Mehrdad Oskouei's Sunless Shadows is a harrowing observational documentary into oppression and reciprocal violence. The confines of an Iranian juvenile detention center where adolescent girls serve time for acts of violence against men is observed with a restrictive, tactical precision that helps elucidate the moral complexities of the truly tragic circumstances these women find themselves in. Interweaving observational communal interactions between these women with intimate confessional moments, Sunless Shadows' formal deployment properly contextualizes these women both as individuals and victims of larger systemic issues of this deeply patriarchal society. In the observational moments of socialization, Sunless Shadows begins to reveal a sense of freedom and liberty one never would expect given they are incarcerated. They may not be free in the material sense, yet how they interact with each other, many feeling far freer to speak about their circumstances and feelings with one and another while incarcerated ultimately signals a metaphysical type of freedom. In these social moments of interaction, one gets a sense that for the first time these young women feel unrestrained by the social oppression and deeply embedded patriarchal system that places them in a place of subservience. In a sense, this place is the first time they genuinely have experienced egalitarianism, with each woman in this juvenile center being on equal footing, their conversations and interactions being rooted in a place where there is no imbalance of power, unlike any interaction they'd have with men. A film that can be difficult to watch, Sunless Shadows navigates the moral relativism of systemic abuse and individual acts of retribution that are reactions to such embedded systemic oppression. Death and violence are commonplace for this young woman, in one way or another, and Sunless Shadows manages to give them a sense of autonomy through its observational and deeply empathetic lens.
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AuthorLove of all things cinema brought me here. Archives
June 2023
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