As a France-based journalist Freidoune Sahebjam is trying to leave Iran, his car breaks down. He comes to a village where a mechanic will try to repair his car. A woman, Zahra, comes up to him and speaks in English, telling him there are secrets in this town that the world must know. Soon he is recording her story. She wants it on his recorder because, "the voices of women do not matter here. I want you to take my voice with you."

The secret is that, the day before, a woman was stoned in that village as an adulterer. Soraya's husband wanted a divorce so he could marry a fourteen-year-old girl, but he refused to provide sufficient support for her and their daughters. To free himself of her, he conspires with the local mullah to bring adultery charges against her. (Actually he is not a real mullah, but an ex-convict impersonating a mullah.) In theory, proving adultery is a difficult task, but in the somewhat chaotic legal environment of Iran in the 1980s, such problems were easily ignored. Rumors are spread. Charges are brought. False testimony is given. The sentence is passed and carried out. And the men of the village go on about their lives.

The first encounter between Zahra and Sahebjam seems like a scene from a horror movie. (A traveler on a lonely road is stranded in a small town. He meets a seemingly crazy woman who says she has to talk to him about the danger.) This is not accidental. The story Zahra tells is a true horror. In real life, Sahebjam takes the story to the world through his international bestselling book, The Stoning of Soraya M., which is the basis of this film. It is a tale of injustice, of misogyny, of brutality, and of hypocrisy.

This film also resembles a horror film in its attention to the physical reality of stoning. Before the screening I attended, the publicist warned us that the stoning scene was prolonged and brutal, and it was done this way by design.

Before the stoning actually occurs, the film builds tension just as a horror film would. We see the children of the village gathering stones. We hear the rhythmic clacking of rocks together as the men and boys (including Soraya's sons) march through the streets. Slowly she is prepared for her execution and buried up to her breasts. All the men of town assemble. It begins slowly, but in time becomes a constant shower of stones.

This is an issue-oriented film. Its main purpose is to shock the world with the maliciousness that stoning represents. Watching the stoning, I was reminded of The Passion of the Christ and the brutality with which the scourging and crucifixion of Jesus was portrayed. (It should be noted that Stephen McEveety, who produced this film, also produced The Passion of the Christ.) It is not easy to watch the slow and torturous execution of Soraya at the hands of a mob filled with blood-lust. The film is intentionally graphic in its portrayal of stoning. We are not allowed to turn away from the knowledge of such a vicious and cruel form of execution.

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