Be Like Others (2008, Iran)

U.S.-based filmmaker Tanaz Eshaghian effortlessly shifts from her lively autobiographical documentaries (Love Iranian-American Style) to the tougher conditions of a Tehran sex-change clinic in the resonant Be Like Others. The film keenly focuses on the personal lives and experiences of young gay men who opt for gender change rather than undergo steady harassment and abuse. Some of this ranks with the prostitute segment in Kiarostami's Ten as a powerful window into a once-hidden side of the country.

With Dr. Bahram Mehrjalali's sex-change clinic as the arena, Eshaghian finds her subjects among some of the kind, progressive doc's patients. Perhaps most interesting is 20-year-old Anoosh, who becomes a woman named Anahita, alienating her gay boyfriend Ali. Twenty-four-year-old Ali Asghar finds some support from Vida, who's had her operation and adjusted. The very issue of why Iran's Islamic laws compel such drastic maneuvers and adjustments on the part of gay men runs under every scene, making the film a model of non-dogmatic filmmaking on a highly charged topic.

In the picture Anoosh (right) is insisting to his mother on wearing make-up and presenting as female.

There is an official website for the film at:

Be Like Others Website

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