It’s been a day for hard hitting films. This was one film I was really looking forward to as it’s by one of my favourite directors, Mohammed Rasoulof (Manuscripts Don’t Burn, A Man of Integrity, There is No Evil). He has a tendency to explore morals and actions within corrupt systems in Iran and this one follows those themes.

This story centres around the rights of women and I expect is inspired by the protests where women began taking off their hijabs in public and after a young woman was killed in custody in 2022 after being arrested for not wearing a hijab.

Iman (Missagh Zareh) has just been promoted to inspector in the revolutionary court, a stepping stone to becoming a judge. His ambitious wife Najmeh (Soheila Golestani) is delighted and exhorts her daughters to ensure they do not bring shame to the family. Rezvan (Mahsa Rostami) is at college and has a friend Sadaf (Niousha Akhshi) who her mother doesn’t approve of. When they get caught accidentally in a rally, Sadaf is injured and arrested. 

We know from Iman’s experiences that the justice system is not about evidence and it is enough to accuse someone – she must have been doing something if she was arrested and so deserves to be controlled and punished. We see the cut corners, paranoia, and bullying inherent in Iman‘s job slowly starting to permeate his role within the family. We also see Rezvan and younger sister Sana’s (Setareh Maleki) realisation that their mother’s job to date has been to protect them from his anger.

It’s a long film and some aspects of the third act seem a bit contrived but it has a driving tension caused by the precariousness of the women’s situation. You are damned no matter what if a man decides you are guilty.

There are great performances all around and some threads of humour that had the audience laughing, even amid terrible things.  It ended with some hope and was intercut with real footage of riots and violence. The title was alluded to at the start – the sacred fig grows as a parasite around a tree until it finally kills off its host and stands alone. For a while I felt that the corrupt system was the sacred fig, killing off women, but it’s possible that Rasoulof means the opposite.

As the credits rolled, a young woman walked to the front of the cinema and exhorted the audience to do more than watch a film and to lend their support to asylum seekers in Melbourne. I’m not sure anyone was listening.