O Caftan Azul

As a Belgian I feel proud to have an actrice as Lubna Azabal, one the best actrices in the international movie world. I will never forget the movie 'Incendies', for me still one of the best movies of this century, where she was also the leading actrice.

And this time again, Lubna and the other two leading actors were fantastic in their roles. The script is beautiful and very emotional. And the love and tenderness between the three very different characters is pure and very profound.

Le Bleu du Caftan puts all national feelings and international religions aside. It's a timeless story. Director Maryam Touzani has a very bright future ahead, what an achievement.

I fell in love with the tenderness and delicate sensuality of 'Le bleu du caftan'. Rarely does a movie maker so poetically depict the many facets of sincere love and sorrow. Surrounded by colourful fabrics and brilliant threads all viewers could admire the pure essence of touch, intimacy and devotion, but also the cutting pain of loss and grief.

Everyone in the movie hall was very quiet and in full admiration of this wonderful movie, and some had to reach for their handkerchiefs.

So, go to the cinema and be witness of a true and realistic masterpiece.

A sensitively drawn chamber piece for the three actors. Lubna Azabal especially delivers a finely crafted performance encompassing the breadth of human emotions. Wonderful.

I really did want to like this Moroccan drama, and indeed, it is very beautifully and carefully executed, but I did find it just a bit too languid and nuanced for its own good, perhaps also finally just a little too sad and poignant, but it lingers in the mind, and like the precision snd skill of the kaftan maker, struggling with his sexuality and the conflicts of the society he is in, it does create a lasting effect. Not only a touching drama, but it highlights some very human themes and struggles.

Of course, a film from a Muslim country with themes on homosexuality and the struggles of individuals in a repressed society is a brave but necessary thing, and for that the makers should be congratulated. Beautifully crafted by all concerned.

A convenience, an arrangement but with love, like the hand that nestles firmly within glove, a partnership, a pairing, with the coalition fearing, that an influence might thrust down from above; as events are taken out of their control, a condition leaving one without parole, a fight that can't be won, a world that's gradually undone, a price to pay, with the heaviest of tolls; all performed with so much elegance and grace, as two people braid, entwine, surround, embrace, whose devotion and whose caring, elevate just what is sharing, with respect, regard and reverence their embrace.

It's a beautiful film, with beautiful performances from beautiful people.

"Halim" (Saleh Bakri) lives with his ailing wife "Mina" (Lubna Azabal) and together they run a small tailoring business. Now he is a master craftsman, everything is measured, cut and stitched by hand - a fairly labour intensive and time consuming process. To help meet the demands of his impatient customers, he has acquired an handsome apprentice "Youssef" (Ayoub Missioui) who takes a keen interest in his work and demonstrates an aptitude that is increasingly appreciated by "Halim". What's also fairly obvious is that both men are attracted to each other and we now embark on a rather delicate triangle in which the two men - entirely platonically - develop their relationship under the watchful gaze of his wife whom we suspect suspects, but... It's a very gently paced film this, allowing the three strong performances from these on-form character actors to develop slowly and engagingly and though the underpinning issues of sexuality in a country that is still largely unwelcoming is part of the theme, it is not a greater a part than the observation of the couple's happy marriage nor of the creative beauty of the men's skills at creating garments of delicacy and fineness. It's a film about discovery and family and I found it worked really quite well as we navigate a myriad of challenges towards the conclusion that, like the rest of this story, is anything but simple. It's quite observational in nature, so don't expect things to rattle along - they don't, but it draws together threads of lives and choices in as intricate a fashion as any of his creations and is really well worth a watch.