Women without men

How you approach this film will surely shape your experience. It is a poetic film, with more than a dash of magical realism. That said it does not shy away from the political, that thread is important of course, it is just not what I believe the director and her creative partner wished to accentuate.

I've been on a bit of a Shirin Neshat addiction as of late, and I strongly recommend tracking down her "Turbulent" split-screen split-audio art installation. That is on the web, although I wish I could have experienced it (and her other works too, but that one foremost) in person.

"Women Without Men" is based on a book by an author who was imprisoned in Iran; and now like Shirin, that author is estranged from if not in exact exile from her beloved motherland. This movie is infused with a sense of nostalgia, a longing for a beautiful time in Iran, and in particular from Shirin's youth. The metaphoric/memory garden she has spoken of in other arenas.

Shirin' acute photographic sense is definitely employed in some of the beautiful shots specifically of the mist-drenched garden offering refuge to three of the women. The lighting through-out the film feels at times like an extra actor on screen. The sound as well.

I could say more, but I full-heartedly recommend seeing this movie. For other critical reviewers, enjoy the interview with Shirin and Shoja that accompanies the DVD. That interview is currently at the Walker Art web site. It is illuminating and she is so elegant in many ways. Shoja addresses topics succinctly as well, notably the male roles in the move. It is quite a nice guide to splendid non-polemic poetic experience that captures much of the art, beauty and music of an Iran that hopefully blooms again.

I would be curious to ask Shirin, even if CIA-interference and subsequent religio-political turmoil had not marred her beloved Motherland, would she still not sense a separation from the garden/country of her youth.

Perhaps too hard to speculate, as her identity and her artistic spirit are so interwoven with her own dislocation and displacement. Maybe no one can truly go home again, but for Shirin and the Iran she shares with us all, that is a great sorrow.

More of a visual impressionist than storyteller, Shirin Neshat uses the thread of magic-realism to weave together vignettes of five besieged Iranian women. The film beautifully depicts the early fifties era in Iran, during the Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi coup and rebellion against American-British usurpation. Men fare badly in this feature, with maybe one silent gardener playing a benign male role. Neshat has a gifted eye, so check out the extra features for her detail-rich explanations of film nuancing. AfroPixFlix finds 8 fig-forks for this film-festival feature.Women Without Men (Zanan-e bedun-e mardan) 2009; 91 mins Directors: Shirin Neshat, Shoja Azari Writers: Shoja Azari, Shirin Neshat

In a way, it does what it says on the tin: it's a movie about women who escape the -- always suppressive -- men in their life. In Iran in the 1950ies. There is a woman whose brother is trying to force her into marriage, a prostitute, the ageing wife of a general, a girl in love with an orthodox Muslim. All suffer ignominy from men without really engaging them or even fighting back. They eventually all retreat into a surreal orchard owned by the general's wife. At the same time we get to witness a bit of the political upheavals of the 1954 CIA-sponsored coup against the democratically-elected prime minister Mossadeq.

Director Shirin Neshat was born in Iran and left as a young woman as a result of the 1979 Islamic revolution; so she knows both Iran and the West. Here she is able to employ her expertise as a video artist in some scenes, which give the film a unique visual style (for example there is a "still" scene where the people seem to be both frozen as well as slightly moving).

What I didn't like about this movie is that it always stays on the political surface. We notice that there is a revolution going on, but we don't get to see any historic context -- by way of saying "sit up and listen, USA, this is how you fecked up Iran in a big way". Communists as well as loyal supporters of the Shah somehow seem to be equally opposing "the system". I also didn't like how women are portrayed as helpless victims of one-dimensionally evil men.

"Women Without Men" centers on the lives of four women in 1950's Iran. It offers an interesting view and it's not without its good points, but in general is out of focus, withers, and feels way too long, even if it clocks at just a little over an hour and a half.

The story follows how family, friends, society, repress the lives of four women, and how they react and how they try to break free from the limitations and lack of liberty their environment throws on them. It is kind of dreamlike in its exposure of its ideas, and some situations are more like drawings of a feeling than a real plot developing. It is almost white and black, which suits well with the bleak spirit of the story, which is quite gloomy in general, and it looks quite good. The actors, in general, do quite a good job, even if the material is a little bit thin.

Sadly, the director tries to encompass too much and show too many things, and the films paddles and loses itself. It doesn't help that it has been directed in a very languid style, with little action and long shots. I am not expecting Michael Bay's style to pop by in these kind of movies, but slow can be too slow. And this is one of those cases. On top of that, the story per se is not very original, as we have seen these kind of situations before (for example, the wife who married and meets again the love of her youth), so the movie is not very original either.

A good effort, but kind of a misfire.

As a cinematic experience that is both gripping and mesmerizing it deserves a 10 out of 10. But I couldn't care less about the backdrop of the coup d'état, that provided some, but not much, narrative structure.

Somewhere between an audiovisual poem, a feminist tale, and a historical drama, it has taken on too much at once.

To dissect what is exactly wrong with the narrative would be difficult. There are elements of the story that work well: the girls' story before they come to the house, women's place in society, the love stories that develop. If these aspects would have gotten all the attention and focus, it would have been more than enough for me to chew on.

Still I love this film. There is an etherial atmosphere throughout the film that kept my eyes fixed on the screen. Visually the film is stunning, its desaturated look is fitting as a metaphor for the oppression both the country and the women face.