Here's another road movie in French and Arabic, but less involving and more puzzling than "Le Grand Voyage" below. A pair of free-spirited lovers played by Romain Duris as Zano, the grandson of a French family thrown out of Algeria during a period of political unrest, and Lubna Azabel as Naima, the daughter of an Algerian father who has not passed on his heritage, language, or religion, decide as a whim to travel from France to Algeria. "Travel" in this instance is not anything as straightforward as booking a flight, but a combination of fare-dodging on trains, stowing away on a ship (which it turns out is headed for Morocco rather than Algeria), and mainly what I call "Shanks Pony", i.e. on foot. They have neither a map nor sufficient funds, but eventually make their way through Spain -- taking some casual work en route -- and across the closed border between Morocco and Algeria. I was puzzled by a number of shots which showed them walking against the crowd -- but perhaps this was meant to be symbolic or something.
Naima is a free spirit and is totally unprudish about displaying her body or demanding sex (not always with boyfriend Zano either), and is promptly told off in Algiers for her immodest dress. Her attempt to cover up demurely lasts about fifteen minutes and the matter is then dropped. Zano visits his family's old apartment which (very unlikely) is still full of his family's effects and photos and, in the final minutes of the film, his grandfather's grave. Naima who is portrayed as totally rootless is told by an old biddy that she is cursed and that she must ground herself; she and Zano then take part in what I can only describe as a musical exorcism ceremony where they engage in frantic origastic dancing. This scene seemed to go on f-o-r-e-v-e-r and I was none the wiser afterwards as to what it represented. The music, however, was fascinating as were some earlier gypsy and flamenco interlundes, but the film itself didn't convince me that either one of them had found the cure for their malaise.
1 comment:
What is with this 'free spirit' rubbish! Is it not a question-begging phrase to cover a failure to accept responsibility for one's life and actions. At least ' Le Grand
Voyage' was purposeful even if one wanted to kick the father up the backside.
I found this film pointless and thus boring.
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