Yomeddine

Abu Bakr Shawky's first feature tells the story of a Coptic man living in a leper colony in Egypt. He leaves the colony for the first time in his life and sets out to find what remains of his family. An orphaned boy travels with him. Rady Gamal, in the lead, is not a professional actor and carries the marks of the disease. That is the film's most important decision: the illness is not created with make-up and the viewer meets a real face. Even so the film does not push toward pity; humour, anger and ordinary difficulty come forward along the way. The road-movie shape works across the Egyptian landscape: trains, trucks, towns at the edge of the desert. It screened in the main competition at Cannes in 2018, about as high as a first film can reach. Who it's for: those who like road movies and human stories built around exclusion. Who it's not for: anyone seeking an emotionally comfortable watch; several scenes show exclusion directly.