Showing @ Filmhouse, Edinburgh until Thu 09 Jan @ (times vary)

Atiq Rahimi / Afghanistan/France/Germany/UK / 2012 / 102 mins

Sometimes the most powerful weapon is a single heartfelt voice speaking from experience against the status quo.  Such is the case with Atiq Rahimi and the heroine he has created in his novel and its cinematic adaptation, The Patience Stone.

The story may take place in Afghanistan, but it could be one of a dozen other countries where religion is used as a threat and bitter men do battle over their preferred flavour of  faith. In this war-torn city, a nameless young woman watches over her much older husband as he lies in a coma. On the advice of their mullah, she fingers prayer beads and chants the names of Allah. But as the days grow longer and her hope diminishes, she turns away from the scriptures and begins to talk to her husband as she never as before. Spurred on by the mythological Patience Stone, which absorbs all one’s secrets until it bursts and the speaker is set free, the woman shares her memories, her secrets and her dreams with her husband for the first time as bombs explode in the street outside.

The vivid colours and recurring bird motif hint at the freedom the woman dreams of, in sharp contrast to the constant gunfire, crumbling walls and shattered windows that anchor the story firmly in a reality which is far from idyllic. The woman, too, vacillates between wishing her husband dead and dreaming that he will awaken and, having listened to her at last, they can begin a new chapter in their marriage. Atiq Rahimi has created a heroine that demands to be heard, and Iranian actress Golshifteh Farahani is simply astonishing in the lead role. In a world where so many women still suffer in patriarchal societies, The Patience Stone is a deeply important film – but more than that, it is a truly beautiful and inspiring one.