Captain Abu Raed

Review: Captain Abu Raed

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

Published: Jordan 2008

Length: 102 minutes

Main Cast: Nadim Sawalha(Abu Raed), Rana Sultan(Nour), Hussein Al Sous(Murad), Uday Quiddisi(Tareq), Ghandi Saber(Abu Murad), & Dina Ra'ad-Yaghnam(Um Murad). 

Director: Amin Matalqa

Synopsis: When an old man,Captain Abu Raed (Nadim Swalha),finds a captain's hat in the airport garbage while completing his duties (janitor), he decides to bring it home with him. The kids in the neighborhood see that he has a captain's hat on and assume he is a Pilot. In order to offer hope to this childen he begins to tell imaginary stories of his "adventures" as a captain. 

Review: This film made me cry so much it's unbelibable. I'm not sure if it was because of the time of day but quite honeslty it was a great film. Everyone always wishes films have a happy ending for everyone except the "villans". Not in this film, we really get a very realistic ending. And in real life we don't always get happy endings or atleast not everyone. Tareq (Uday Quiddisi) has his fate sealed and is forsed to become a business man at a young age. Abu Raed tried helping him by buying the wafflers but ended up making things worse.  I was happy that Um Murad (Dina Ra'ad-Yaghnam) and Murad (Al Sous) found a resolution to their toxic father, Abu Murad (Ghandi Saber). All thanks to Nour (Rana Sultan) and Abu Raed. Sadly, Abu Raed stayed back to try and help Abu Murad and unfortunatly that was the last thing he was able to do. 

In the film we also see how Nour is frustrated because she is getting older and she has social pressure to get married. She has her carrer as a pilot and is happy. Unfortunatky, her father keeps introducing her to men and she could care less for them. I enjoyed that Matalqa made Nour, a female protagonist, an independent women in this film. I feel that in a lot of films there are not many femlae leads who are actually successful, independant and strong characters. I can also relate to Nour because regardless of my age, since I've turned 20 I am aleays asked about when I'll get married and have kids. This happens all the time at family reunions and to my cousins who are older than 26 years old they are criticized if they don't have a boyfriend/husband. It's something that gets to be annoying and hearing it all the time is exhausting. Why can't we just live our lives and choose on our own if we want to get married and have kids. If we decide not too it's fine, we're still women; because we don't have man or kids it doesn't make us any less of a women. 

According to Rotten Tomatoes this film is considered a poetic and deeply felt debut.This film was rated a 6.7/10 stars (27 fresh tomatoes and 7 rotten tomatoes). I believe it should have had a higher rating because the acting, transitions and just the concept of this film is like noneother. It definetly doesn't get as much credit as it should. 

By Andrea Valladolid-Ochoa