Underplayed Gems

No Burqas Behind Bars (2013)

No Burqas Behind Bars poster
Original title
Frihet bakom galler
Directed by
Nima Sarvestani
Genre
documentary film
Country
Sweden
Runtime
1h 17m
Rating
7.2 of 10 from 4 voters
Elsewhere
IMDb
The 3D catalogue: film cases on wooden shelves, with the cat sitting at the counter next to its greeting.

The catalogue in 3D

The film shelves have a room of their own that you can walk around in. The cat behind the counter is the AI Catbot, and they pick real films from the same catalogue when you tell them what you feel like watching. Nothing is for sale, here or in there. Go in from here and this film is already out on the counter, with more like it waiting on the shelf next to it.

More films like this

How it feels

This documentary follows women imprisoned in Afghanistan for so-called moral crimes such as fleeing abuse or falling in love. It shows the harsh conditions they endure alongside their children and contrasts their punishment with that of women convicted of murder.

eye-openingsoberingintimaterestrainedhumanizingsomberobservationaldisturbing

What happens

No Burqas Behind Bars is a 2012 Swedish feature-length documentary film made by Maryam Ebrahimi and Nima Sarvestani on life in a women's prison in Afghanistan. In Takhar Prison, Afghanistan, 40 women are locked behind bars together with their 34 children. They all share four cells. Through the prisoners’ own stories, the film explores how "moral crimes" are used to control women in Afghanistan. The film shows that women fleeing from their husbands get a longer punishment than those who have committed murder. Outside the home, burqas cover the women of Afghanistan from head to toe, masking their identity, making them faceless and voiceless in society, except when they are in prison. Sima was forced to get married at the age of ten and had five children by the time she was 20 years old. She is locked away, together with her children, for 15 years. Her crime consists of fleeing from an abusive husband, who had already murdered one of his other wives and their child. Sara, one of the main characters of the film, is locked away because she fell in love. Najibeh, Latife, and many more names – they all carry stories that show the inner strength and dignity of the human being when she faces obscene living conditions. The film premiered at the 2012 International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

More like this

This page is from Underplayed Gems. Not quite it? You can browse by genre, country and year, or take this one into the 3D catalogue and ask the Catbot for something closer.