"Mehrjui proves that before the New Iranian Cinema there was a pretty good Old Iranian Cinema."-Harlan Kennedy, Film Comment One of the last long-banned films to be granted a release permit in Iran, The Lady is Mehrjui's adaptation of Buñuel's Viridiana. As with his adaptations of Ibsen's A Doll's House (Sara) and Salinger's Franny and Zooey (Pari), Mehrjui translates it fluidly into a completely Iranian context. Living in a vast and richly appointed mansion, the Lady has withdrawn from her businessman husband to study spiritual and philosophical matters. When he leaves her for a passionate divorcée, the Lady involves herself in charitable works by taking in a homeless peasant couple, a subservient gardener and his grotesque, chatterbox wife. Soon they are joined by the wife's runaway sister, her sickly children, and the women's criminally inclined one-eyed father (the great Ezzatollah Entezami in a tour-de-force performance). The "beggars banquet" scene is as memorable here as it is in Buñuel.-Alissa Simon