The Idol

In Gaza four children play and sing at weddings, saving up to buy instruments. The sister in the group is the most insistent; she is the only one who believes her brother's voice will get somewhere. The first half of the film is that childhood. In the second half the boy has grown, is looking for a way out of Gaza, and wants to enter a competition in Cairo. The subject is not talent but crossing the border itself. The most tense passage is not a stage but a checkpoint: the passport, the permit, the crowd waiting at the gate. The singing is the easy part. The form is split in two and the halves do not resemble each other. The childhood section is loud and alive; the adult section is flatter and drifts towards the aesthetic of a television contest. That fall is the film's weakness. The source is real: Mohammed Assaf won Arab Idol in 2013 and his departure from Gaza was itself news at the time. Hany Abu-Assad was known for Paradise Now and Omar; here he is aiming at a noticeably wider audience. Tawfeek Barhom plays the adult Assaf and Hiba Attalah the sister. Who it is for: viewers interested in music films from real events and in Palestinian cinema. Who it is not for: anyone put off by the emotional templates of the second half; the film turns into a familiar triumph story towards the end.