A brutal work attacking misogyny - "Holy Spider"

Today we will talk about the Danish/German/Swedish/French movie "Holy Spider".

"Holy Spider" is a brutal and shocking film, full of critiques of systemic misogyny.

The film is based on the true story of Iranian serial killer Saeed Hanai at the beginning of the millennium. The killer, known as the "Spider Killer", brutally claimed the lives of 16 prostitutes in Iran between 2000 and 2001.

The story is set in Mashhad, one of the seven holiest sites of Shia Islam. At the beginning of the film, the city is seen as a vast spider web, and the sacred Mashhad is located at the center of this spider web.

Originally a veteran of Iran's Iraq war, Saeed Hanai is now an ordinary municipal worker. He saw his actions as a sacred mission, to clean up the streets of filth, a series of actions he defined as a crusade against a decadent society. The reason he started committing the crime was because someone wrongly believed that his wife was a prostitute.

Saeed Hanay is a municipal construction worker who is usually a loving father to his children, but at night he shows a very different side than during the day.

Riding a motorcycle, he patrolled the city streets, luring his victims into his home with bait, strangling them to death with a turban, and then abandoning the bodies on a remote path.

Meanwhile, a female journalist named Rahimi comes to the city to investigate the series of killings. She was recently fired for alleging sexual harassment from her boss, but that didn't stop her determination to pursue the truth. Her partner is Sherifi, a journalist who also upholds a sense of justice. When Saeed calls Sherifi, claiming that he is "declaring war on sin," Rahimi realizes she must take action to find the "spider killer" herself.

While Rahimi is trying to hunt down the "spider killer", she is met with indifference and disregard from the authorities. She was frustrated that the authorities were not interested in her investigation. Despite this, Rahimi did not give up, and she resolutely continued to pursue the truth.

Eventually, Saeed was arrested, however, unexpectedly, he was considered a hero by some. This distorted response complicates the situation and provokes deep reflections on justice and morality.

The film began development in 2016 and has undergone several geographical and program changes.

Initially, the filmmakers wanted to shoot the film in Iran, showing the problems and challenges in Iranian society. In 2019, the idea was abandoned. Filming was planned for early 2020 in Jordan, but due to the pandemic, it was postponed several times and the plan had to be shelved.

It wasn't until the end of 2020 that they finally decided to move the production location to Turkey, where there were fewer pandemic restrictions. However, they were thwarted by the Turkish authorities, which put the production team in a huge predicament. Director Ali Abbasi said it was the result of the Iranian government's intervention.

Despite the difficulties, the production team was not discouraged. They returned to Jordan and finally started filming in May 2021 and took 35 days to complete.

Director Ali Abbasi changed Saeed Hanai's surname in "Holy Spider" and fictionalized details of the female journalist who followed the case, in an attempt to shift the viewer's attention from specific characters to the film's central theme of misogyny.

The most impressive thing is that the film is designed with a shocking scene: the female journalist Rahimi does not hesitate to disguise herself as a sex worker to conduct an in-depth investigation in order to track down the killer. In fact, real female journalists did not take such action.

Director Ali Abbasi also revealed that an important narrative decision was to abandon the traditional cop film model of shooting another serial killer, and instead chose to delve into the phenomenon of serial killers from a social perspective. This choice allows the film to jump out of the traditional framework of crime and give the work a deeper social meaning.

At first glance, "Holy Spider" is the kind of crime thriller in which a journalist tracks down a serial killer, but there's so much more to it than that.

The film does not delve into the background of Saeed Hanai's identity or his motives for committing the crime, and his identity and intentions are revealed to the audience at the beginning of the film. Similarly, the film doesn't focus too much on how he was caught. Instead, "The Spider" focuses on how Said orchestrated and carried out this series of murders, revealing the entire process of his crime.

It all revolves around director Ali Abbasi's original intention to reveal the misogyny and unfair treatment of women that are prevalent in Iranian society.

In the film, when Rahimi, a female journalist, first arrives in Mashhad, she is confronted with a series of injustices. Since she was single and unmarried, she was unable to get a room at the hotel. The clerk excused himself for a system error, but when Rahimi identified himself as a journalist, the problem was immediately solved. Later, when she delved into the "Spider Killer" incident, she encountered more obstacles and indifference. The police and the judge were indifferent to this, even turning a deaf ear to the clues she revealed.

"Holy Spider" begins with a unique narrative approach that deromanticizes the serial killer.

This move is undoubtedly a subversion and mockery of those movies that glorify murderers. In many films, the killer is often endowed with a mysterious, otherworldly charm, and their actions are cleverly constructed into an intractable mystery.

However, in this work, the director resolutely rejects this routine. From the very beginning of the film, the audience can clearly perceive that the murderer Saeed Hanai is an ordinary person, and his madness, arrogance and fascist ideas make him no different from those vulgar idiots who claim to be elites.

Through this film, the director profoundly reveals the roots of misogyny in Iranian society.

He pointed out that this social pathology was not simply a religious, political or institutional product, but more of a cultural tradition.

This is also why the director, when describing the film, emphasized that it is a work about a "serial killer society". In this film, the audience is not only watching the story of a serial killer, but also examining a society, a culture, and the pathologies and diseases hidden in it.

Zara Amir Abrahimi was not chosen as the heroine at the beginning.

In fact, when director Ali Abbasi was looking for an actress suitable to play the female journalist Rahimi, he auditioned about 50 actresses. He had in mind the ideal candidate for a more physically strong actor with a youthful vibe, as he considered the character of Rahimi to be very young, inexperienced and with a strong desire to prove himself. In his opinion, Zara Amir Abrahimi is too soft and mature, and does not fit his imagination of the character.

Zara Amir Abrahimi is a well-known TV actress in Iran, however, her acting career was interrupted by her ex-boyfriend's exposure of intimate videos. In order to escape the pressure of public opinion at home, she chose to flee Iran.

It was her past life experiences that made her look different from the rest of the crowd in her auditions. Director Ali Abbasi changed his opinion of her when he saw her use her own life experience to interpret situations in which people in despair might make dangerous choices.

At the 2022 Cannes Film Festival, "The Holy Spider" received a seven-minute standing ovation after the screening, and Zara Amir Abrahimi's outstanding performance won praise from audiences and critics alike, and won the Best Actress Award at the festival. This honor made her the first Iranian actress to win the Best Actress award at the Cannes Film Festival.

Days after Zara Amir Abrahimi won the Best Actress award at the Cannes Film Festival for "The Holy Spider," Iranian government officials launched a fierce crackdown against the Iranian-born actress and the film's Danish-Iranian director, Ali Abbasi. Some radicals have even gone further to call for their execution.

In a statement, the Iranian Film and Audiovisual Affairs Organization called the film "shameless and obscene," adding that it was "the product of a distorted Iranian-Danish male mind." The group condemned the Cannes Film Festival's award for Best Actress in the film, calling it "an insulting and politically motivated act."

In an interview with CNN, Ibrahimi revealed that she received about 200 threatening messages after the Cannes Film Festival awards ceremony. The director of "Holy Spider" and others involved in the production suffered similar threats.

Of course, misogyny is not confined to a particular country or religion, and we cannot dismiss an entire country just because there is a Sayyid Hanai. After all, Jack the Ripper has not been caught to this day, and Saeed Hanai was captured and sentenced.

Those who are extremely misogynistic try to link their actions to ethno-religious issues, in fact, to make excuses for their crimes. We must remain soberly aware of this and not be deceived by their sophistry. This kind of pathological thinking is not only despicable, but also a serious threat to human equality and dignity.

"Holy Spider" is full of unbelievable and righteous rage.

And when people began to expect the emergence of vigilantes to defend the justice that has been neglected and trampled on, this has fully demonstrated the rotten and unpopular nature of the entire system. This expectation is actually a kind of irony of the existing system, and a kind of helplessness to uphold the morality of lynching.

The film cleverly puts us on the side of resistance and anger, where a mother, a daughter and a pregnant woman are brutally murdered, only to be ignored by society and devalued to the dust.

The finale is a perfect example of this, revealing Said's murder from a shocking angle, and grimly showing how misogynistic values can be passed on and ingrained across generations.

revealing social misogyny,

Challenging justice and morality.