An individual has to make diverse decisions throughout life. When a person stays firm about a decision knowing that he will have to pay the ultimate price in the future, the person has to be at his strongest. Rehana Maryam Noor is such a stubborn character.
Written and directed by Abdullah Mohammad Saad, Rehana Maryam Noor has made history by representing Bangladesh in the 'Un Certain Regard' section at the Cannes International Film Festival.
Although Rehana is the main character in the movie, the story revolves around the harassment of her student, Annie.
In whose name the movie, Rehana Maryam Noor is a single mother of a 6-year-old girl. Raising a daughter alone, taking care of father, mother, and brother, raising expenses - all she has to do single-handedly. Nevertheless, such people have to be strong! However, we see how persistent she is as she always wears her husband's watch.
Rehana is a 37-year-old- medical college teacher. To prove the insistence of this medical college teacher, the director showed that she was sitting next to the student to catch cheating in the exam hall, and she became successful in that too. The talented director Saad depicted all these small but meaningful incidents to create the context of the story.
However, the real tragedy comes when Rehana sees a part of the incident where another teacher sexually harassed a student (Annie). After that, Rehana asked Annie repeatedly to raise her voice against that teacher, but Annie did not agree. Then, Rehana made herself a victim. Originally, the film revolved around this incident.
Rehana faced a critical situation as she sought justice while she was stubborn too. The pain of not being able to deal with the injustice, besides the situation that women have to go through while working in various roles such as teacher-doctor-mother-daughter-sister, Rehana has become a reality here.
Other characters also played a bigger role; hence, they deserved to be mentioned. The principal of the medical college cannot stand next to Rehana even though she is a woman. Although Rehana's brother has a girlfriend, he does not want to introduce her to her mother.
Fearing that they will fail the exam, Rehana's students give false testimony against her. Despite knowing everything, Arefin's wife Ayesha is afraid to leave her husband for the sake of society. A student at the school harasses her daughter Emu, but in the end, the responsibility of 'not being a good mother' falls on Rehana's shoulders.
UNB