Holy Spider

I watched this film yesterday on the Golden Apricot film festival and its rating of 6.6 makes little sense to me.

It is a crafty film that takes you on a suspenseful trip with moments of well-placed humor.

The Iranian setting is somewhat overdramatized, but I believe that works for the film, rather than against it.

The important note here is that the true Spider Killer received very little to no support from the Iranian society.

The overall setting is somber, it is relatively violent, there is a lot of room given for the personal development of our characters, there is social criticism, great acting, and powerful sound design.

My only criticism is that secondary characters could have given more screen-time to act out their emotional curve, as there performances were really strong.

I strongly recommend this to anyone that loves European film and/or true crime pieces.

Easily an eight!

The movie beautifully portrays the injustice that women face in Iran, and how corrupt the justice and jurisdiction system is. I used to live in Iran as a child and I remember the how terribly people were being treated in the name of "Allah and Islam". To me, this movie was extremely thrilling because it resurfaced some of my childhood traumas, and that tells me how relatable and well made this movie is. The actors and actresses were absolutely amazing. Making a movie outside of Iran about inside of Iran is not easy. I can't imagine how difficult it was for the actors and actresses get mentally prepared for their roles and get in character, since they all have been living outside of Iran for a long time. Most interesting movie of the year!

A killer trawls the streets of Mashhad City, shows no remorse, regret or shame, there is no pity, for the women that he kills, I'm sure he gets plenty of thrills, as a self-appointed one man vigilante. A journalist begins investigations, in a culture that's built on male foundations, but she's persistent and quite brave, to stop the girls going to graves, and to suffer prejudice, of generations.

It's a brutal depiction of events, as a disgruntled, discontented and disturbed psychopath decides to take the lives of several women who have been left with no choice but to sell themselves on the streets to survive (or not as it turns out). I thought Zar Amir-Ebrahimi was brilliant as the stubborn and relentless journalist who tenaciously puts her own life in peril to track the killer down.

The events that inspired this story made international news. I suspect some of what is on the screen actually happened.

A serial killer is strangling the junkies who work as prostitutes in the holy city. This is controversial, inducing terror and mistrust. No one wants to be killed or suspected, though some openly praise this illegal activity. A very determined journalist comes to town to investigate. We accompany the journalist and meet many characters whose words and actions inform us about the situation. We also learn pretty quickly exactly who is doing the killing by closely following along for some shocking incidents. Who and how is revealed, along with an uncomfortable social context. Much of the movie is an intimate visit with the journalist and the killer whose activities are being investigated, and the suspense increases. After a while the audience is led to suspect that the civil and clerical authorities might be okay with wholesale murder, under certain circumstances, and the journalist will not stop, taking crazy chances.

The artistry is first class throughout. The way all of this is presented makes us feel closer to every character, so we can better consider how we are the same or different, in our social context. Dangerously determined journalist versus homicidal maniac has been done before but this movie is exceptionally good and most entertaining.

As someone who actually lives in the city the events of this movie happened in any bad review of this movie usually containing bad and broken english is not a real person and either is someone trying to make this movie look bad or it is someone working for the corrupt islamic regime of iran, this movie perfectly shows the social situation of iran and the city mashhad especially ,women are treated unjustly and un-equally even this movie is labeled as "dishonoring holy beliefs" and therefore is illegal and dont get me started on the cencorship laws perventing this movie ever going on screen in iran atleast under the islamic regime ,but anyways the movie.

Unfun fact the interview footage at the end of the movie is based of what the son of saeed hanaee(the spider killers real name) actually said in an actual interview...

Where to even start the cinematography ,the lighting ,the atmosphere the feeling it gives you as characters panic you are on the edge of your seat panic-ing with them everything about this movie is just perfect but a warning to anyone light hearted or anyone who gets uncomfortable easily and all that this movie for lack of a better word decimates you ,at about the halfway point I was physically exhausted and had to take a break ,I noticed I was tense and was contracting muscles in some really disturbing scenes ,This movie is just something else ,A True Masterpiece.