Women Without Men, directed by Shirin Neshat and released in 2009, is a film focusing on the gender-based adversities that four women face during the political turmoil in Tehran, Iran, during the 1950s. Although the women are from different social and religious backgrounds, they all seek liberation from oppression in a patriarchal society and the freedom to realize their desires.

Munis shows a deep interest in the political climate of the time and yearns to become more active in the fight against a foreign-backed coup. She spends her time glued to the radio listening to the news and refuses to greet the suitor whose visit has been set up by her fervently religious brother, Amir Khan, who rips out the radio cord in anger. Faezeh, a friend of Munis, is deeply religious and wants to marry Munis’ brother; however, she lets go of any hope after she is raped by two men from a teashop and faces shame. Zarin is a prostitute who is constantly berated by the madam of the brothel to greet her male customers. She hugs herself on the floor of her room, scrubs her body until it bleeds, and runs away from the brothel after looking at one of her customers and discovering he is faceless. Fakhri, the fourth woman, is fifty, wealthy, and married to General Sadri, who threatens to get rid of her for another wife if she cannot satisfy him. She leaves him and moves out to a property with an orchard, where Zarin and Fakhri also eventually find themselves after running away from their unsatisfying lives.

From the start, the film presents death as a way to achieve freedom. We first see a flash-forward scene in colour where Munis jumps to her death to escape Amir. This contrasts greatly with a dark, desaturated scene where Munis sits on the floor and is violently scolded by Amir, who threatens to break her legs if she leaves their home. The lack of colour in the scene reflects the bleakness of Munis’ life – a life where she is unable to act politically and fight for what she wants. These two scenes also show by the physical position of her body how Munis finds place of power and freedom through death. She sits on the floor at her brother’s feet while he shouts at her. Whereas before Munis dies, she is shown in a low-angle shot on a tall roof overlooking the city. She has chosen the freedom to break her own body rather than allow a man to do so.

Neshat chooses to present the rest of the scenes with Munis in colour: Munis can finally live out her heart’s deepest wishes in death. This is an example of the film’s use of magical realism to portray her after death. Here, Munis continues to listen to the radio, even in an environment meant only for men, and joins the communists in fighting against the tyranny of the Shah. After Zarin also dies, we flashback to the scene where Munis dies and narrates how death is release from a world where women cannot change their lives.

Much like death, letting go of the chador represents a liberation for the women from their past constraining lives. Before finding her way into the orchard, Zarin lets go of her chador and leaves it by the stream. She finds herself in a sanctuary of peace and reflection, where no madam is constantly calling for her to serve her body to a male stranger. Living with Fakhri in the home by the orchard, Faezeh also discontinues wearing her chador and embraces a happier life with Fakhri who makes her smile and provides her with a place of safety. When Amir visits Faezeh to propose she be his second wife (while his first wife will be her servant), he sees she is not wearing her chador and questions whether she is still religious. Faezeh stands up for herself and her new way of life, which no longer centers around having Amir as her husband. When Faezeh leaves the orchard on the long, dirt path, she is wearing a floral dress instead of the black chador that she wore on her way to the orchard. Before Munis’ body hits the ground in her suicide, we see her chador falling and landing first; she too has let go of her life of oppression.

The film makes use of the human voice to represent the world of chaos driven by men, and contrasts this with the use of silence that represents a world of freedom for women. When Zarin is waiting for customers in her room, the madam is constantly shouting her name. When she is walking alone after her bath, she stops by a group of women in black chadors mourning and wailing loudly. It is only when Zarin reaches the orchard where there are no men that she is surrounded by silence and peace. Throughout the film, the men, such as General Sadri and Amir, are always loudly talking while the women are in silence and in pain. For example, Munis is constantly chastised by her brother, Amir. Fakhri sits sadly at her table as General Sadri is noisily voicing his opinions in the background; she escapes this world of chaos by moving to the orchard as Zarin did. We see how silence also contrasts with the sound of the adhan, the Islamic call to worship, when Munis falls to her death. As she flees from the calls that remind her of pious brother, the voices stop. There is also the whispering of Faezeh’s name, which is followed by a voice that echoes her worry that people will found out she is not a virgin. The whispering stops when she finds inner peace and embraces her woman’s body as she looks in the mirror.

A life where women can live without men is portrayed as desirable in a country wrecked by political upheaval and unwilling to give women the freedom to make their own choices for their bodies and futures. The women and Iran serve as metaphors for one another; both are undergoing a period of oppression from which they try to escape. The women seek to live freely and in control of their own bodies, while Iran tries to fend off the control of foreign governments and the dictatorship of the Shah.  It is either through death or escape to the orchard, far from the chaos of political demonstrations and the violence of a patriarchal society, that the four women can finally achieve freedom.