Italy or Tehran, leaving or staying. The latter is portrayed through the film’s sound choices. Inside Amir also uses music in a very clever way to represent this inner conflict. With a big part of the soundtrack being inspired by Iranian music, this is also a stark reminder of Amir’s origins and cultural background. 

As suggested by the title, the entire film is an exploration of Amir’s inner world, dreams, and often conflicting desires. He’s torn between wanting to be with his girlfriend in Italy – this much is clear from the multiple phone calls we witness – and the life and routine he has built for himself in Tehran. In a way, it also feels like Inside Amir is split into two movies: one is the dream of a life in Italy with the person he loves, and the other portrays his reality in the place where he grew up and has lived all his life.

While Inside Amir does work as a character study, there is admittedly very little going on in terms of its plot. As the main character continues his daily life, the audience often witnesses very mundane scenes or ordinary life in Tehran: from moving around the city with his bicycle to meeting up with the friends that he would leave behind if he decided to move away. There is a certain appeal to this mundane normality – especially because it allows the audience to get an insider look into what life in Tehran looks like for a young man – but it also easily gets repetitive over the course of its one hour and 40-minute runtime. This movie might have benefited from a shorter runtime to make it less predictable and more memorable. 

Overall, Inside Amir is a beautiful exploration of the main character’s inner life and motives. His struggle to make such a life-changing choice will be relatable for those in the audience who have experienced the reality of moving away from home, with both its highs and its lows but, even without such a personal connection to the story, the film does an excellent job at portraying Amir’s inner state of mind. While a lot of what we see may seem mundane and ordinary, it all contributes to the central question Amir has to answer: to stay in Tehran or to leave his hometown? 

Inside Amir (Daroon-e-Amir) will have its German Premiere at the Internationales Filmfestival Mannheim-Heidelberg on November 6-14, 2025.