Under the Shadow - Review
‘A woman should be scared of exposing herself more than anything else’
Babak Anvari’s Under the Shadow (2016) is one of the best horror films of the decade. Shideh and Dorsa, mother and daughter, are living in Tehran during a particularly brutal and violent period of the Iran-Iraq war. They must survive the very real, external threat of Iraqi missiles launched at night and the unreal, insidious threat of ghostly ‘djinn’, demons that threaten to sever the ties between mother and daughter.
The superstitious elements, which prey on Shideh during these missile attacks, have a multifaceted metaphorical significance. The ghosts that creep at the edges of the frame embody the enveloping forces of the Cultural Revolution, strangling personal freedoms that have prevented Shideh from resuming her studies as a doctor because of her past as a student activist. Significantly, the djinn dispose of Shideh’s Jane Fonda fitness DVD, symbolic of the . We’re told by a neighbour that the djinn have their origins in the Quran and therefore the hauntings that take place have a very real historical index, in the purging of non-Islamic institutions that took place during the Cultural Revolution.
Female oppression is also at the heart of the horror. The most threatening ghost, which threatens to remove Dorsa from her mother and raise her instead, comes in the form of a shape-shifting headscarf, symbolic of the policing of female presentation in the film. At one point, Shideh is arrested for appearing in public without her headscarf and is chastised by the police: ‘A woman should be scared of exposing herself more than anything else.’ But there’s more to be scared of. Neither inside nor outside is safe, as Shideh and Dorsa are haunted by the spectre of the revolution while inside the house, and hunted by its political results while exposed outside.
Numerous other themes within the film are explored metaphorically through the ghosts. There’s Shideh’s unprocessed grief from the death of her mother; her failed ambition to be a doctor; her perceived lack of maternal instinct, exposed by her husband’s words and absence.
This proliferation of meaning is why the film succeeds as a horror. While the jump scares are fairly standard for the genre, the richness of the symbolism means the terror expands and endures beyond any set piece. Yet there are images that stand out amongst the rest: Dorsa’s face, frozen in terror and bathed in a ghostly light, looking up at missile caving through the ceiling, is a frame that should be hanging in a gallery.
Shideh is the vehicle through which all the political and historical commentary is passed through, in her struggle against the demonic forces that threaten her family. This is made possible only by a stunning performance from Narges Rashidi, who moves seamlessly from the tenderness of a concerned mother, to spiteful rate, to stony-faced possession.
Under the Shadow is a film that both horror fans and non-fans will love, packed with haunting imagery and rich subtextual meanings. At a crisp 84 minutes, the film does not overstay its welcome, yet leaves us looking within the film’s shadows for much longer.