Faces of chage
‘The Stoning of Soraya M,’ a disturbing testament to individuals making a difference, could not have come at A better time
By Jana J. Monji 06/25/2009
The title tells you how co-writers Cyrus and Betsy Giffen Nowrasteh’s “The Stoning of Soraya M” ends, and although the death scene is graphic, the movie draws vibrant portraits of courage while posing probing questions about current social problems.
Based on Freidoune Sahebjam’s 1994 bestseller by the same name, the movie, which premiered at the Toronto Film Festival, isn’t a condemnation of Islam, but of corruption and mob violence, offering a testament to how courageous individuals really can make a difference.
Much like amateur video of Neda Agha-Soltan, an Iranian woman whose shooting death during a recent Iranian election demonstration catapulted her to international fame as the face of those protests, Soraya’s story made an otherwise unremarkable woman the symbol of both the oppression of women in Iran and all victims — men and women — of executions by stoning. Her story came to light because two people were willing to defy many: her aunt told everyone Soraya’s story and a man she never knew listened.
Sahebjam, who died in France last year at 75, was a Paris-based investigative reporter who covered crimes committed by the Islamic Republic of Iran against the Baha’i religious minority and the use of underage children in the Iranian Army during the Iran-Iraq War. Sentenced in absentia by the Iranian Revolutionary Court with a death fatwa, he continued to slip into Iran and on one of these excursions heard about the real Soraya, who was stoned to death in 1986.
The movie begins with two seemingly unrelated incidents. A woman, Zahra (Shohreh Aghdashloo), digs up bones and washes them, only to re-bury them. Then a car driven by Sahebjam (played by Jim Caviezel) breaks down outside a small, isolated village. When he leaves the mechanic, he is accosted by Zahra, a middle-aged woman whom some locals suggest is crazy. She invites him to her house to tell him the story of her niece, Soraya (Mozhan Marnò). And the story is then told in flashbacks.
Soraya has given her husband, Ali (Navid Negahban), sons and daughters, but he now wants to marry a 14-year-old girl. Ali attempts to turn his sons against Soraya, saying, “This is a man’s world. Never forget that boys.” Then, by threatening the local mullah (Ali Pourtash) and a widower (Parviz Sayyad), Ali begins to turn the whole village against Soraya. Soraya becomes an innocent bystander, believing she has nothing to fear because she has done nothing wrong, although her mother warns her to watch out. Then, by unanimous vote of the men — including her own father — Soraya is found guilty of adultery and sentenced to death by stoning. Director Cyrus Nowrasteh doesn’t just show us the bloody brutality of this execution, but how many of the villagers are affected — the polarization of men and women, the horrific emotional toll on the sons who participate and the callousness and cowardice of some villagers.
Although this is about injustice under Sharia Law, the film is not a direct criticism of Islam. Sahebjam used a quote from the Iranian poet Hafez in his book, and Nowrasteh uses it at the beginning of the film: “Don’t act like the hypocrite who thinks he can conceal his wiles by loudly quoting the Koran.”
Zahra condemns the action of the men by calling upon God and it is her fierce determination that drives her to defy all the men in the village. Not all the Iranian male characters are vile. One, Hashem (Parviz Sayyad) asks Ali and the mullah, “What are you doing? God is watching.”
Just as the governing powers in Iran today have forbidden a proper funeral and collective prayers for Agha-Soltan in real life, according to Associated Press reports, in the movie, Soraya is denied even a burial. Her body is dumped on the side of a river.
Betsy Giffen Nowrasteh states in the press notes that this movie “isn’t about Islam. It’s about examining ritual, much like the lynchings that happened in the US in a different era, that needs to change, that can change if there is an outcry around the world.”
Even though Soraya died in 1986, stonings still occur, and not only in Iran, according to several Web sites (such as stop-stoning.org).
The Internet has made Agha-Soltan’s death international news, but a book and now a movie records the death of Soraya. Decades separate these two tragedies, but historical happenstance now links them. This movie, in Farsi with English subtitles, is ultimately about courage and faith and how, by people spreading her story, the real Soraya now has some measure of justice. n
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