Rating: 
Summary: A WASTE OF MY TWO HOURS!
Review: I am an Iranian student who majors in English here at Tehran U. Many of my friends warned me about how horrific this movie was. But nothing could have prepared me for this!As an Iranian who lives in Iran, i truly believe this is the worst movie i have EVER seen in my entire life. First of all i would like to confirm that the movies scenery does not even resemble in the least bit anything like Tehran or any city in Iran for that matter. The movie offended me as many of the facts did not have any truth whatsoever! My personal favorite was the part that Dr. Mahmoody told his wife something about Iranians only taking showers after they have sex......BS!(pardon my french). This was one of the smaller errors made.....as there were many other more major ones.. I would also like to clear up something.....Iranians are NOT ARAB, they are ethnically PERSIAN SPEAKING people(a mistake made in several reviews as well as the editorial review here at amazon). Now that that is out of the way, i would like to go on and say that this movie is a sad but successful attempt at stereotyping Iranians all accross the globe. I commemorate the film makers if that was their sick intention. and for those of you who are wondering, iranians are not religious fanatic, camel riding, terrorists who live in mud houses....lol MRS. MAHMOODY, IF YOU ARE READING THIS, PLEASE KNOW THAT YOUR BOOK/MOVIE HAVE FURTHER SCARED AND STEREOTYPED THE IMAGE OF THE IRANIAN PEOPLE! and as for all you people who commemorate this movie, i would like to say that i truly feel sorry for you....THE CULTURE SHOWN IN THIS MOVIE IS NOTHING LIKE IRANIAN/PERSIAN CULTURE IN ANY WAY SHAPE OR FORM and one more fact.....the iranian society is not a male dominated society(at least not to the extent showed in the movie..lol)! sorry to dissappoint all the americans out there!:) Society is not in need for such a movie that clearly stereo-types a group of people.... I could really write a book about how bad this movie was and write some true things about iranian culture and society, and perhaps someday i will. But as for today, i think thats enough typing for me.....THE MOVIE WAS A WASTE OF MY 2 HRS!
Rating:
Summary: Film student
Review: The story line is similar to STAR WARS and the acting and camera work reminds me of GERMAN propeganda films back in WORLD WAR 2...and the conversation between characters reminds of RICKY LAKE shows..only they are much better.... and overall it was so SAD.... as long as this movie is appriciated anywhere in the world, racism will be with us. As long as this film is callasified as TRUE STORY...LOW IQ will be with us... oh one more thing...this film wasn't even filmed in Iran.
Rating:
Summary: Terrible
Review: As an Iranian, I found this movie ridiculous in its depiction of anything to do with Iran. I was not offended until I came here and read comments about a "strange country and culture" and that this movie serves as a "warning to women considering marrying a foreign man." These views really show the damaging effect an ethnocentric and highly inaccurate movie like this can have. How would you feel if the story of Elian Gonzales were made into "Not Without my Son" (shot in Mexico perhaps) depicting America as a villainous society where the government and people deprive a father of his son? This would be just as realistic a portrayal of America as Not Without My Daughter is of Iran. It shocks me how some people buy into xenophobic portrayals of other cultures without critical intuition.
Rating:
Summary: Bad Viewing
Review: I am part Iranian and have been to Iran several times. When watching this movie, I was struck by how virtually nothing matched my own experiences of the country and the culture. In the first place, the location did not resemble Iran in the least, but most inaccurate was the way the culture was presented. My mother married an Iranian and has received the warmest and most affectionate welcome from my father's family. The severe treatment of women did not seem plausible as the norm and the portrayal of many Iranians as cold and uncaring could not be further from the truth. There are valid criticisms to be made of Iranian society, but this movie is a caricature that draws from stereotypes and a history of demonization in the media. I am disturbed by how many people believe they are getting a "window into other cultures" from movies like this. If you are interested in learning about Iranian culture, how about watching some recently acclaimed Iranian films like White Balloon or Children of Heaven and skipping this rubbish?
Rating: 
Summary: what contraversy
Review: I REALLY CANNOT BELIEVE ALL THE ACCLAMATIONS AS WELL AS ANNOYANCES FOR THIS REAL LIFE STORY OF A REAL WOMAN'S STRUGGLE TO OBTAIN THE RIGHT AS A MOTHER CUSTODY OF HER DAUGHTER. FIRST OFF SALLY FIELD BEING THE EXTRODINARY ACTOR THAT SHE IS PORTRAYED BETTY BEAUTIFULLY. I CAN UNDERSTAND THE CONTENT OF THIS FILM CAUSING SOME PEOPLE DISMAY BUT THIS IS A REAL LIFE STORY AND ONE MUST HAVE RESPECT FOR SOMEONE WHO HAS GONE THROUGH THIS HORRIBLE EXPERIENCE OF RISKING THE LOSS OF HER CHILD BECAUSE HER HUSBAND DECIDED TO LEAVE THE U.S. WHO DESERVES AS A PARENT TO CHOOSE A LIFE AS A PRISONER JUST TO KEEP PEACE AT HOME. IT WAS A WELL DONE MOVIE AND WELL WORTH WATCHING.
Rating: 
Summary: Good movie, but doesn't paint whole picture
Review: I read the book before I saw the movie and thought that the movie portrayed the book story pretty well. Betty's story is pretty harrowing of how an American woman flees Iran with her daughter. It is informative in that it tells viewers about conditions in other places, such as Iran. But one must remember when watching this that this is not everyday occurance and Iranian and Muslim men don't all treat their women like slaves and captives. Don't form your opinions of this society based upon this movie.
Rating:
Summary: Too Much Insinuation
Review: One has to read between lines to know what was really going on in this movie, if they hadn't previously read the book. The movie pointed out certain laws existing in Iran during those days and clearly pointed out Betty had been told about the laws, so as not to get herself or the family into trouble. In the movie, Betty herself, asked the question of what would happen if she didn't cover. Later the movie shows Betty in Tehran streets, hair uncovered, conveying it was a purposeful act, showing disregard for authority, because she already knew! The movie shows Betty breaking laws of government continuously and probably endangering all the Mahmoody family living under that government, by willfully disobeying the laws. The movie shows accusations of Betty not being allowed access to her passport, then shows she has it, in her own purse when being driven around by a group of men she'd never met. In spite of movie makers trying to portray Betty's inability to be out and about, having no rights, freedom of movement, etc., it then continuously shows her spending vast amounts of time in a man's shop, his back room, his car, riding around in broad daylight in Tehran, at Qur'an class, shopping in the market,spending time in one of the men's houses, drinking tea with him, chatting about his gardens and Persia, all again showing her disregard of the rules and yes, all by herself. The movie tries to convince us that Betty would never leave her child alone anywhere, but soon shows her dropping the child off at school telling her she'd be back later and to be a big girl. The women in the school offer to 'help' Betty. They tell her they're sorry for her and her husbands troubles and she could come 'after morning' with the child. It appeared this was because Iran was having difficulties during those years and Bettys husband couldn't find work. It seemed like an offer for her to come late for convenience sake but the movie showed that Betty took it as if they were going to help her disobey more laws. It would be ludicrous for anyone to interpret the incident that way. Next the movie shows the Dr. waiting when Betty returns to school with the child. He was there because Betty and the child hadn't showed up at school. Wouldn't he have been frantic with worry that his American wife and his little girl might have met some bad end, since supposedly as the movie was trying to depict, there was danger everywhere in those days? The movie shows Betty having lack of concern for anyone other than herself when it came to her own desire to leave her husband. It shows her happy to socialize with another American woman until she finds out that the woman didn't hold the same views. It shows the other woman trying to tell Betty marriages are also good in Iran and she had to give it time if she wanted it to work out. When the woman winds up not mailing a letter that she knew might put the Mahmoody child at risk and Betty's life in danger, Betty drops her as a friend. It seemed the movie makers stuck in various people and events that didn't have much value other than trying to cram down the viewers throats, that women are nothing and Iran was violent. The movie drops the story line of the other woman from Betty's Quran class, quickly after Betty learns she converted to Islam. The scene where the woman tells Betty she is happy her own children were 'growing up Muslim', seemed to be said with some weird and crazy expression, with the woman cocking her head and looking completely phony with her eye-opening, half hearted vocalization by the movie makers, for what purpose we didn't know, unless it was to make anyone who says they are happy about their life and their children having values, be somehow a crazy thing. The next time you get to glimpse the converted American Woman, who was working for an Islamic Magazine is when her husband shows up outside the Qur'an classes betty was attending. It seemed to be insinuated that the man supposedly had beaten her and NO the movie didn't say he had beaten her, it just eluded to it by moving the camera to show her burst lip etc. The movie even portrays the husband of the American Muslim woman to help Betty by returning the letter to Betty herself. If it was so bad and men were so terrible to women, why wouldn't the man have given the letter to Dr. Mahmoody himself? The movie clearly pointed out that Betty went wherever she wanted, pretty much did what she wanted even when it came to Mahmoodys relatives, including driving the Dr.'s family out of their own apartment, and had plenty of 'men' who were willing to risk their lives for her? The movie seemed to suggest American women are ignorant about dealing with difficulties in any other country except their own. I don't know if the movie makers intended this to be their goal, but for many of us it was. Surely the movie makers didn't mean for women to seem so incredibly ignorant?
Rating:
Summary: MovieMakersMess-2nd Part
Review: The movie, no matter how hard they tried to portray innocence on Betty Mahmoody's part and how hard they tried to portray horror coming from the Mahmoody family, the government and the treatment of women by Iranian men, didn't seem to make it, in our estimation. Perhaps the movie industry didn't realize they had nothing but men helping their main voice in their movie. The movie showed Betty begging to live with other members of Dr. Mahmoody's family because she didn't want to live with his sister. Yet from the very beginning of the movie it seemed the movie makers were showing Betty as a self-centered individual who was jealous of her own daughters relationship with her Daddy and her new Aunt in Iran. It even gave Dr. Mahmoody some good qualities in spots and allowed the more discerning viewers the idea that it might have actually been Dr. Mahmoody himself who might have been considering a divorce and sending Betty back to the U.S. to her family because of her lawbreaking and screaming fits that the movie showed very liberally throughout. Quite naturally he would keep his daugher with him and his family, since the laws in Iran were such that in a divorce, the child goes with the father as he is most likely the best one to provide financially and the child was an Iranian citizen, as well as Betty as long as she remained his wife. The movie shows that to this day, Betty still holds onto the Mahmoody name, so what the movie is trying to say and what they are actually saying simply depends on how much education a viewer has about other countries and how much understanding one has concerning experiences outside their own worlds and families. Next, the movie continuously suggested that Dr. Mahmoody claimed he was going to kill her? We felt if he had wanted to do that he probably wouldn't have had much difficulty in arranging it as the movie tried (in vain in our view)to show that he was supposedly in charge of Betty etc. It probably would have been easy to say an accident happened especially since there was so much stuff going on over there,according to the movies own account of the violence and danger where she was staying, but obviously he didn't do anything like that! In the movie scene where he told her he'd have her locked up if she didn't stop her nonsense, we took it as being a threat because she was going out in the streets alone (which according to the book & movie were dangerous) and she was throwing temper tantrums as the movie showed continuously throughout the movie, so I took the scene as the Dr. considering locking her up in a hospital or asylum type institution for a time, as a way of controlling her behavior because he couldn't trust her to adhere to the laws of the country in which they were living. Then the danger she subjected her little girl to in the movie seemed to move more smoothly along than the claims made in the book, which went on and on as an almost unending ordeal. The movie simply suggests this woman, Betty Mahmoody, took this child and ran off with a bunch of men she didn't know, slept on floors in huts out in the middle of nowhere, gets molested by one of the men, has no idea where she is going or what is going to happen to her little girl, rides off into the hills and winds up getting off a bus? on some street directly across from an embassy? Hmm! It seemed clear in the movie that Betty had to have known that running around the streets alone might get the family into trouble with the government. The movie showed her sneaking around Mahmoody's sisters house and running through the streets. Those scenes in the movie seemed a bit laughable because certainly the running and carrying on would only have served to bring about more attention, this woman running through Tehran dragging a child along behind her? I guess it depends on how you read the book and watch the movie, you see what you want to see and ignore what you don't want to see. In the movie they chose Sally Fields as an actress to portray Betty Mahmoody. Ms. Fields only acted according to her script. Ms. Fields and Betty Mahmoody are not the same people but the movie makers did a good job in selecting Fields to play her. It was the only thing in the movie that made the story seem plausible. Sally Fields has the innocence in her demeanor that was able to make Betty seem innocent and sweet. We didn't see Betty as some innocent young girl at all. Perhaps it was having read the original book that tells a whole lot more about Betty and her marriage to Dr. Mahmoody. Those who are educated in life experience and in other cultures will probably be able to see the whole story, from a different perspective once they sort through the contradictions of the movie version. No where in the movie or the book do they show any validation from the Mahmoody family in Iran as to the validity of events, so judging the movie on it's own merits is difficult without knowing the facts or reasonings for any of the characters actions. We felt that the movie version of this book was inadequate. It seemed to make American women look like a bunch of shadowy figures who had to rely on 'men' to get them out of bad situations they get themselves into with 'other men'! The movie just didn't seem to do justice to what it was trying to say, in our opinion.
Rating: 
Summary: Should be re-titled "IN-LAW TROUBLES"
Review: Nice to see that no matter where you go in this great big world of ours, no matter what culture, what religion or what country, in-laws are all the same. Man, some things never change. I thought those Kurdish Guys were pretty Kool, and the Iranians who helped her escape. I can't for the life of me, however, understand WHY they were willing to take such risks in helping her get out? Now THAT was suspense.
Rating:
Summary: Not Without My Daughter
Review: This is a great video if you like to see how other cultures are over seas. The video totally explains how women and children are treated in Iran. It gets to be a pretty sad film, but in the end you'll really enjoy it.
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