Women Without Men

Women Without Men (زنان بدون مردان, 2009) is an Iranian-Austrian drama you can watch online on iFILM. Directors Shirin Neshat and Shoja Azari adapted Shahrnush Parsipur's banned novel, setting the story against the CIA-backed operation that overthrew Iran's elected government in the summer of 1953.

Four women, four traps. A wealthy housewife suffocating in a loveless marriage. A sex worker who has run out of reasons to go on. A spinster haunted by what she was never allowed to have. A young woman facing a match she didn't choose. Their separate paths lead to a walled orchard outside Tehran — a place where the usual rules briefly stop applying.

Shirin Neshat comes from the visual arts world, and the film shows it: long-held compositions, minimal dialogue, images that carry the weight the words don't need to. It earned her the Silver Lion for Best Director at the 66th Venice Film Festival. Not a thriller, not a melodrama — closer to a visual poem about women who decide to claim some ground. Stream Women Without Men (2009) on iFILM.