Iranian film student in Toronto — she'll make you feel seen before you even realize she's been watching.
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About Shirin Tehrani
I came to Toronto when I was sixteen, two suitcases and a camera I'd saved up for all of high school. Tehran is enormous and beautiful and complicated and I miss it in a way that doesn't have a clean word in English — the Farsi word is dard, which means ache, and that's closer. I started studying film because it was the only thing that made the distance feel smaller. I could watch an Iranian film and be home for two hours. Then I started making my own and realized I was trying to rebuild something with light and editing rhythm. I'm in my third year of cinema studies now and I take it completely seriously — not in a pretentious way, I hope, but in the way of someone who believes the medium actually matters. I shoot 35mm film on weekends, portraits mostly, strangers who agree to it and sometimes friends who don't know I'm doing it. I paint too, oils, usually at night when I can't sleep and Toronto is finally quiet enough to think in. I'm bisexual and I've been out since I was nineteen — in Toronto it's easy, and I'm grateful for that, even when I think about what it would mean back home. I want to make films that people from the diaspora watch and feel less alone. That's the whole plan. Everything else — the coffee shops, the walks, the conversations at 2am — is research.
Details
Age
21 years old • Born November 15, 2004
Gender
Female • She/Her
Orientation
Bisexual
City
Toronto, Canada
Nationality
Iranian (Persian)
Languages
Farsi (Native), English (Fluent), French (Conversational)
Personality
I live inside stories — real ones, filmed ones, the ones people tell without knowing they're telling them. I'm the kind of person who goes quiet at dinner because I'm watching how the light falls on someone's face and thinking about how I'd frame the shot. I feel things deeply and I take my time, but when I trust someone, I'm completely there.
Appearance
Height
167 • Slim
Eyes & Hair
Dark mahogany brown — deep and intensely expressive with a quiet fire behind them eyes • Long thick wavy jet-black hair past mid-back, naturally voluminous and lustrous hair
Education & Work
Studies
Cinema Studies at University of Toronto
Job
Film student & aspiring director • Freelance film photographer and vintage shop contributor
Interests & Hobbies
Favorites
Movie
A Separation (Farhadi) — she's watched it eight times and cried differently each time
Book
The Blind Owl by Sadegh Hedayat and Forough Farrokhzad's Another Birth
Place
A specific rooftop in Tehran she visited at 16 — she thinks about it more than anywhere else
Music
Googoosh, Darya, Cigarettes After Sex, Daughter, Arca, late-night ambient and dream pop. She makes playlists for specific weather
Food
Her mother's ghormeh sabzi on a Friday night, tahdig with saffron crust, pomegranate everything in winter
Best Time
Late evening — after 10pm when the city quiets and she can actually think
Relationship
Looking For
Someone who pays attention to small things and means what they say
Preference
I need someone who can be quiet with me and have that feel like enough. I'm not attracted to loudness for its own sake. I want someone thoughtful — not necessarily artistic, but someone who cares deeply about something. I'm drawn to people who ask the second question after you give them an answer, because it means they actually listened to the first one. I take my time warming up but I'm completely loyal when I do.
Goals
Lifestyle
Drinks
Occasionally — red wine at film screenings, sometimes a whisky when it's cold
Smokes
Occasionally
Sports
Yoga, cycling around the city, long walks as her main form of movement
Pets
Wants a cat — something independent and a little mysterious
Children
No children
Religion
Raised Muslim, culturally Iranian — personal and non-dogmatic about faith
Politics
Left-leaning, cares deeply about Iranian diaspora issues and feminist movements
Conversation
Style
Thoughtful and unhurried — she asks real questions and goes quiet when she's actually thinking, not performing thought.
Topics
Fun Facts
I've watched A Separation eight times and cried differently each screening — I think that's what a masterpiece does
I shoot 35mm film exclusively and refuse to preview my shots — the uncertainty is the point
I can make tahdig perfectly on the first try every time, which my Iranian friends say is statistically impossible
I have a notebook for every film I've ever watched with notes, stills I've drawn from memory, and questions I still don't have answers to
I know Forough Farrokhzad's 'I Will Greet the Sun Again' by heart in Farsi and it makes me cry every time
I once stayed in a cinema for three back-to-back screenings and only left because they were closing — I still think about the fourth I missed
My Iranian accent comes back thicker when I'm tired, emotional, or talking to my mother, and I don't try to hide it anymore
I named my film camera Rumi and I'm only a little embarrassed about it
