By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3.5 cats
Director: Shirin Nehsat | Shoja Azari
Starring: Arita Shahrzad | Mehdi Moinzadeh | Orsolya Tóth | Pegah Ferydoni | Shabnam Toloui
Year: 2010
Michael says: “This Iranian film by first-time filmmaker Shirin Neshat was on my list of films to see in Toronto back in 2009, but I ended up missing it. Then it had a brief run at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, and I missed it again. Thanks to the kind folks at Indiepix, members of Chlotrudis have a screener for nominating purposes, and I’m so glad I was finally able to see it. WOMEN WITHOUT MEN takes place in Tehran during a time of civic unrest in 1953 when Mossadegh was overthrown by a combined British and U.S.-backed coup. The fact that Neshat’s undeniably gorgeous film is mostly allegory makes it a difficult narrative if you’re lacking the knowledge of Iranian history. Add to that some strong doses of magical realism, and Neshat’s inexperience with film narrative becomes a definite drawback. That said, the first-time filmmaker with a background in photography and video design knows the visual language of film extremely well, and in many ways, the narrative is almost irrelevant. Almost.
“The stunning opening shot reeled me in immediately; Munis, her black hair and robes flowing in the wind, sits atop a stark white building, the brilliant blue sky and puffy white clouds a dramatic backdrop. She’s thirty-years-old, unmarried, and carefully following the political unrest going on in Tehran through her radio, unable to join in due to the tyrannical rule of her older brother who intends to marry her off that night. That rooftop is the final resting point in this phase of Munis’ existence, but far from the end of her story. Munis is one of four women whose stories are told in this film which does much more than tackle the struggles of women living in a monstrously patriarchal society. It also touches upon class, ageism, and politics. In addition to Munis, we meet her good friend Faezeh, who wants only to marry Munis brother (yeah, the tyrannical blowhard) until her own horrific experiences at the hands of men set her on a different path. Zarin is a prostitute who experiences a nightmarish vision while with a client which finally drives her from her miserable life, and filled with self-loathing she literally tries to scrub her guilt off her body in a communal bath before collapsing in the woods, on the brink of death. Fakhri is a near-fifty-year-old, wealthy woman who is married to a General who berates her for her fading sexual attractiveness. In a fit of luxurious independence, Fakhri leaves her husband and purchases an isolated and abandoned orchard that quickly becomes the spiritual and paradisical center for these lost women. There Fakhri finds Zarin near death and nurses her if not back to health, back to a half life that hangs in the balance even as the future of their country does the same.
“Those who know me know that one of my favorite ‘genre’ of films is something I call the ‘slit-your-wrists-at-the-end’ film. Films like OR (MY TREASURE) where just when you think things can’t get worse, they do. WOMEN WITHOUT MEN could have been one of those films, but the featured women are all so emblematic of they different types of oppressed women that they never seem like real characters. Still, the story is powerful, and the movie is thrilling to look at that these make up for that lack. I imagine with each successive film, Shirin Neshat will grow in the type of accomplished filmmaker that you won’t want to miss. 3 ½ cats”