Based on the novel by Atiq Rahimi, winner of the Prix Goncourt, France’s most prestigious literary prize, and co-scripted by legendary screenwriter Jean-Claude Carrière (who wrote BELLE DE JOUR), THE PATIENCE STONE takes place in an unnamed Middle Eastern country. Beautiful actress Golshifteh Farahani (who is persona non grata in her native Iran for starring in Ridley Scott’s BODY OF LIES and posing nude in a French magazine) gives an electrifying performance in a reversal of the Scheherazade role: Instead of spinning fabulous tales to amuse her man, she sits by her injured, unresponsive husband and confesses to a litany of abuses she has suffered at his hands, among others. Critics have called her performance “mesmerizing,” “spellbinding,” “luminous,” and “a tour-de-force.”
