A restrained death penalty drama, Ballad of a White Cow is necessarily harsh in its tone but finds a tangible, human element to anchor its messages.

| Original Score: 3.5/5 | Jul 18, 2024

A portrait of an oppressive system that fails Mina time after time, because only women can't escape it. [Full review in Spanish]

| Sep 14, 2022

While not always an easy watch, Moghadam’s film is a haunting and vital piece of work.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Jul 11, 2022

On the edge of human resistance, this involuntary heroine holds a symbolic duel between the just and the regulated. [Full review in Spanish]

| Original Score: 3.5/5 | May 31, 2022

Moghadam carries the film on her shoulders... a pertinent and beautifully acted piece of work in its own right.

| Original Score: 3.5/5 | Apr 1, 2022

This is a suspenseful engrossing watch, though perhaps with a couple too many plot developments.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Feb 8, 2022

A dignified performance by the film's co-director serving as principal performer lends stature to what is largely a chamber piece.

| Original Score: B+ | Feb 8, 2022

An exceptional piece of work.

| Original Score: 4.5/5 | Nov 8, 2021

There's an elegance to the filmmaking as this story unravels its themes of societal prejudice, justice and remorse that elevates every frame.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Aug 30, 2021

A granular social drama that grapples with the inherent contradiction of brutality and grace that characterises everyday life under the Iranian regime.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Aug 25, 2021

Gripping drama intersects two caught up in Iran's brusque legal system. Almost oppressively sad, tensions ratchet up from increasing social, economic, and family pressures.

| Original Score: 9/10 | Aug 19, 2021

A competent and undeniably engaging melodrama with superb acting and meticulous mise-en-scene, the well-trodden themes of guilt and retribution are nonetheless awfully familiar.

| Aug 18, 2021

Ballad of a White Cow delivers a quietly devastating portrait of what happens in the aftermath of a wrongly convicted prisoner's execution and how good intentions can be poisonous if they're based in deceit.

| Jul 7, 2021

This lack of tonal self-awareness results in a mostly sanitized portrayal of its urgent subject matter, the film's impact lessened through its refusal to pare down its filler.

| Jun 21, 2021

A perfectly told story about deep emotional issues and ethical dilemmas.

| May 7, 2021

There is nothing significantly wrong here and the movie is actually well-shot and interesting to watch. However, it lacks the impact such a story could have and in the end emerges as something unoriginal that will be forgotten soon after being watched.

| Apr 11, 2021

Ballad of a White Cow captures how any semblance of innocence is the first thing shattered in such a repressive regime.

| Original Score: B+ | Mar 17, 2021

The movie's fatalism is depressing, but the unshowy cinematography makes it plain Mina's suffering is nothing special.

| Mar 14, 2021

A sorrowful and sobering Iranian tragedy...

| Mar 12, 2021

Ballad of a White Cow is very much Mina's film: it is a strong character study filled with deep sympathy for its subject, elevated by Moghaddam's luminous performance.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Mar 11, 2021