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Holy Spider

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7.3/10 • 439

2022-07-131h 58m

ThrillerCrimeDrama

A journalist descends into the dark underbelly of the Iranian holy city of Mashhad as she investigates the serial killings of sex workers by the so called "Spider Killer", who believes he is cleansing the streets of sinners.

Directors
Ali Abbasi
Writters
Afshin Kamran Bahrami, Ali Abbasi
Editors
Olivia Neergaard-Holm

Top Billed Cast

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  1. Zar Amir Ebrahimi

    Zar Amir Ebrahimi

    Rahimi

  2. Mehdi Bajestani

    Mehdi Bajestani

    Saeed

  3. Arash Ashtiani

    Arash Ashtiani

    Sharifi

  4. Forouzan Jamshidnejad

    Forouzan Jamshidnejad

    Fatima

  5. Sina Parvaneh

    Sina Parvaneh

    Rostami

  6. Nima Akbarpour

    Nima Akbarpour

    Judge

  7. Sara Fazilat

    Sara Fazilat

    Zinab

  8. Alice Rahimi

    Alice Rahimi

    Somayeh

  9. Ali Nazarian

    Ali Nazarian

    Lawyer

Reviews2

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CinemaSerf Avatar

CinemaSerf

Jan 23, 2023

7/10

Over a relatively short period of time, over a dozen dead women are found bundled by the roadside - and the police are baffled? The women have not been sexually assaulted, but strangled using a knot tied in their headscarves. Not convinced that everything is being done by the authorities, investigative journalist "Rahimi" (Zar Amir-Ebrahimi) decides to get to the truth. Meantime, we follow the life of taxi driver "Saeed" (Mehdi Bajestani) and his daily life helps us to realise that the deceased were prostitutes. Not that he uses them, but pretty soon we realise that the stories are connected. At this point the plot rather falls away - we get to the bottom of the murder-mystery a little too simplistically for my liking; but actually as that plot develops we realise that the whodunit element of the narrative is not the most important one. It rapidly becomes an evaluation of a judicial process - and of vocal popular opinion - that may just indicate that these killings are in someway justifiable. These women, were - after all, sinful and irredeemable. Can the killer capitalise on this zealousness and escape justice? It's quite an intriguing film that looks at how religious faith can butt - head to head - with civic justice; of how the ordinarily law-abiding public themselves can; of how a person can genuinely believe he is doing good by removing "stains" from his community... I cannot believe anyone from the West would watch this with anything other than a feeling of abhorrence at the offences, but this film does attempt to put both sides in a thought-provoking fashion. Though it didn't change my opinion, it did offer a balance that makes the last twenty minutes or so a lot less fait accompli than we might expect. Bajestani is good here and this is more than just a good vs. evil crime drama. Well worth a watch. Telly will be fine, though.

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Status
Released
Original Language
Persian
Budget
--
Revenue
$1,252,637.00
Keywords
journalistprostituteinvestigationbased on true storyserial killerreligioniran