When a desperate Grace (Deborah Puette) walks into the Queen of Persia Gold Emporium, all she wants is to get in and out with some badly needed cash and a shred of her dignity intact. Things do not look promising when she comes up against Ehsan (Navid Negahban), a man with troubles of his own who works the store’s counter under his father’s controlling gaze. A parable for our times, Cash for Gold, directed and produced by Robert Enriquez, delicately examines the economic and ethnic tensions America grapples with today through the lens of two unlikely allies and the split-second decision that will turn their brief encounter into something neither of them will ever forget. Cash for Gold is a testament to this purity of storytelling that gives you everything you could need in 7 minutes. It’s a film about two people from disparate backgrounds coming together and finding a shared bit of humanity. It’s emotional, but not overwrought. It’s hinting at larger themes about today’s society and a need for acceptance, but never feels ham-fisted or weighted down by a mission to convey a “message.” Rather, as is the case with all good drama, it conveys the universal through the specific.
