This coming Wednesday, a special evening will take place at De Fabriek in Zaandam centering on the latest film by award-winning Iranian filmmaker Shirin Neshat, Women Without Men.

In the late 1970s, the then seventeen-year-old Shirin Neshat moved from her native Iran to the United States, where she gained international fame as a video artist and photographer. Her film debut, Women without Men, won the Silver Lion for Best Director at the Venice Film Festival last year. In her film, Neshat combines overwhelming visual power with a political statement about various forms of oppression. A paradisiacal orchard takes center stage in the magical-realist story.

The orchard is the refuge of four women, like an oasis in a suffocating environment. In the background of the women's personal stories plays a historical event: the CIA-backed coup of 1953.

Women Without Men is based on the magical realist novel of the same name by Iranian author Shahrnush Parsipur. The story follows several women in 1953 as Iran stands on the brink of collapse. The reformist, democratically elected Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh is in power, but he is set to be overthrown in a coup by the Shah, which is supported by the US. Four very different women experience that time in their own way.

The isolated Munis follows the latest developments on the radio. Her strict brother forbids her from leaving the house. The politically uninterested Faezeh is her only contact with the outside world, while she is in love with Munis's brother. The older and worldly Fakhri is married to a military man, but one day encounters an old flame who makes her question the choices she has made. Finally, there is the young and quiet prostitute Zarin, who tries to escape her desolate existence in a brothel. In Women Without Men, the precarious position of women is linked to the political situation in Iran. But it is also an ode to the strength of women. Women without men. Women Without Men is a brilliant, passionate film about Iran and about the hope that change is still possible.

On Wednesday, August 18, the immediate family members of author Shahrnush Parsipur, namely her sister-in-law Elli Safari and her niece Sharie Parsipur, will discuss this dazzling film and how it relates to the novel on which it is based during a meeting with the audience present.

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Elli Safari is a filmmaker. She makes documentaries and reports for public broadcasting on a freelance basis. After being imprisoned multiple times for her critical films, she fled Iran with her daughter Sharie.

Sharie Parsipur is a sociologist, musician, and DJ. Some may know her as DJ Ishtar. She plays regularly in clubs and had her own radio program at the NPS for many years.

Women Without Men
Director: Shirin Neshat / Shoja Azari, 2009.
Germany / Austria / France
Duration: 95 minutes
Starring: NavÃd Akhavan, Mina Azarian, Bijan Daneshmand

Men are also very welcome for the film and the subsequent debate.

Reservations are recommended. For more information, visit: www.de-fabriek.nl

Location
Jan Sijbrandssteeg 12, Zaandam



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