SundayFilmRecommendation: A Girl in the River

In the short film "A Girl in the River," the director Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy tells the gripping story of Saba, a 19-year-old girl deeply in love with Qaiser. After four years of clandestine conversations, Qaiser proposes marriage, and Saba’s family begins planning the union. However, the dream is shattered when her uncle, Maqsood, vehemently objects to the marriage, citing the impoverished status of Qaiser's family. Maqsood insists on a better suitor, a brother-in-law.

Refusing to accept this injustice, Saba takes matters into her own hands. She calls Qaiser and escapes to his family home, where they marry legally without her parents' consent. This act of defiance ignites a horrific chain of events.

Within hours, her father and uncle, feeling dishonored, arrive at Qaiser's home. They swear on the Quran that they only want to follow proper procedures in respect to the family and marriage, promising not to harm her. However, their true intentions soon become clear.

The brutality that follows is almost too painful to recount. Honor killings, known locally as karo-kari, claim the lives of hundreds of women and girls in Pakistan each year, often by relatives claiming to protect family honor. Saba becomes a victim of this barbaric tradition. Her father and uncle take her to a river in the dead of night, beat her mercilessly, and then place a gun to her temple. In a desperate moment of survival, Saba flinches, causing the bullet to graze her face running down the length of her eyes to her lips, instead of taking her life. Believing her dead, they place her in a bad and throw her into the river.

The film lays bare the grim realities of patriarchal societies where women are treated as second-class citizens, their choices and rights utterly disregarded. It is an infuriating watch. Saba, even after surviving such a brutal attack, is pressured by these same patriarchal forces to forgive her assailants.

One particularly enlightening scene captures the depravity of the situation. Director Obaid-Chinoy asks the perpetrator, “What did you tell your wife?” He coldly replies that he told her he had killed their daughter as he wished. "My wife cried, what else could she do? I am her husband. She is just my wife."

The statistics are chilling: around 1,000 women are murdered in Pakistan each year in the name of honor, and over 90% of Pakistani women have faced domestic violence in their lifetime. Recently, a man was charged with murdering his 18-year-old daughter because she appeared in a photo with unrelated men on social media.

"A Girl in the River" is not an easy watch, but it is a necessary one. It forces viewers to confront the harsh realities faced by women in many parts of the world and underscores the urgent need for continued advocacy for women's rights. The film is available for free on YouTube and is a crucial piece of the ongoing fight for justice and equality.