Direction: Amjad Abu Alala
Country: Sudan
This revelatory Sudanese drama film directed and co-written by the debutant Amjad Abu Alala tells the lugubrious story of Muzamil (Mustafa Shehata), whose life is negatively affected when a holy prophet passes the message that he will die at the age 20.
Whereas his father (Talal Afifi), too disturbed by the curse, decides to leave the family and go abroad, his mother, Sakina (Islam Mubarak), embraces sadness and premature mourning while keeping her son at home. Consequently, the boy is deprived from having a proper education and a healthy social life. Still, whenever there’s an opportunity, Muzamil goes out, just to be bullied by the other boys who call him ‘the son of death’. This dark prospect doesn’t refrain Naiema (Bonna Khalid), his only childhood friend, from showing her love for him years later. However, he’s too afraid to take any step toward her, unable to break free from impairing superstitious creeds and strict religious procedures.
As a smart boy who, at 19, memorized the Quran in two reading styles, he begins to see a new reality due to the influence of Sulaiman (Mahmoud Elsarraj), a free-minded man with a passion for cinema and a bad reputation among the villagers.
Shot with an eye for cultural particularities and holding on to a competently structured storytelling, this fable of death exposes the current problems - many in the guise of tradition - of countries marked by long-lasting dictatorships and inflexible visions. It also serves as a metaphor for our world today, where ridiculous and unsupported beliefs are taken to extremes.
Both the narrative quality and stylistic grounds suggest a crossing between Youssef Chahine and Satyajit Ray, in a sad film dedicated to the victims of the Sudanese Revolution.
