A MUST WATCH !!

Rating: 9/10 (27 October 2019)

While religions all over the world overtly profess a language of love and offer a path to salvation, it is not uncommon to find their teachings hijacked by fanatics and zealots who spew hatred and incite teeming followers in the name of God to commit ungodly acts. Many a war have been waged and scores of precious lives lost, maimed and scarred in the name of religion which preach a blind hatred of others. This is a story of a society and in particular, a family, which had to bear the brunt of a civil war spawn from such mindless religious hatred.
Jeanne and Simon, twin siblings in Canada, are taken by surprise when their reticent mother dies leaving a strange will which requires to deliver two letters from their mother. Jeanne is to deliver a letter to her father whom they thought had died long ago while Simon is to deliver another letter to a brother whom they were unaware of. Simon is clearly reluctant as he considers the demands in the will as an unreasonable, if not, a totally irrational request by their mother whom he believed was demented. Jeanne, however, sets out on a journey to discover her mother's past and to find out her father and brother.
Jeanne's journey is interwoven with a parallel narrative arc which depicts the story of their mother, Nawal, in her youth in an unnamed Middle East nation (probably Lebanon) with simmering tension between the its Muslim and ruling Christian populace. Nawal, a Christian, falls in love with a Muslim from a refugee camp. When she discovers that she is pregnant, she tries to flee with her lover. However, Nawal's brothers confront them and kill her lover in the name of family's honour. Nawal's grandmother saves her from her brothers' wrath for bringing dishonour to their religion and clan. Nawal's grandmother helps her to keep her pregnancy secret and promises to assist Nawal in having the baby under the condition that Nawal would send it to an orphanage upon delivery and leave to a distant city for her studies. Nawal fulfills her condition and leaves her village to pursue higher studies in a university even as the newborn which is tattooed by her grandmother is handed over to an orphanage. At the university, Nawal is an activist during her studies and when the threat of civil war looms large, she forsakes her studies to look for her son to take him to safety before the onset of full blown war.

The rest of the movie oscillates between these two parallel narratives of past and the present, separated in time by a few decades - Nawal quest for her son and Jeanne's quest to unravel her mother's past. Nawal's search for her lost son takes her ever so deeper into the heart of an unfolding dark civil war, where her life is tossed around by the belligerent forces like a helpless vessel in a terrible storm. Jeanne's search, on the other hand, reveals her mother's troubled past and the traumas she had to undergo before she left her strife-torn native for Canada. These two intertwining strands culminate in an exceptional, SHOCKING and INTENSE revelation in the finale. Playing the reticent, yet resilient and psychologically complex character of Nawal, Lubna Hazabal as Nawal provides the stand out performance which is compelling even in her intense silences. The rest of the cast consisting Melissa Desormeaux-Poulin playing Jeanne, Maxim Gaudette playing the reluctant Simon as well as Rémy Girard playing the notary Maître Lebel, Nawal's former employer and the holder of the will who guides the twins in their quest provide competent performances.
Canadian director Dennis Villeneuve helms this multi-layered movie (adapted from a popular play by Wajdi Mouawad known for its poetic flourishes) with the assurance of masterly auteur with potent visuals, sharp writing and a deliberate pace that keeps the viewer glued to every detail. Villeneuve's brilliance is manifest in the manner in which he has crafted an ambitious non-linear narrative that transcends multiple genres of drama, road movie, thriller and anti-war movie.
Overall, this stirring movie is an exceptional ode to the triumph of kinship, togetherness and love which trump over the seemingly invincible forces of hatred. Nominated for Best Foreign Language Movie for the 83rd Academy Awards (2011) has also received acclaim in several international film festivals.