There
is plenty of mock in Kaouther Ben Hania’s hybrid-doc, but the attitudes it
depicts are embarrassingly real. In 2003, an unknown assailant drove through
the streets of Tunis, slashing the buttocks of women who were not sufficiently “modest”
in their dress. One Arab Spring revolution later, the so-called Challat is
still regarded as a cult hero by a significant number of Tunisians—all male and
Muslim, of course. Ben Hania set out to find the slasher in a traditional documentary,
but official road blocks forced her instead to make a true-in-spirit
examination of the Tunisian national character in The Challat of Tunis (trailer here), which screens
during the 2015 Socially Relevant Film Festival.
At
least eleven women were attacked by the Challat. The “at least” caveat is
important, because the Tunis police do not exactly encourage reports of sexual
violence. If you suspect they might blame the victim, you don’t know the half
of it, but Ben Hania saves their real life testimony for the final act. Most of
the narrative is devoted to her semi-fictional pseudo-Michael Moore style
search for the unpunished perpetrator. Circumstantial evidence points to an
unemployed misogynist named Jalel Dridi, who adamantly takes credit for the slashings.
Initially, he is quite convincing, but Ben Halia eventually starts to doubt
some of the details of his story.
Let’s
not sugarcoat it. There is something deeply pathological about a society in
which people want to be known as violent criminals who prey on women. Dridi may
might a fraud or an actor in a put-up job, but there are plenty of
men-in-the-street responses to him that speak volumes about Arab Muslim
attitudes towards women. For instance, one imam endorses his Challat video
game, because it grants points for slashing disrespectfully dressed women,
while deducting from players’ scores if the assault women in suitably oppressive
garb.
Some
of the comic bits are better developed than others, but they all reflect highly
problematic social iniquities and double standards. Ben Halia even shows an
aptitude for broad Apatow style comedy when Dridi buys a “Virgin-o-meter” to
test his unlikely new girlfriend. However, the film really knocks the wind out of
the audience when Ben Halia dispenses with her hype-real narrative to interview
two of the Challat’s extraordinarily brave victims on camera. Their stories of
lingering physical and emotional pain, as well as the humiliation they
experienced at the hands of the police, make the blood run cold.
