Amra and the Second Marriage, director Mahmoud Sabbagh - 8.7 out of 10

Amra and the Second Marriage, director Mahmoud Sabbagh
8.7 out of 10


We have had the chance over the past year to get more insight into the politics, abuses of Saudi Arabia - and with that, into the workings of similar regimes.

Most gruesome and terrifying was the assassination, on orders from Prince Mohamed bin Salman, no matter what they or stupid Trump would say, in their consulate in Turkey, by a Death Squad formed with members of their repression regime.
The journalist that had repeatedly declared that he is not a dissident and he does not favor, advocate regime change was horribly murdered and then his body was dismembered, in order to be smuggled out and made to disappear...

Recently, a young man who was only ten when arrested for taking part in demonstrations, barely escaped with his life, after being sentenced to death, like so many other opponents of the regime.
Young women have made the headlines when trying to escape their oppressors back at home, where they suffer from abuse, lack of freedom, discrimination, sexism, rape and worse.

Which rather convolutedly brings me to the film about Amra and the Second Marriage.
The heroine is a married woman who has to work almost continuously, at the orders of her husband, as it is the custom and alas the law in Saudi Arabia and other fiefdoms that apply the Sharia law, pertaining that the woman is somehow second class and under the dominance of her husband...at least in the interpretation of many, or most of Muslims.

When he has guests, which is not a rare occasion, she has to sweat to make food and be a Servant for these men, that must on no account se her.
She and all the other women have to hear the niqab, hijab or whatever they want to call the outfit that permits one to see only the eyes of a woman...Boris Johnson has said that this dress makes women look like 'mail letter boxes'.

Amra is under pressure makes she also has responsibility over the books, the expenses of the household and indeed, we marvel at what men would be doing, except shooting the breeze with other males and ordering their female relatives around.
They import workers from Pakistan, India and other places and millions of laborers struggle in what look like subhuman conditions.

Since Amra has not given birth to a son, the only genre that matters there, her spouse is annoyed and ready to act.
In those parts, the man does not even have to do much, if anything to divorce, except say the words three times and that's it.
They are changing this to a degree, albeit cosmetically, for they have the one that used to be acclaimed as a reformer:

The Killer Prince MBS

Amra also has a mother in law that has just exited The Taming of the Shrew, only this bitch ain't tamed, as slang would call it.
The man decides to take on another wife.

In a rather cynical twist of fate, counterintuitively, women from the market where Amra works are keen to celebrate this new wife.
They even ask Amra to contribute for a feast of something like that.

When the woman is not welcoming and enthusiastic, exhilarated by this event and explains that money is short, she is rejected.
Ostracized outright by...other women!

It makes the audiences wonder what will the future look like for the next generations in those God forsaken or Allah filled places.