Feminism, Patriarchy and Art as Resistance in The Things You Kill
The Things You Kill is the newest film from Canadian-Iranian filmmaker Alireza Khatami, and recently, I was lucky enough to speak with him and gain some fascinating insight. The film follows Ali (Ekin Koç) as he investigates the death of his mother, faces complicated family dynamics with his father, and engages in a sinister plot with his gardener. Spoilers ahead!
We started off by talking about the dedication opening up this film that says "for my sisters":
W SPOTLIGHT: Thanks so much for making the time to meet with me today. The Things You Kill was such a beautiful, fascinating film; I really loved it. I’d like to ask you first about the dedication at the start of the film, dedicated to your sisters. There is clearly so much love and admiration for women in your film, one of my favourite lines is "agony seems reserved solely for women"—I’m wondering how your relationship with your sisters and other women in your family shaped your creation of the film.
ALIREZA KHATAMI: This movie is very personal; a lot of it comes from my own histories. One of the defining moments was when I realised I’m the only son of the family, and I’ve had a completely different childhood compared to four of my sisters. That I’ve been such a privileged person as a man in a patriarchal structure. For a very long time, I didn’t realise that my sisters didn’t have the same opportunities as I did. That realisation was a defining moment for me to look at myself, and this movie was an opportunity to examine my own privileges, my own formation under a patriarchal structure. I put a dedication to my sisters at the opening, not that my sisters need to know, I thought it gives the audience coming to this movie a pathway to knowing that you are entering into a private space. I’m inviting you to my very private thoughts, private life, private histories. So tread with caution. So audiences enter the film with a different relationship, thinking, "This is just fiction, this is for entertainment," so I thought that’s important that I put that opening there, so audiences can adjust their feelings when they come in.
W SPOTLIGHT: All of that really shows. The film is so protective of the mother in every way. She seems so adored by her son; everyone in the family goes through so much in defence of her and in acts of retribution against patriarchy. So yeah, everything that you just explained really shows.
KHATAMI: I’m glad it resonated with you.
We then moved on to talking about some of the visual cues in the film, the use of form to signify meaning. How the levels of meaning in the film exist from the script all the way down through the production design, and the small details of what we are seeing on screen.
KHATAMI: My goal was to render the invisible structures of patriarchy. For example, in Canada, we haven’t had a female prime minister. That’s a way of showing how Patriarchy works. We look at the names of the streets in Toronto and Vancouver, and how many of them are named after Women? Very few. How many statues are in the city, and how many of them are of a woman? How many institutions and museums are named after women? My goal was to render the invisible structures of Patriarchy and say, "This is how I see it, am I crazy, or do you see it too?"
To continue the discussion on the depth of meaning in this film, and film as a structural storytelling tool that involves layers of intention and requires interpretation and effort to fully comprehend, we began to discuss the recent anti-intellectualism in media and media comprehension.
W SPOTLIGHT: This film takes a lot of analysis and thinking to understand. There are so many levels and details working together that contribute to the overall film. It feels as if in our current culture, media literacy is sort of waning - popular figures are stating that "art isn’t political," classic literature is being "dumbed down." In our current culture, how can we get people to theatres to see a film such as this that would make you re-examine the world around you when we are leaning towards easy consumption rather than artistic merit or intellectuality?
KHATAMI: There are many things in this question to answer. The first part of it is the statement that Wim Wenders mentioned at the Berlinale that art is not political. It was sad to see Wim Wenders bring himself to the level of an idiot. I was sad to see one of the giants of world cinema act like a puppet. Especially at this old age, when he has achieved everything, and he can be truly independent with his thoughts, he acts like a puppet. I mean, it was a very sad day for me to see that. Art has always had political aspects to it, and some of us have used it to speak about things that matter to us.
KHATAMI: How do we fight the “dumbing down” in our population? I think it starts with seeing the roles that corporations have played. Look at Carney's speech at Davos. At one glance, it looks very intellectual and very interesting, but when you really look at it, it completely ignores the role of the corporations. How corporations have owned Canadian infrastructures, our social media is completely American. Our technology is completely American. And these corporations have turned us into junkies for a little bit of dopamine; our youth are addicted to TikTok, to Instagram. We have neglected our youth and completely treated them like a market. They have been handed down to corporations and turned into zombies. If there is any concern for the future of who we are as Canadians, we have to take back our youth and take back our stories. That needs a serious look in the mirror. It is sad to see that our parliament still opens with a speech from an old King in England. While our elders in this country have been mistreated and ignored. That shows where the priorities are in the Canadian government right now. But I think there is still a little bit of hope for us to step in and do something about it.
To switch gears back to the particulars of the film, I asked about the mythologies that may have inspired the story.
W SPOTLIGHT: In your filmography, we encounter a lot of magical realism; we do, of course, in this film. However, here to me it felt a lot more like mythology, rather than just magic. There’s the story of one man living in another man's skin, there’s the idea of the dead coming back to haunt the guilty, and this feels very much like a folk legend. I am wondering if any folk tales or mythologies inspired you in this story?
KHATAMI: If there is anything, this is a conversation within the Biblical stories of Abraham and Ishmael. In that story, the father is supposed to kill the son, and God sends a ship to make a deal. In other stories, the son is killing the father, and god sends hundreds of ships, and still the son kills the father. I am definitely playing with that Abrahamic tradition of killing the son, in Judochristian religion, that’s the norm. The reverse is not, so I am in that conversation.
KHATAMI: Old stories and mythologies, I’m an Indigenous filmmaker, my storytelling definitely has been informed by those traditions. The oral folk tradition has had a significant impact on me, and I’m sure in everything I write,e there is always - I’m not afraid of breaking out of what all of our storytelling demands - I’m not scared of ignoring it completely, I’ve seen this working in other domains as well.
W SPOTLIGHT: I think it all worked together very well, and I think it was very beautiful.
We continued on to chat a bit more about political expression in nationally funded media, where Khatami closed off our conversation with a compelling statement.
KHATAMI: Those of us who try to be independent, we find cracks in the system, and those are the spaces we live in. We live in the cracks, and our job is to make sure the cracks are further opened by these independent voices. It is our job as artists to always push back against institutions for a more humanitarian approach.
KHATAMI: Art, more than anything else, is to bear witness, to remind us that we are not crazy. My job as an artist is with my films, with my voice, to remind us that there is a crack. Let's render that crack visible for everyone to see.
The Things You Kill is a powerful and thought-provoking film that begs to be seen in theatres. Many thanks to Alireza Khatami for the time to talk and for sharing all of this with me!
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