Greenes Please don't spend money on this.

Kailansorac Clever, believable, and super fun to watch. It totally has replay value.

Ogosmith Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.

Tymon Sutton The acting is good, and the firecracker script has some excellent ideas.

Mahmoud Al-Atassi Women without men; is an Iranian film which was directed by Shirin Neshat and Shoja Azari in 2009. The movie reflects women issues in Iran and the oriental culture generally. The film based on an Iranian novel which has the same name. It was written by Shahrnush Parsipur in 1989. The writer was prison-ed five years because of this novel and it is forbidden until now to be distributed in the Iranian land. The film has four main women characters embodying a several situations in the Iranian society. The writer and the directors criticize enslaving women and considering them as bodies controlled by men or even by some dominate women. The film take a place in 1953, where there was a coup against Mohammed Mosaddegh by the UK and USA. None of the film characters is politically active, but Munis has the interest of supporting Mosaddegh and follow up the news, while her brother prevent her from that. The four main characters are Munis, Faezeh, Zarin and Fakhri. Munis is a liberal woman reached the age of thirty without getting married and her brother tries to arrange her a husband because he feels ashamed of that. Faezeh is the best friend of Munis; and she loves Munis's brother secretly. Bothe women are middle class women. Zarin is a prostitute woman; she hates her life and wants to change it hardly and she sets at the bottom of the social pyramid. Fakhri is an upper class woman who is tired of her husband and wants to dislocate her husband. The movie starts with Azzan (Islamic call for prayer) which reflects the religion issue in the film as one of the most important elements. Munis stands alone on the roof wearing her Islamic dress (Higab-scarf), she takes it off and the scarf falls on the ground as she throws herself into the sky. She seems like flying in freedom after she took off her heavy weights of religious and cultural thoughts that were forced on her by the society and the dominant power of men. She says while she is flying into the sky "I'll have silence, silence, and nothing, and I realize the only freedom from pain is to be free from the world". The scene shows the hardness of her life with the Hijab which portrays religious and traditional barriers that she can't break, so she decided to leave them on the earth and go away to the sky, where she can find freedom to enjoy. The four women decide to survive from the society and have their own freedom, as they all meet in a strange garden. The garden is outside the city and it has its own gatekeeper. Whenever the woman come near of the garden, the door is opened by the gatekeeper without any knocking. In this garden women have their own freedom to live their live as they always wanted as they also face their fears and challenges. The concept of "the garden" goes all the way back to the Babylon time, which it has the oldest texts that talk about the sacred, secret garden. The space that devoted for love symbolizing the Garden of Eden. The bible has also mentioned the sacred garden and describe its beauty as the woman body and the act of love. The film is one of the best films I have watched which deals with symbolism and it is so rich with it, so I will give one of the best examples in the film. When Zarin was doing her job as a prostitute, as she is sick of her life and she seems like a dead woman. She has a strange costumer. She usually doesn't look into the face of her costumer. She waits the costumer until he finishes having sex with her. But the strange costumer has touched her differently, he softly touches her arm and then her face. She might has felt that, he touches her soul not her body with a dirty and sexualized desire. So she decides to see that different man. When she opens her eyes, she sees a faceless man and then she runs away. The faceless human in dreams can be explained by discovering the one self's hidden character. As she doesn't want to continue her life under the pressure and the ashamed society who forced her in a way or another to have such a dirty life. surprisingly, the man is the garden gatekeeper himself, as he is shown later on.

alexanderjosefina bad movies are just bad,cause they are nit done well, have no scripts, or terrible actors, lighting is wrong and above all director is just far off the line of what movie making is all about. this terribly bad film has it all in it. and all that shows how invaluable, stupid, and worthlessness all world festivals are all together to get all these stupid films merits and awards. man i was almost wet in my pants as it went on every 10 minutes. bad movie from a good artist, but hell who said all artists should make films. this one is out of pure complexions from an artist who wants to be taken seriously as an director. sorry girl, you have miles to go to get there . go back to your art

thisissubtitledmovies Women Without Men is the debut feature from 'visual artist'-turned- director Shirin Neshat, well known for her artistic works exploring gender relations. It is the adaptation of the 1989 novel of the same name by Shahrnush Parsipur, which was banned by the Iranian government in the 1990s for its outspoken depiction of female oppression.Women Without Men is a tasteful, beautifully shot, well-meaning drama with some excellent performances and strong story set in a fascinating period in Iranian history. It's let down a little by its tendency to rely on clichés and convenience when it comes to character, but still an extremely enjoyable take on female independence and the intertwining lives of these four women. LB

Red-125 Women Without Men (2009) is an Iranian film whose original title is Zanan-e bedun-e mardan. It was directed by Shirin Neshat and Shoja Azari. The title "Women Without Men" is misleading, because the women are only "without" men because they are able temporarily to escape from the men in their lives by moving to a rural estate.The movie takes place in 1953, when the CIA helped overthrow the democratic government of Iran and put the Shah into power. Some of the women are running from government oppression, and some of them are running from the oppression of the men in their lives. The women in the film had few acceptable options--probably an accurate reflection of the lives of women in Iran during this period. It's a grim situation, and it's depicted in a grim film. I don't have the expertise to know how faithful the film is to the novel on which it's based, or to the reality of events in 1950's Iraq. That information will have to come from an expert. (My guess is that the portrayal of women's lives is pretty accurate.)This is a powerful film. We saw it at the excellent Rochester 360-365 film festival--dumb name but great festival. There's enough in this film to make it worth seeing, but, in my opinion, not enough to warrant seeking it out at all costs. It should work well on a small screen.