If you are lucky enough to find Persepolis playing at a theater near you run tonight and see it. What makes this film remarkable is not the amazingly beautiful black and white animation that dazzles the eye with its gentle technique but the story of the coming of age of a girl in Tehran, Iran in the days when the Shah lost his grip on the country and the Islamic Revolution took over.

Marjane Satrapi tells the true story of her own childhood in this film adaptation of her graphic novels.

As a mom, I found lessons about my own teenage daughter in this remarkable honest story from so far across the globe. And as the daughter of a loving mom and granddaughter of a wise grandma I found myself feeling their presence in  Marjane's mom and grandma. How telling that these different cultures produce moms and grandmas so much alike.

Persepolis also taught me a history lesson about Iran and Iraq that filled in lots of missing peaces of knowledge about this key region of the world. But more important than history, it taught me graphically and in story format about the sad repression of women that has gripped many countries. That is the saddest part of the story to me, and makes me feel so proud of what women in this country are accomplishing.