THE STORY – Naru, the only camerawoman at Kabul TV, is convinced there are no good men in Afghanistan. But when a reporter takes her on an assignment just before the Taliban’s return, sparks fly between them – and she begins to question this belief.
THE CAST – Shahrbanoo Sadat, Anwar Hashimi, Liam Hussaini, Yasin Negah, Torkan Omari & Fatima Hassani
THE TEAM – Shahrbanoo Sadat (Director/Writer)
THE RUNNING TIME – 103 Minutes
For the first time in its history, the Berlinale opens with a film by an Afghan filmmaker, or more precisely, with the film of an Afghan director now living in Western exile. Shahrbanoo Sadat fled Afghanistan following the Taliban’s return to power in 2021 and has since been based in Hamburg. Her latest feature, “No Good Men,” is therefore largely a German production, shot primarily in Hamburg, though set in Kabul during the final months before the political collapse.
That this displacement is barely perceptible on screen is one of the film’s most impressive achievements. Through textured production design, including dusty streets, aging cars, and crowded marketplaces, Sadat and her team recreate a convincing sense of place. Kabul feels lived-in rather than reconstructed. Set in 2021, just before the chaotic withdrawal of American troops and the Taliban’s rapid takeover, the film follows Naru, a camera operator at Kabul TV and the only woman working in that capacity at the station. She is separated from her unfaithful husband and raising her young son while navigating a legal system that structurally favors men in custody disputes. From its opening scenes, “No Good Men” positions itself as a feminist interrogation of patriarchal structures. Naru’s conviction is blunt: in her country, there are no good men. What initially sounds like emotional overstatement gradually reveals itself as a systemic diagnosis.
In the film’s strongest passages, Sadat captures how patriarchy operates not merely through individual cruelty but through normalization. Naru is initially assigned to trivial segments and dismissed as incapable of handling “serious” political interviews. When she persuades her superiors to let her accompany a senior reporter, she is met with skepticism. In one painful scene, a male interview subject refuses to speak in front of an unveiled woman, using religious propriety as a convenient shield for misogyny. The humiliation is quiet but devastating. A Valentine’s Day street survey becomes a crucial turning point. While men either mock or evade her questions, women speak candidly about domestic violence, possessiveness, and emotional neglect. Their testimonies give the film its title and articulate its thesis with clarity: patriarchal entitlement is embedded in everyday life. Even in her son’s kindergarten, militarization seeps into childhood through toy guns and propagandistic language. The film suggests that gendered violence is learned early and perpetuated generationally.
Sadat casts herself as Naru, a decision that brings both strength and limitation. On one hand, her presence lends authenticity. Her performance feels observational and unforced, especially in newsroom scenes or moments of female solidarity. Conversations among women about intimacy, desire, and even the introduction of a vibrator as a symbol of sexual autonomy offer refreshingly candid glimpses into private life rarely depicted in Western portrayals of the Middle East. These sequences balance humor and resilience, grounding the political context in everyday experience.
On the other hand, Sadat’s performance often remains emotionally restrained, even in scenes that call for greater intensity. In confrontations with her ex-husband or in moments of existential anxiety about losing custody of her son, the dramatic register never fully deepens. The film’s semi-autobiographical proximity may explain the tonal caution, but it also contributes to a sense of narrative underdevelopment.
The film’s most significant complication arrives with Qodrat, played by Anwar Hashimi. Qodrat is an established journalist who states he is around twenty years older than Naru, married, and professionally more powerful and privileged than she is. He initially dismisses her capabilities but gradually becomes her ally and confidant. Dramatically, he functions as a counterargument to Naru’s thesis. Is he the exception? The “good man?” With that, “No Good Men” falters, both ideologically and dramatically. Hashimi’s performance is frequently stiff, particularly in emotionally charged scenes. The dialogue feels recited rather than inhabited, and the romantic chemistry between him and Sadat rarely convinces. Because the film hinges on Naru’s gradual emotional shift, this lack of palpable connection weakens the entire narrative arc.
More critically, the film fails to interrogate the contradictions it creates. Naru is introduced as a sharply feminist figure who understands patriarchy as systemic and structural. Yet she enters into a romantic relationship with a significantly older, married man whose social and professional power exceeds her own. The age gap, marital infidelity, and inherent imbalance are barely examined. Rather than complicating her feminist stance, the relationship is framed as tender hope amid chaos. This narrative turn undermines the film’s initial provocation. Instead of asking whether love can survive or be deformed within patriarchal conditions, the film appears to suggest that the existence of one respectful man softens the structural critique. The problem becomes individualized. The systemic diagnosis gives way to romantic exceptionalism.
The tonal structure further complicates matters. For much of its runtime, the film adopts a light, almost satirical register. Moments of situational humor, pop music at weddings, and workplace absurdities evoke tragicomedy rather than unrelenting drama. When the political crisis intensifies and the Taliban’s return looms, the film abruptly shifts into a tragic mode. The images of impending evacuation and societal collapse echo global news footage from August 2021, yet the tonal transition feels imposed rather than organic.
In its closing movements, “No Good Men” gestures toward collective trauma but does not fully integrate it into the personal narrative. The result is a film caught between statement and story, between feminist manifesto and romantic melodrama. Its political urgency is undeniable, and the Berlinale’s decision to spotlight it as an opening film is symbolically powerful. On the other hand, as a film itself, it feels uneven.
What endures most vividly are the moments of female candor and solidarity, the glimpses of everyday Kabul life, and the attempt to reclaim Afghan narratives from Western news framing. What lingers less convincingly is the central love story, which dilutes rather than sharpens the film’s thesis. That makes “No Good Men” earnest, historically resonant, and culturally significant, but it also stops short of fully confronting the contradictions it raises. In striving to balance critique with hope, it ultimately compromises the force of both.
