Screen/Society--"The Seed of the Sacred Fig" (Mohammad Rasoulof, 2024)

THE SEED OF THE SACRED FIG
(Mohammad Rasoulof, 2024, 166 min, Germany/Iran/France, Farsi w/English subtitles, DCP)

A target of Iran's hardline conservative government for his films' criticism of the state, director Mohammad Rasoulof fled his home country to avoid an eight-year prison sentence, though he hadn't finished editing his latest film yet. His searing drama THE SEED OF THE SACRED FIG is every bit as urgent and gripping as its real-life backstory would portend: Investigating judge Iman grapples with paranoia amid political unrest in Tehran. When his gun vanishes, he suspects his wife and daughters, imposing draconian measures that strain family ties as societal rules crumble. Both paranoia thriller and domestic drama, THE SEED OF THE SACRED FIG is above all an epic of anti-patriarchal political conviction.

- Winner of the Prix Spécial and FIPRESCI prize at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival

"Rasoulof crafts an extraordinarily gripping allegory about the corrupting costs of power and the suppression of women under a religious patriarchy that crushes the very people it claims to protect." - Ryan Lattanzio, IndieWire

"THE SEED OF THE SACRED FIG asks us to enter a family's story, but also to acknowledge that we are part of it. We're extras in the background, no matter how far away we are. For Rasoulof, the world he's created is far from theoretical. The consequences have been, too." - Alissa Wilkinson, The New York Times