Golshifteh Farahani

Hamid Djavadan

Hassina Burgan

Massi Mrowat

Mohamed Al Maghraoui

Malak Djaham Khazal

Faiz Fazil

Hatim Seddiki

Mouhcine Malzi

Amine Ennaji

Hiba Lharrak

Aya Abida

Fatima Mastouri

Sabah Benseddik

Ahmed Ait Mahrabi

Frédérique Dumas-Zajdela

Atiq Rahimi

Malek Jahan Khazai

Thierry Arbogast

Max Richter

Erwin Prib

Hervé de Luze

Hani Farsi

Sajjad Motamedzadeh

Bénédicte Bellocq

Dana Farzanehpour

Faraz Mesgari Abbasi

Anas Hamouch

Xavier Prat

Rémi Burah

Lars Ginzel

Lauraine Heftler

Verona Meier

Philippe Gautier

Noemi Hampel

Michaël Gentile

Gerhard Meixner

Roman Paul

Jean-Claude Carrière

Delphine De Casanove

Drama

Syngué Sabour - Pierre de patience

The Film

Studio 37

ARTE France Cinéma

Razor Film Produktion

Corniche Media

Jahan-e-Honar Productions

Germany

France

Afghanistan

CinemaSerf

In a war-torn Muslim nation (that we can presume is Afghanistan) we are introduced to a young woman (Golshifteh Farahani) who is trying to look after her two young daughters whilst their father is lying lifeless on a mattress with a bullet hole in his neck. His colleagues have long deserted them and so she must try - with the help of a nearby aunt (Hassina Burgan) - to keep her family safe whilst nursing her husband as best she can. There are militia everywhere and with him paralysed on the floor, she has to find ingenious ways to try and hide him from their murderous hands. As the days pass, she begins to talk to the man (and us) and that provides for much of the fairly traumatic backstory that sees her exposed to brutality, indifference and negligence since childhood. She also has an encounter with the local commander whom she convinces she is an whore. He is disgusted but seems to have mentioned this to his men as a nervous young man (Massi Mrowat) appears on the doorstep ostensibly just looking to pay for sex but actually he is in need of a great deal more. Vulnerabilities are rife amidst the chaos of war. Gradually, her memories become more descriptive, more explicit and by the conclusion we know much more about her than perhaps she had realised. Is he listening, though? It's most unusual to have an incapacitated man, on death's door, serving as a conduit for a story like this but it works effectively. She tells us a story riddled with persecution - physically and intellectually and once she has opened the floodgates, her resentment pours out. It's not a rant, there's not really that much rancour. It is a measured and rational evaluation of her life and of her treatment by those she loved and who were supposed to care for her in return. It invites us to critique the austerity of her faith, and of her sex's role within that framework, without telling us exactly what to think. Any judgements here are ours. It can get a little repetitive at times but Faharani exudes a sense of intensity that does make this quite a poignant watch.

فارسی

The Patience Stone

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The Patience Stone

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