• Director(s)

    Milena Aboyan

  • Production Year

    2023

  • Release date

    26/04/2024

  • Genre(s)

    Drama

  • Approx. running minutes

    111m

  • Cast

    Bayan Layla, Hadnet Tesfai, Derya Durmaz

Film

ELAHA

strong sex, sexism, sexual threat, nudity, very strong language

Torn between tradition and her desire for freedom, a young German-Kurdish woman seeks hymen reconstruction surgery before her upcoming wedding. This powerful German drama tackles difficult issues with empathy and sensitivity.…

Torn between tradition and her desire for freedom, a young German-Kurdish woman seeks hymen reconstruction surgery before her upcoming wedding. This powerful German drama tackles difficult issues with empathy and sensitivity.

Content Advice(May contain spoilers)

violence

threat and horror

language

sex

discrimination

sexual violence and sexual threat

suicide

injury detail

  • Director(s)

    Milena Aboyan

  • Production Year

    2023

  • Release date

    26/04/2024

  • Genre(s)

    Drama

  • Approx. running minutes

    111m

  • Cast

    Bayan Layla, Hadnet Tesfai, Derya Durmaz

strong sex, sexism, sexual threat, nudity, very strong language
Classified Date:
12/04/2024
Version:
2D
Use:
Cinema
Distributor:
606 Distribution
violence
A woman slaps her adult daughter. Two sisters have a brief hair-pulling fight.
threat and horror
Scenes of threat include one in which a man behaves in an aggressive and sexually threatening manner towards his fiancée during an argument, and another in which people are heard screaming after discovering a loved one attempting suicide off screen.
language
There is infrequent use of very strong language (‘c**t’), in addition to more frequent use of strong language (‘f**k’). Milder terms include ‘slut’, ‘whore’, ‘pussy’, ‘shit’, ‘tosser’ and ‘tits’.
sex
There are strong scenes of sex and masturbation, with breast nudity and mechanical thrusting detail. In one scene a woman initiates sex with her male friend in order to secretly test the efficacy of a pharmacy-bought ‘fake hymen’; she appears pained or distressed as he thrusts on top of her, and soon pushes him away. There are also moderate verbal references to sex and virginity throughout the film.
discrimination
Scenes of sexism and patriarchal oppression occur throughout the film, with particular emphasis on the discriminatory expectation that unmarried women should be ‘virgins’ with intact hymens. Women in the film are subjected to controlling behaviour in order to preserve their perceived 'purity', and characters equate female virginity with honour and worth, using misogynistic terms such as ‘slut’ to describe women they see as sexually promiscuous. The film strongly and clearly criticises such attitudes.
sexual violence and sexual threat
During an argument, a man aggressively shouts at his fiancée, corners her against a car and starts undoing her trousers. She begins to sob, at which point he stops and cries in her arms, obliging her to comfort him. In another scene a woman faces pressure from her fiancé's family to submit against her will to a pseudoscientific 'virginity test'.
suicide
It is strongly implied that a character attempts to take their own life. The scene is distressing but brief and undetailed, and the attempt itself occurs off screen.
injury detail
A short extract of a video on a laptop screen of a surgical hymen reconstruction features moderate bloody detail.
nudity
We see brief close up images of hymen reconstruction surgery being performed on a woman’s genitals. Breast nudity occurs during sex scenes. There is also infrequent breast, buttock and full-frontal nudity in a non-sexual context.
theme
There are moderate upsetting scenes.
Classified Date:
12/04/2024
Version:
2D
Use:
Cinema
Distributor:
606 Distribution

  • Classified date

    12/04/2024

  • Language

    German