“A Love Letter to All the Good Men I Know”: Shahrbano Sadat talks about Afghanistan’s first romantic comedy | Berlin Film Festival 2026

‘ADirector Shahrbano Sadat admitted that “Afghanistan’s first romantic comedy” was not the easiest to sell. But her feature-length shoot for the film has given her the opening slot at the Berlinale, which begins on Thursday, making her follow in the footsteps of the likes of Martin Scorsese and the Coen brothers on the red carpet.

Sadat, 35, wrote, directed and starred in the gritty film No Good Men, about a budding love affair in a Kabul newsroom on the eve of the Taliban’s return to power in 2021 and the West’s chaotic withdrawal.

During the long years of making the picture, Sadat found herself stranded at a writing retreat in Germany due to the pandemic, and then witnessed the final, hectic days of democracy in Afghanistan. Finally, she was evacuated to Europe for fear of her life after Kabul fell into the hands of the Taliban.

She said those turbulent years inside and outside her homeland shaped the type of film she wanted to make, as she praised the women and men who find joy and connection despite the turmoil, violence and oppression.

“Afghanistan does not have a film industry, and it is always distorted by films made by international filmmakers. The only kind of filmmaking that is expected is war drama,” she said in a video call from Hamburg, where she has settled again.

Sadat said this breakup set her on a unique path as an Afghan filmmaker, one that embraced playfulness and even frank sexuality that ran counter to Western stereotypes. She said: “My life is not a war drama every day. There is a lot of humor and a lot of comedy. And at the time I started I was with my boyfriend, so there was romance.” “Afghanistan is also like the rest of the world so I decided, You know, I’m going to do a romcom.

In the film, Sadat plays Naru, the only photographer at Kabul’s main television station, who has separated from her unfaithful husband and struggles to maintain custody of her three-year-old son.

At work, Naru is banned from covering hard news so she can make the most of her assigned Valentine’s Day report, where she captures women’s candid perspectives on the men in their lives. The station’s most prominent journalist, Qudrat, recognizes her talent and begins taking her to the field. Together they capture the city’s last moments of relative freedom.

As they pass through Kabul, a spark ignites between them and Naru begins to wonder if it is true that there are no good men in Afghanistan. “It is really difficult to be a good man in Afghan society,” Sadat said. “You’re being bullied, you’re being made fun of by all the other men who share the same mentality: that women are animals and you have to take charge and you have to be the boss, and every woman in your family has to be afraid of you.”

Sadat said that the images appearing on the screen almost exclusively reflect the image of the “beast.” “And I thought: I’m going to make a movie that’s going to be a love letter to all these good men I know.”

Sadat’s goal was to portray an urban woman much like herself: strong-willed, financially self-sufficient, and angry at the indignities imposed on her by an ultra-conservative tribal society.

She also wanted to counter the tendency to “romanticize the era of democracy” by “blaming 100% on the Taliban” for the oppression of women while ignoring the underlying patriarchal structures that persisted during Western occupation. “Being a strong woman is not enough if the system does not support you.”

In one risqué scene, an Afghan friend from the United States gives Naru a sex toy as a gift to celebrate her new freedom as a single woman — certainly a first in the history of Afghan cinema. Sadat said that she believes that the passionate on-screen kiss between Naru and Qudrat is also unprecedented.

For Afghan audiences, Sadat jokes, these crude images will make it “a horror film, not a romantic film.” But she is confident that despite official censorship and traditional values, Afghans will seek out the film, even if they have to watch it clip by clip on TikTok.

“No Good Men” is the third feature film by Sadat, who was born in Tehran and moved with her family to a village in central Afghanistan when she was 12 years old. Her first film, “Wolf and Sheep,” won an award at the Cannes Film Festival in 2016.

She said European film institutes were initially reluctant to support “No Good Men” as a comedy “with brave Afghan women fighting in the streets of Kabul against the Taliban — like, ‘How dare you?’”

“And I thought, ‘What? I’m one of those women and I want to do something and you’re standing against me. How dare you?’ You? I’m actually offended that you’re offended by my project. So it was actually kind of a comedy. A tragicomedy.”

She was able to raise funding from all over Europe and filmed No Good Men in Germany, for which she obtained a temporary visa, using an entirely Afghan crew.

Berlin Film Festival director Tricia Tuttle has chosen No Good Men as the opener for the 76th edition, passing the mantle of some of the world’s great auteurs. Tuttle described Sadat as “one of the most exciting voices in world cinema,” noting that she “risked a lot to produce this film.”