My Favourite Cake

Seizing the day and small rebellions are championed by Iranian directors Maryam Moghadam and Behtash Sanaeeha in their latest collaboration.

Their gentle drama is built around a delightful performance from Lili Farhadpour as 70-year-old widow Mahin, who decides to shake her life up a bit. Living in a comfortable home, Moghadam and Sanaeeha take time to establish her friends and family. She might not see them as often as she’d like but her female mates are a hoot of a crowd, sharing jokes over dinner when they do get together.

Mahin’s daughter is part of the far-flung diaspora these days, connected mostly by interrupted video calls. She’s not a sad case but the older woman is lonely, something which leads her to try to forge new connections. Although this is an Iran-specific film - and partially revolves around the breaking of many of the country’s oppressive rules - Moghadam and Sanaeeha also touch on the universal issue of becoming ‘invisible’ as we age.

That’s why perhaps even 70-year-old cabbie Faramarz (Esmaeel Mehrabi) doesn’t spot her when she sits near him at a restaurant frequented by pensioners with state vouchers to spend. She sees him, however, and soon sets in motion a meeting that will prove to be full of welcome surprise for both of them.

While many other films feel as though they are really staking out a deliberate political stance against the Iranian regime or coming at it from deep within metaphor, My Favourite Cake is casually, but almost constantly, rebellious in small ways. Through the course of an evening, Mahin will face down the morality police, invite a man she barely knows to her home, drink an impressive quantity of fortified wine and dance like nobody's watching, among other things. “The more submissive you are, the more they push you down,” she tells a younger woman, in what could easily be a rallying call for women in plenty of other countries as well as Iran. That said, the authorities took exception to the film, unsuccessfully raiding the directors’ offices and banning them from attending the Berlin Film Festival for its premiere.

These sorts of bullyboy tactics seem particularly heavy handed for such a sweet-natured work. As Faramarz repairs the lights in Mahin’s garden, Farhadpour and Mahin’s growing relationship takes on a gentle glow as well, although there’s always a sense of the fragility of the moment. Mahin’s nosy neighbour is married to someone who could cause trouble. It’s a sense of threat that the filmmakers don’t labour but which feels invasive, after all this is a country where, Faramarz notes, he once got carted off to jail for a month simply for playing an instrument at a wedding. Graceful camerawork from Mohamad Hadadi ensures there is movement even in Mahin’s house, often almost imperceptibly drawing closer to what’s happening. Later, the camera joins in the mood of the dance.

Moments of sweetness may be fleeting, like the taste of your favourite cake but perhaps that’s what makes them so irresistible - plus, if you never try to take a bite, how would you know?