Inshallah, A Boy
Directed by Amjad Al Rasheed
Rating*** ½
Palestinian actress Mouna Hawa gets into the skin of her character to deliver a performance that is at once gritty and moving.Ms Hawa plays Nawal in this drama of female self empowerment in a society that is not ready yet to grant women their rights.
When we first see Nawal she at a window trying to pin her undergarment from a clothesline dangling out in the crowded street. The garment falls at the foot of passing man.
Nawal bites her tongue. This is a society that is yet to acknowledge its women’s body, let alone mind. Outwardly, though, there is no violence against any woman character. These are women who are happy to be at the fringes. The male characters are shown to be tolerant and even compassionate.The women are tacitly sympathetic to one another.When Nawal snaps at her neighbor, the neighbor still continues to look after Nawal’s daughter while she is at work, although Nawal , it is mentioned, pays the neighbour for the favour.
Nawal’s brother-in-law Rifqi(Hitham Omari) does not allow push to come to shove until one night Nawal’s husband suddenly dies, leaving her to fight for her daughter’s rights to her father’s property.
Although this is an articulate and sassy film, telling Nawal’s story with a spirited flourish, some of the plot twists are highly unconvincing. The dumb deviousness of getting a fake positive report on her pregnancy test to hold on to her property is not only very dangerous it is practically impossible.At the end it is hinted that Nawal is actually pregnant. This seems to be just a gimmicky twist to give Nawal’s story a triumphant closure: in the beginning when Nawal’s husband was alive it was hinted that they did not share a physical intimacy because of his health.
Such glaring discrepancies do not take away from the inner strength of this compelling character study of a society struggling to come out of the purdah. Inshallah , A Boy is far more committed to portraying a society in flux and chaos,than it actually seems.
Director Amjad Al Rasheed avoids punctuating the emotional highs in the storytelling. The background score is kept at a bare minimal. The characters are left to their own devices: fine ploy to make the emotions rich raw and relatable without garnishing or underlining the drama.
I especially liked Nawal’s screen time with her daughter Nora(Seleena Rabahbah)as two women trying to make sense of a man’s world.There is also polite gentle suitor who promises to pay off all of Nawal’s debts and keep her and Nora happy. But finally Nawal chooses to be on her own. Being a woman in a hijab can be very liberating if she chooses to walk the craggy path on her own.
