Mohammad Rasoulof is now an exile because he made The Seed of the Sacred Fig. The Iranian director was the talk of the Cannes Film Festival last summer. Because his film (like many of his others) criticized his country’s government, he shot it entirely in secret. After the French festival selected his work as part of its competition, the Iranian justice system sentenced him to eight years in prison plus a flogging and seizure of his property. Having already done prison time for his filmmaking, Rasoulof instead spent almost a month fleeing the country over land and finding refuge in Germany, where he lived previously.
This compelling backstory is no doubt part of why The Seed of the Sacred Fig is now nominated for an Oscar as Germany’s entry for Best International Film, though it would still be fantastic drama even without that. I named it the second-best film of 2024, and as it opens this weekend at AMC Grapevine Mills, AMC Parks at Arlington, and Cinemark North East Mall, you can see why I think it’s so much better than Emilia Pérez.
The story begins with a devout lawyer named Iman (Missagh Zareh) being promoted from lawyer to investigating judge in Tehran’s Revolutionary Tribunal. It’s a big thing for him, affording him more pay, a bigger apartment for his family, and a chance for further advancement. It also comes with the expectation that he’ll rubber-stamp hundreds of death sentences passed by his superiors each day, along with advice not to tell even his family about his new job, which he disregards. Then his handgun vanishes from an unlocked drawer in his bedside table, less than two weeks after it’s given to him for protection. Could one of his college-age daughters Rezvan and Sana (Mahsa Rostami and Setareh Maleki) have taken it, even though he hasn’t told them about the weapon? Or is his wife Najmeh (Soheila Golestani) the culprit? His boss (Reza Akhlaghirad) promises dire consequences for losing the gun. They’re in his car at that moment, because the boss’ office is bugged.
This movie is 168 minutes long, but Westerners may find it more digestible than some shorter Iranian films. That’s because Rasoulof makes thrillers. They’re not as slam-bang as Western action movies, but his There Is No Evil and Manuscripts Don’t Burn have plots and action set pieces that would suit a Hollywood film just fine. This movie contains a sequence on a country road where Iman becomes convinced that he’s being followed, then gets behind the pursuing car and tries to run it off the road. (I repeat, they shot this entire movie in secret, though it’s made so professionally that you wouldn’t suspect it.)
Elsewhere, Rasoulof emphasizes the suspense element, which is everywhere in a society where nobody has any expectations of privacy. Iman is outed as a judge when social-media users dox him, and when he drives home after that, he eyeballs a motorcyclist who pulls up very close alongside him and a man loitering outside his apartment building who’s talking on his cellphone. The scenes around the dinner table are shot through with the tension, as the parents are true believers in the Islamic revolution while the daughters chafe against the system. On top of that, the movie is set in late 2022, when the Mahsa Amini protests are taking place. (The film contains a lot of real-life footage of those protests.) An answer comes when Rezvan brings home a fellow student (Niousha Akhshi) who has been shot in the face.
The movie’s climax is a political and psychological masterstroke, as Iman drives his family to the rural village where he grew up. He says it’s to bond as a family, but really it’s for locking up his wife and daughters and interrogating them separately in front of cameras until somebody confesses to taking the gun. His methods are quite similar to the ones used by Iranian police and military against the protesters, but you don’t have to know that to be chilled. As we saw this past election cycle, it’s not just Muslim fathers who try to clamp down on women (in their families or in public life) when they feel their own lives spiraling out of control.
As first one and then all three women get free and lead Iman on a deadly chase through a complex of deserted stone houses, the parallels with traditional gender roles in Iran and America are extraordinary. (And this is funny: The person who has taken the gun learns to shoot it by watching a YouTube video from America. If that’s me, I’m probably doing the same thing.) The Seed of the Sacred Fig rightly hails the courage of the Amini protesters against Iran’s theocracy, but its own existence is itself an act of great courage. We could use more of that in our politics and culture.
The Seed of the Sacred Fig
Starring Missagh Zareh, Soheila Golestani, Mahsa Rostami, and Setareh Maleki. Written and directed by Mohammad Rasoulof. Rated PG-13.
