Maryam Rahimi is an Italian/Iranian director and writer who has been living in Italy for many years. She has graduated in the field of Italian language from the University of Siena in Italy, and after one of her books titled Yalda was made in Italy by Ray Cinema as a film project, she decided to keep his education as a Director. She received his director's degree from the Estonian Film School and after writing eight books, several screenplays and five short films, she continued his studies in optical and optometry course. Maryam Rahimi is now working in the field of optics and optometry in the south of Italy, and besides this job, she continues her activities in the field of writing and directing. Filmography: After writing eight books, Maryam Rahimi started writing screenplays and simultaneously translated two Iranian films for Italian television. After the success of her screenplays in international festivals and winning two of her screenplays in the Italian Ministry of Culture and Arts and making a movie of her book by the main Italian television, she studied directing and has made six short films in Iran and Italy so far. Her films that have been screened in many festivals around the world, have won important and valuable awards. Her films are: Save my dreams, Italy 2015 Our Sea, Italy, 2016 Time to change, Iran, 2018 Black and white, Italy, 2018 Gladiators, Iran, 2022 Soraya, Iran, 2023

At the beginning of the protests, I had to travel to Iran, it was at the same days I received a proposal to make a short film. That was why I decided to depict the problems and demands of Iranian women. Soraya is the story of one of thousands of Iranian women who decides to have an intentional abortion out of fear of family prejudices, but due to this surgery is illegal in Iran, she is forced to leave her country secretly with the help of smugglers. She is not alone in this journey, so Melissa is another woman whose husband has legally taken all human rights from her such as the right to divorce, the right to take care of the child after the divorce and the right to travel abroad, decide to walk on a dangerous and irreversible path with Soraya to immigrate illegally.