A colourful musical journey into the narrative of a woman’s tangled past, with magical glimpses of her present world and hopes for a liberated future.

Yalda mixes sumptuous imagery, vibrant text and music with a first-person voiceover which tells of Yalda’s complex past relationships with her lovers and family. Shifting from past to present tense, narrative and images become knowingly abstracted from one another.

The protagonist journeys to a swimming pool - a place of relaxation, exercise and ritual cleansing. Her immediate physical presence is interwoven with remembered past situations; and an encounter with a company of synchronised swimmers is juxtaposed with her decision to have an operation which she hopes will change her future for good.

About The City Speaks:
Co-produced by BBC Radio 4 and Film London Artists' Moving Image Network, The City Speaks: A Film for Radio, is a multi-faceted portrayal of London created for radio, cinema and television. Artist film-makers were commissioned to collaborate with radio writers to produce a unique portrait of London. Responding to a narrative framework by writer Peter Ackroyd, the artist and writer teams created a film in six sections.

The City Speaks was supported by an Arts Council England Grants for the Arts Award.