Elaha: Milena Aboyan Film Is A Gut-Wrenching Elegy To Virginity

Virginity and themes around it could well have been the blurb for Elaha, Milena Aboyan’s German-Kurdish drama on the cultural parenthesis of a society in transition.Syrian-German actress Bayan Layla feelingly plays Elaha, a 22-going-on-17 bride who has lost her ancestral pride: her virginity. This ancient treasure, she must restore before her marriage to Nasim (Armin Wahedi Yeganeh) a well-to-do doctor from a respectable family who expects his wife to be a certifiable virgin. The problem is, Elaha is not! So deal with it.There begins Elaha’s search for restored honour(read: reconstructed hymen). A theme as whacked out as this could either be a dense tragedy or an irreverent comedy. Milena Aboyan chooses neither option. She just allows Elaha to take off on a path of her own, following the beautiful self-willed girl’s trajectory as if it had a mind of its own.While there is much to be admired in this spirited swipe at age-old anti-women customs and traditions, the one thing that immediately grabs our attention is the non-judgemental tone of narration. All through the exhilarating yet frustrating plot, we sense a moos of repressed rebellion, even in the initial scenes when Elaha is dancing at a wedding and having a sneaky smoke with her friends.ALSO READ: CONFIRMED! Coldplay Coming To India In 2025This is a society in a state of constant flux, denying women the basic right over their own bodies and yet claiming a place at the cusp of social reform. It is an interesting if somewhat self-defeating intersection in societal progress.Elaha’s fiancée is not a radical conservative. He seems to be reasonably accommodating. But in the most shocking moment of the film he stands exposed, when he confronts Elaha on suspicion of having sex at a party, in the crudest way possible. That sequence will leave audiences sickened. It mirrors the gender disparity that all third-world communities try to hide so desperately.A lot of what happens in and to Elaha is in response to the bigotry that tugs at the heart of conservative society. How high should a woman’s skirt be? Is it okay for her to have an occasional drink at a party? What if, desire forbid, she succumbs to the temptation of pre-marital sex?Elaha goes along with all the restrictions. Her quest to restore her hymen, a rather inapt metaphor for conformism, is in direct opposition to her self-worth. She has had sex before marriage. She won’t feel guilty for it no matter how hard the pressure.There is a delicately constructed sequence where she invites a gentle kind canine-loving friend to have sex with her. That moment explicitly tells us whose side the director is on.