Taglines: Two friends. One Journey. No limits.
Just like a Woman is an English-language film directed by Rachid Bouchareb, starring Sienna Miller and Golshifteh Farahani. The narrative follows an American housewife and a North African woman who travel from Chicago to Santa Fe to participate in a bellydance competition. The film is a co-production between companies in France, the United Kingdom and the United States. Bouchareb intends it to be the first in a trilogy about the relation between North America and the Arab world.
Tessalit Productions produced the film together with Taghit, which is the American subsidiary of Rachid Bouchareb’s company 3B Productions. It was co-produced by Arte France Cinéma, the British The Bureau and the American Cohen Media Group. Filming started in June and ended 5 August 2011.
About the Filmmaker (2013)
Rachid Bouchareb was born in Paris to an Algerian immigrant family. Themes of cultural identity and clash pervade his body of work, beginning with his first film, Baton Rouge (1985). In 1987, the director and his friend Jean Bréhat co-founded production company 3B, which produced all his subsequent films as well as those of Bruno Dumont.
Bouchareb was first nominated for a Best Foreign Film Oscar in 1995 with Poussières de vie (Dust of Life), about life in Vietnam after the war. His next film, Little Senegal (2001), a tribute to Sergio Leone westerns and Midnight Cowboy, met with critical and public acclaim.
With Indigènes(Days of Glory) (2006), Bouchareb was again nominated for a Foreign Film Oscar for his cinematic tribute to the thousands of African soldiers who fought and died to free Nazi-occupied France during World War II. The film helped motivate French President Jacques Chirac to recognize the duty of war veterans and increase their pensions.
In 2011, Bouchareb received his third Oscar nomination for Hors-la-loi (Outside the Law), a chronicle of three Algerian brothers fighting for their country’s independence after 1945. His latest film, Just Like a Woman (2013), is Bouchareb’s first in English. The movie tells the poignant tale of two women, barely more than casual acquaintances, who escape the prisons of their unhappy marriages and embark on a revealing journey of self discovery that leads them to the importance—and true meaning—of friendship.
About the Cast (2013)
Sienna Miller was born in New York, educated in England and studied drama at the Lee Strasberg Institute in New York. Sienna’s film debut came as the love interest of Daniel Craig in Matthew Vaughn’s Layer Cake. From there she excelled in movies including Factory Girl, Casanova, The Edge of Love, Interview and Paramount’s, GI Joe: Rise of Cobra, which was a huge international box office hit in 2009.
Sienna played the role of ‘The Baroness,’ for which she was awarded ‘Best Supporting Actress’ at the ShoWest Awards in Las Vegas. Sienna has received a number of accolades for her work in film including a British Independent Film Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress for her role in The Edge of Love. In the same year she was also nominated for the BAFTA Orange Rising Star Award and in 2006 was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award for her role as ‘Katya’ in Interview.
Sienna’s more recent film projects include the Nick Cassavetes film entitled Yellow, which is due for release in 2013, Just Like a Woman directed by the Oscar nominated Rachid Bouchareb and Julian Jarold’s The Girl, which was aired on HBO in October 2012. The Girl explores the relationship between Tippi Hedren (Miller) and Alfred Hitchcock (Toby Jones) during the making of ‘The Birds.’
It has received outstanding reviews, especially for the performances of Miller and Jones. Brian Lowry of Variety magazine heralded Miller’s ‘splendid performance’ announcing it as ‘the best work of Millers career.’ Roger Freidman wrote ‘Jones and Miller are superb as the conflicted duo.’ It was also shown on the BBC in December 2012. Sienna was nominated for her performance in The Girl for a Golden Globe in the Best Actress category and for a TV BAFTA in the same category.
Sienna’s most recent film project is the much-awaited new Bennett Miller movie, Foxcatcher, which tells the true story of John du Pont who suffered from paranoid schizophrenia and killed wrestler David Schultz. Sienna stars alongside Channing Tatum, Mark Ruffalo and Steve Carrell. The film will be released in November 2013.
Sienna has done a lot of Theatre work throughout her career and in 2005 Sienna made her West End debut playing Celia in the Young Vic’s production of William Shakespeare’s As You Like It at the Wyndhams Theatre in London. She appeared alongside Helen McCrory and Dominic West. Critics heralded her “brave” and “fearless” performance. Sienna has since trodden the boards on Broadway in Patrick Marber’s adaptation of After Miss Julie, directed by Mark Brokaw, similarly to critical acclaim. More recently she starred in Terrence Rattigan’s Flare Path at the Theatre Royal Haymarket, directed by Trevor Nunn. It was a box office hit and received rave reviews across the board.
The Independent newspaper wrote of Miller, ‘Her performance is genuinely heart-tugging.’ Sienna also has a staunch devotion to her humanitarian work. As the Ambassador of Global Cool, Sienna changed legislation in India, tackling head-on the worrying problems of Climate Change. Now, as the Ambassador of Children’s Charity Starlight, and world relief organization, International Medical Corps, Sienna continues to follow her passion for charity work.
Golshifteh Farahani is an Iranian actress and daughter of the theater director Behzad Farahani Her career began very early when started performing on stage at the age of six. When she was 14, Farahani was cast as the lead actress in Dariush Mehrjui’s The Pear Tree for which she won the award for Best Actress at the 16th Fajr International Film Festival.
Since then, she has acted in over fifteen films. Recently, Farahani has appeared in acclaimed films such as Bahman Ghobadi’s Half Moon in 2006, which won the Golden Shell at the 2006 San Sebastian Film Festival. She also appeared in Rasool Mollagholi Poor’s Mim mesle madar, which was chosen to represent Iran for the Best Foreign Film at the Academy Awards in 2008.
In 2008, she appeared with Leonardo DiCaprio and Russell Crowe in Ridley Scott’s Body of Lies, making her the first Iranian actress to play in a major Hollywood production. Her last film in Iran, A propos d’Elly directed by Asghar Farhadi, won a Silver Bear at the 2009 Berlin Film Festival and The Best Narrative Feature at the 2009 Tribeca Film Festival.
In 2011, she appeared in Vincent Paronnaud and Marjane Satrapi’s Chicken with plums with Mathieu Amalric and Edouard Baer in addition to starring in Just Like a Woman for which she was awarded Best Actress at the “Festival de la fiction TV de la Rochelle” in 2012.
Farahani also stars in award-winning author and director Atiq Rahimi’s film adaptation of his best-selling novel The Patience Stone, which will be released by Sony Picture’s Classicsin August 2013. She also the lead in Hiner Saleem’s My Sweet Pepperland, which will be released later this year.
Just Like A Woman (2013)
Directed by: Rachid Bouchareb
Starring: Sienna Miller, Golshifteh Farahani, Bahar Soomekh, Tim Guinee, Roschdy Zem
Screenplay by: Joelle Touma, Marion Doussot
Cinematography by: Christophe Beaucarne
Film Editing by: Matt Garner
Costume Design by: Mahemiti Deregnaucourt
Set Decoration by: Patrick McGee
Music by: Éric Neveux
MPAA Rating: R for language and a scene of sexuality.
Studio: Cohen Media Group
Release Date: July 3, 2013
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