Chess of the Wind (1976)

Khanom Bozorg, the matriarch, dies, leaving Aghdas wheelchair-bound and dependent on Hadji Amoo. The vast Moshir ad-Dowleh Mansion becomes a stage for grief, money-driven motives, and the social gossip that threads through the film. Ramezan is engaged to Aghdas, but his interest seems rooted in her fortune.

Aghdas and Kanizak enter Hadji Amoo's room and burn the deeds to the house with his name on them, destroying papers that could prove ownership. The act cements their intent to control the inheritance. The room's ashes mark a turning point in their scheming.

Tensions between Aghdas and Hadji Amoo intensify, with confrontations revealing competing claims to the house. Aghdas openly contemplates murder and signals the plan to Ramezan, setting the stage for a deadly resolution.

As Hadji Amoo prays in his room, Aghdas is wheeled in by Kanizak and strikes him on the head with a silver flail. He collapses, and Kanizak and Ramezan drag the body toward the cellar to conceal the crime. The act marks a decisive turning point in the scheme for inheritance.

The conspirators transfer Hadji Amoo's body to the cellar and place it in a bottomless jar, planning to dissolve it later with nitric acid. The warehouse-like basement becomes their secret chamber of crime. The scale of the deception grows as more people come to the mansion.

A few days later, two creditors and a police commissar arrive to collect a debt Hadji Amoo owed. Aghdas denies knowing him, and Kanizak and Ramezan escort the men to the cellar, where the jars are inspected but the body is nowhere to be found. The inquiry unsettles Aghdas further.

Aghdas becomes increasingly paranoid about whether Hadji Amoo is truly dead. A traveling musical troupe claims to have met him in public, and such whispers drive her into a feverish panic, emphasizing her isolation in the mansion.

Kanizak persuades Aghdas to leave the house for a brief break, visiting a nearby holy site. Aghdas departs with Kanizak's help for a couple of days, stepping away from the looming possibility of exposure in the mansion.

Alone in her room at night, Aghdas hears laughter from the cellar. She retrieves an antique pistol and drags herself down to the basement, where she confronts the secrecy that's haunted the house.

In the basement, Aghdas finds Hadji Amoo and Kanizak in the bath, exposing their connivance. The shock compounds her fear and rage as the crime circles closer to home.

Aghdas shoots Hadji Amoo and immediately collapses from a heart attack. The murder and the death eliminate the central obstacle to her inheritance, but at a terrible personal cost.

With Hadji Amoo dead, Kanizak and Shaban scheme to live off the inheritance. The plan hints at a long-running alliance, though the earlier aid to the deception by Kanizak now collides with Shaban's own intent.

Tensions erupt when Shaban's betrayal is revealed. Ramezan races upstairs and shoots Shaban dead, removing a rival for the inheritance and sealing the fates of those left behind.

Kanizak departs the mansion, leaving only a young boy and Aghdas's elderly nanny. The camera then pans across the city beyond the mansion walls, closing the story on the social labyrinth of wealth and crime.