A New Day in Old Sana'a

Title: A New Day in Old Sana'a
Director: Bader Ben Hirsi
Cast: Paolo Romano, Dania Hammoud, Nabil Saber
Year: 2005
MPAA: PG
Date of Review: April 9, 2006

Yemen's first feature film is an ambitious one. Despite the fact that it is a fairly lighthearted movie by general standards, it presents the audience with a look at Arab culture that has never really been shown to a western audience before now. The director, Bader Ben Hirsi, has taken the stereotypes of religious fanaticism and terrorism in the Middle-East, and thrown them out the window to create a beautiful and genuinely funny romantic-comedy set in the magical city of Old Sana'a. Not only did the film try to destroy any preconceived notions about Islamic life, but it tries to rebuild a completely new view of this culture, showing that between the Middle-East and the West, there are much more similarities in life than there are differences.

The basic plot of the film revolves around a young man and woman who are about to be wed. It begins early in the morning when it is still dark, and the young man is walking around the streets of Old Sana'a, when he sees a woman dancing in the street, whom he assumes is his wife as she is wearing the dress he gave her. The rest of the film covers a single day, from dawn to dusk, and how this sighting sends the young man on a journey to discover who was wearing the dress. Much of the story is told through the gossiping of a few women in the town who are involved with the wedding preparations. One is an egg-vendor, who provides much of the comic relief in the film. They are all strong characters that come across very naturally, and none of their performances seem forced. Strangely enough, the only bad performance in the whole film was that of the only Western actor, Paolo Romano. He plays an Italian photographer living in Old Sana'a, and also doubles as the narrator. Not only did his character seem to be somewhat unnecessary, he also did not play it convincingly at all. He speaks with a British accent, and really cannot hold his own next to the Yemeni cast members - which is surprising, since he is the only one in the cast who has made previous films.

One of the most important characters in the film is the city of Old Sana'a itself. Bader Ben Hirsi captured it beautifully, using various techniques with light and shadow to add to the atmosphere of various scenes. As tensions rise between the characters, the city seems to get tighter, creating a claustrophobic feeling. This setting is perfect for adding quite a magical feel to the film, emphasizing on it's "modern-day fairy tale" type story.

Seeing as how the film is the first to come out of the country, one cannot expect "Casablanca". Bader Ben Hirsi had quite a hellish time trying to bring this story to life. The Yemeni Government was giving him constant trouble, pulling funding and insisting that he change the script to keep Westerners from seeing the true Yemeni lifestyle. Newspapers published over 200 fictional stories, claiming that Bader Ben Hirsi was filming pornography in mosques, and even trying to prove that Bader Ben Hirsi was an undercover agent for the Mossad. However, after seven weeks of shooting, the film was finally complete, and London-born Bader Ben Hirsi has been travelling the world displaying his film at festivals ever since. It has already won "Best Arab Film" at the Cairo International Film Festival, and is expected to do well at Cannes next month.

While not up to the production standards that we have come to expect from other films, "A New Day in old Sana'a" succeeds by being unafraid to show what life is really like in the Middle-East. It was a labour of love by all involved, and that is immediately apparent. Hopefully this is only the beginning of a wonderful film industry coming out of the beautiful country of Yemen.

7.5