Saim Sadiq co-wrote with Maggie Briggs and directed. It got a lot of press for setting a few firsts in Pakistan, and winning the Un Certain Regard Jury Prize at Cannes in 2022.
The focus is on younger brother Haider (wide-eyed and ineffectual, played perfectly by Ali Junejo) who lives with his wife (bright, bubbly but glum Rasti Farooq) and his brother's family (taciturn Sameer Sohail, animated Sarwat Gilani and four lively girls) and Father (stilted veteran Salmaan Peerzada) in a compound in Lahore. There are goings-on, like the visits to Father of the age-appropriate neighbour Fayyaz (Sania Saeed), that present an expected conservatism. The dominant, novel thread is the coverage of the Lahore demimonde, specifically the dance theatres, and within that, how a trans woman (Alina Khan) might find a livelihood. It's not especially prurient, unlike (e.g.) Head On (starring Alex Demitriades in Melbourne before he converged with Ben Affleck) or Shortbus.
All of the cast are excellent. The highlight for me was the brilliant cinematography; Joe Saade take a bow, it's beautiful. It put me in mind of Wong Kar-Wai's efforts with Christopher Doyle, perhaps Happy Together where Hong Kong (etc) is made to look unreasonably fabulous. There are a few scenes on scooters that timelessly and universally evoke life in Asian metropolises (but where is the traffic?). At times I thought things were going to get nasty and they do but it's not graphic, which recalled the social realism of Lukas Moodysson (cf Fucking Åmål and I guess Tillsammans on too many people living together) to an extent; I wish Sadiq had injected more humour here. The incidental music is great.
Prompted by Alizeh Kohari in the New York Review of Books; see also Carlos Aguilar on the real-world politics. Glenn Kenny. Peter Bradshaw. The list of producers and production companies is endless, notably including Riz Ahmed.