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‘The Seed of the Sacred Fig’ Review: Repression Hasn’t Chastened Mohammad Rasoulof, Who Responds With a Marathon Domestic Critique
Mohammad Rasoulof watched Iran's Jina Revolution from prison. 'The Seed of the Sacred Fig' translates that dynamic to a household with two daughters.
With livid, thinking-man’s thriller “ The Seed of the Sacred Fig,” director Mohammad Rasoulof responds to his own imprisonment in 2022 (during which a wave of protests erupted after the death of Jina Mahsa Amini, who was arrested and beaten for wearing an improper hijab) by examining Iranian tensions within the context of a well-placed Tehran family. This turning point occurs 86 minutes in, at the precise midpoint of the film, and shifts what has been a slightly didactic portrait of the difference of perspective between conservative-minded parents and their more change-oriented children into a gripping and all-around more suspenseful look at the extremes to which the older generation will go to maintain its control. This metaphorical location represents the ruins of what Iran once was: a crumbling labyrinth where one of his daughters finds a stack of tapes, including one featuring a banned song from half a century ago, in which a woman celebrates the beauty of female hair.
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