“Foreigner” (2025), written and directed by Ava Maria Safai, follows a classic coming-of-age tale. It’s about a young girl moving to a new school and trying to fit in there. On the surface, it revolves around her struggle to find someone who would let her be a part of their clique. That’s how she crosses paths with three girls in her class. They are popular and outspoken.
In contrast, she is rather reserved. So, the film almost feels like “Mean Girls” all over again. However, it’s far from being a rehash. Instead, it is a visceral exploration of what it feels like to be an outsider when you’re reminded that you don’t belong, every waking minute.
As the title suggests, the film is about an immigrant experience. It follows Yasamin (Rose Dehghan), an Iranian teenager, who moves to Canada with her family: her father Ali (Ashkan Nejati), and her grandmother, Zoreh (Maryam Sadeghi). They take up nearly all the space in her life until she sets foot in her school. It’s not that they’re overbearing or abusive, as they have often been stereotyped in or by Western nations. Of course, they expect discipline, but they are also kind and forgiving. What they care about at the end of the day is what is good for their child, much like any decent parent would.
On the other hand, they are caught between two worlds, trying to hold on to what they learn while embracing new ideals. It’s why they can’t quite connect with Yasamin. She doesn’t want to be Canadian only to be in a land of opportunities. She also yearns to be loved and accepted by her peers, which, again, is a perfectly valid expectation. Yasamin does everything in her power to look and sound Canadian, even if it means that she needs to follow an ill-defined way of life, by her Caucasian peers. Her desire for assimilation seems partially valid since she doesn’t want to feel left out as a teenager. However, her journey is far from steady. It’s rather bleak.
“Foreigner” shows everything through her lens as she tries to make sense of her world. So, the narration often embraces a campier tone to portray an elevated reality, closer to how she experiences it. The film tip-toes between grounded realism and a heightened horror to reveal the eternal dissonance she feels throughout her life.
On the surface, she has similar anxieties to Cady Heron, who feels out of place and rejected in her new school. However, Yasamin’s identity plays an even bigger part in the narrative. It’s not there just as a passing punchline from one of the girls, who finds it shocking that Cady, a white girl, is from Africa. Instead, it’s a constant, haunting reminder that the world may never embrace you, no matter how hard you try.
Safai’s film employs some dramatic beats, similar to Jordan Peele’s “Get Out.” Here, Yasamin’s new friends or their families look at her like a specimen to study or marvel at, not another human being worthy of respect. The script shows her facing danger where she least expects it.
At times, Rachel (Chloë MacLeod), the popular girl, tells her friends that they must not make any assumptions about Yasamin. Her supposed kindness becomes a part of the film’s satirical backbone, which pokes fun at similar gestures that only appear noble. In this case, Rachel or her peers don’t want to be culturally conscious; they just want to reap the benefits of looking culturally conscious.
The script doesn’t dive deeper into similar societal critique or reveal anything strikingly different from what we know about such an experience. Besides, it uses these elements merely for its genre exercise, presenting it almost like a bubblegum horror tale. All its subtextual layers, whether accidental or cultural, are in service to evoke certain emotions with regard to that.
The film faithfully depicts just how debilitating the pressure of fitting in can be for someone like Yasamin. She is at the heart of this narrative, letting us feel her horrors up close while fighting uncertainties and moral dilemmas every step of her path. It wouldn’t have seemed nearly as convincing without Dehgan’s performance.
Dehgan lets us feel Yasamin’s emotions swinging from one end to the other as her shifting priorities change her perspective within short periods. Writer-director Safai highlights the character’s vivid emotional landscape, even if it struggles to find a tonal balance between its heightened, chaotic, and grounded moments. There is plenty to admire in her film and enough to root for the lead character’s perpetual internal dissonance.
Yet, while visceral, the film misses the chance to have something unique to say about its central theme of racial alienation. Even if the script touches upon the underlying topics of code-switching and cultural assimilation (willfully pursued or forced), it doesn’t have the same bite as the former satires trading in similar lanes.
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