Theeb

1916, the last years of the Ottoman empire, in the Hejaz desert. Theeb is a small Bedouin boy; his father is dead and his older brother Hussein is teaching him the wells, the tracks and how to stay alive. One night a British officer and his guide arrive at the camp; they want to reach a well and will not say why. Hussein will lead them. Theeb follows in secret. Naji Abu Nowar directs in his first film. Almost the entire cast are non professionals from Bedouin communities in the south of Jordan; the crew worked with them for months before shooting. The genre is a western. The desert, the railway, the rifle and the relationship of guiding come straight from that shape, and the narrative gives a boy's growing up inside it. The historical background is the Arab Revolt and the Hejaz railway. The film does not explain it; the large politics exists only as far as the child can see it, as a few foreigners and a rail. Wolfgang Thaler is the cinematographer; the desert is shot mostly in narrow, dusty frames rather than wide vistas. It won best director in the Horizons section of the 2014 Venice film festival and was nominated for the foreign language film Oscar in 2016. Who it is for: viewers who like desert westerns and coming of age stories with little talk. Who it is not for: the pace is slow, the dialogue is sparse, and the historical context is deliberately left incomplete.