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Legenda o lásce (1957)

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Əzablı yollar (1982)

A beautifully crafted Azerbaijani film that brings an old folk tale to life through magical objects, mythical beings, and richly imagined worlds. The attention to costume design from the jewelry to the embroidered cloaks and intricate headpieces doesn’t just support the story, it proudly reflects the cultural artistry behind it.

Watching it reminded me of the Afghan folktales my grandmother used to tell me. Fantastical, vivid, and full of wonder. I can still picture the scenes in my mind even if the details of the stories have faded. So many of our tales were passed down by word of mouth, held and carried by our elders. I often wish I had been old enough to appreciate their value, to write them down, to keep them alive.

So many stories left with our elders.

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The Fisherman’s Daughter (2020)

Original title: Tzarevna Scaling

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Anna Karina in Shéhérazade (1963)

The headpiece features a round center piece with small pieces attached below. We see this overall build and aesthetic in jewelry from many countries including Afghanistan.

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Chess of the Wind (1976)
Original title: Shatranj-e Baad

Chess of the Wind is a landmark of Iranian art cinema. The film screened once at the Tehran International Film Festival before being banned in 1979, after which it was long believed lost, surviving only in poor-quality, censored VHS copies. In 2015, the original negatives were discovered in an antique shop in Tehran, making restoration and reintroduction possible.

While firmly rooted in Iranian cinema, the film’s visual language reflects a wider Persianate cultural sphere shaped by centuries of shared artistic traditions across the region.

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Fading Tales (2025) 


Directed by Yernur Bashpay, Fading Tales is a short film rooted in Kazakh culture, exploring dreams, memory, and the relationship between generations. The film draws inspiration from nomadic traditions of Central Asia.

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The Universe of the Manas (1995)

A sweeping epic from Kyrgyzstan, this film celebrates the richness of Kyrgyz culture, history, and visual tradition. What stood out to me most were the jewelry, ornate silver headpieces, bold necklaces, and intricate metalwork that carry centuries of meaning.

These designs reflect the shared artistic language found across Central Asia.

The similarities in metalwork, motifs, and craftsmanship aren’t accidental; they come from connected histories, nomadic routes, Silk Road exchanges, and cultural ties that have shaped both Kyrgyz and northern Afghan traditions.

Watching the film, you can feel those threads: how neighboring cultures influence one another, creating a beauty that is both shared and distinct.

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Parvaneh Massoumi in The Stranger and the Fog (1974), wearing vintage nomadic jewelry whose style echoes both Afghan and broader Iranic traditions.

Original title: Gharibeh Va Meh

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The Silence (1998)

Original title: Sokout

An Iranian–Tajik film directed and written by Mohsen Makhmalbaf.

Fun fact: Tajiks are one of Afghanistan’s largest ethnic communities with significant populations in the Panjshir Valley, Badakhshan, parts of Kabul, Herat, and much of northeastern Afghanistan.

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White Sun of the Desert (1969)
Original title: Beloe solntse pustyni

The film was partly shot in Turkmenistan, and its visual world draws from a range of Central Asian traditions. The women’s garments and jewelry reflect styles historically associated with Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, creating an overall Central Asian aesthetic.

Afghanistan sits at the crossroads of Central Asia. Its northern regions are home to Tajik, Uzbek, and Turkmen communities and share long histories of trade, movement, and material culture with neighboring areas. Because of this, the clothing and jewelry seen on screen overlap with styles that also appear within Afghanistan’s northern cultural landscape.

This post is not an endorsement of the film’s politics, Orientalist framing, or ideological context. I’m simply highlighting the visual use of clothing, jewelry, and material culture on screen, and how these elements echo broader regional aesthetics.

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Arabian Nights (1974)
Original title: Il fiore delle mille e una notte (The Flower of the Thousand and One Nights)

Directed by Pier Paolo Pasolini and released in 1974, the film adapts stories from One Thousand and One Nights and was shot on location in Yemen, Iran, and Nepal. Pasolini avoided studio-built fantasy, choosing real landscapes and local participants to shape the film’s visual world.

The clothing and jewelry seen on screen are drawn from locally worn dress and jewelry, often sourced on location or worn by the performers themselves. Metal headpieces, coin elements, layered necklaces, and textured garments reflect regional practices from West Asia, with additional influence from South Asia in sequences filmed in Nepal.

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Debra Paget in Princess of the Nile (1954)

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Hedy Lamar in Samson and Delilah (1949) Directed by: Cecil B. DeMille

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More (1969)

Opening shot of this edit shows Klaus Grünberg wearing an Afghan coat. Later clips feature Mimsy Farmer in a colorful, mirror-embroidered Afghan vest, with another character appearing in an Afghan-inspired vest toward the end of the edit.

These garments reflect the late-1960s embrace of Afghan dress, when such pieces became symbols of travel, nonconformity, and countercultural freedom, perfectly aligned with the film’s psychedelic mood and its era.