Though I
made a number of attempts to give a complete watch to the movie “The Stoning of Soraya M.”, I failed for many times. The only reason was my failure in controlling myself while watching some shots and scenes. But last time, I
accumulated the courage and sat for watching. After I watched
it completely, it didn’t
let me free without having my emotions, aggressions and sentiments shared.
The movie revolving around the true
horrific story simply begins with a car trouble of a French journalist. A
flashback told him the day after the event took place occupies most of the plotline.
The event is the painful stoned death of an innocent woman named Soraya which
takes place in a Muslim society. The basic plot begins as the journalist starts
to record a woman's voice named Zahra. Zahra shares a horrific and bloody story
about her neice, Soraya in spite of her neighbors' attempt to keep him far from
her.
Soraya’s husband Ali intends to marry
a 14 years old girl though he has already a wife with two sons and two
daughters. In order to fulfill this motive, he wants a divorce from Soraya, for
which he employs a mullah of his village. He becomes able to use him only after
he tells him that he would tell everything about his past as a convict in case
he doesn't help him. Mullah proposes her to be his temporary wife but Zahra
stops her from accepting the offer. After some days following this incident,
one of the neighbouring women dies. Then, Ali as well as the mayor asks Zahra
to persuade his wife to take care of the widower and his children. Zahra says
that Soraya may do that in case she is paid.
With Soraya’s start working for the
widower, Ali and the mayor spread the rumour of Soraya’s disloyalty in the
society and plan to charge her with adultery. For the supportive witness, they
meet the widower and manipulate him into accepting what they say to back up their
conspiracy. Following it, Ali starts beating her and declares that she has been
unfaithful towards him. They called the widower and he lies that she has
engaged in adultery with him. Soraya is confined at Zahra’s house with some
women and at once convicted. After her unsuccessful attempt to flee with
Soraya, Zahra goes to the mayor and pleads for her life. With the preparation
for the stoning, the mayor seems praying to Allah for a signal to their deed.
Having his daughter previously
disowned, Soraya's father throws the stones at her but misses repeatedly. After
a woman comes pleading to the mayor that that is the signal for Soarya’s
innocence, Ali himself takes the stones and throws. Her two sons also are given
the stones to throw and they do. The widower is invited to stone but he cannot
and walks away bursting into tears. Finally Soraya is stoned to death.
At last, Zahra is heard while
narrating the story. The widower comes to inform the journalist that his car is
repaired. Soon, the mayor and the widower are said that Ali’s marriage to a
girl, which was conditional, was cancelled. Shortly later, the widower in fury
admits that he was compelled to tell lie. Suspected with the journalist, the
mayor stops him during his departure and destroys all the tapes the journalist
has. Later Zahra appears with the original tape, hands that to him then he
drives away. She yells with her expectation that the story of injustice will be
spread all through the world. This is how the plot has simply been structured.
All the males in the film are
presented as the villains and so is the reality there. As it is a dramatic
representation of a true account of an Iranian woman named Soraya Manutchehri,
falsely accused of adultery and murdered, adopted from a journalist’s book of
the same name published in 1994, it compels the male members of "a
patriarchal society" to question their own existence.
In one of the scenes, confined
inside Zahra’s house, Soraya responds to a question if she is frightened as
“Not of death, but of dying.. the stones, the pain.” It shows the prospected
degree of extreme physical torment.
Soraya's sons go parallel with her
father. Many things we can reckon from their role in the movie. Like other
males, her two sons are the "suppressing agents" in that society only
because they are the males. Though they are still young, the society has
started teaching them about the gender roles. They are harshly indoctrinated
with the false ideology that the males are the super beings, they must not
burst into tears. Soraya's sons are becoming like her father who believe that
the females are to be suppressed, exploited, and vandalized. Soraya's father,
without any proof, undoubtedly believes that his daughter is a culprit. Though
aged and matured, he is not conscious of his conscience and so are his sons-in-law
becoming. With the age, they had to be more thoughtful, well-mannered and moral
but they are in the way of becoming more thoughtless, ill-mannered and immoral.
If one's own father and sons easily believe in false charges against a woman
without any hesitation and question, who else is there to stand in her favor if
the voices of other women are unheard?
In the male dominated societies, the
females are still docile to the males. Their problems, pains and predicaments
remain unheard there as it has been portrayed in the movie. Almost all females
are united because they identify themselves in each other. We can see them
weeping and lamenting over the pain of Soraya. But, we can't see a single male
serious and hesitant to throw the stones to Soraya rather they seem happy to execute
her. Before stoning, no of them thinks whether he is doing wrong. They are preoccupied
with the notion that whatever the Mulla says is true and this very notion
doesn't allow them even to think of the existence of females. It is the same
notion that has shaped their whole psyche.
Whatever unfortunate incidents take
place, they are the results of the ideology that the women must be loyal and
humble towards the men like the mayor says "When a man accuses his wife,
she must prove her innocence … if a wife accuses her husband, she must prove
his guilt." As the males are superior to females in that very society,
they have power. So they have constructed the culture in their own favour
keeping the females at the margin. When the younger kid asks why their mother
has to die, the elder one tells him "to behave like a man". As he is
little bit older than his brother, he is more influenced by the instruction. He
does have no sense of guilt and hesitation since he has grown up in the society
where the mistreatments towards women are not marked worthy. Soraya's father
and sons are untouched by the pathetic scene of stoning to death. It shows the
harsh indoctrination in that community.
The movie portrays the ill treatment
towards women in the Muslim families. In addition to that, it displays the
harsh and false indoctrination in Muslim culture along with the submissive
status of women. The biased culture, context and falsely conceived psyche of
the males seem more accountable for innocent Soraya's stoned death.
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