The violent tragedy that underlies the plot of the film, delineated linearly, would have proved both predictable and hackneyed. When the mother declares that she had known all along but couldn't bring herself to believe it, for example, the statement is followed with flashbacks, the past shedding light on the present on more than one level. Subsequently, at one point, we see the girl dumping a great number of sanitary towels in the rubbish. This genre of cinema comprises a slippery slope, for the topic of illicit pregnancy is old. Yet the present offering presents the story as lived experience rather than romantic or moralising rhetoric.
Nothing is perfect, though.
Shiha's outstanding performance notwithstanding, the film is overloaded with music. Yet Mohamed Fawzi's classic birthday song, Eid Al-Milad, a joyful and carefree tune that accompanies the more poignant part of the story, served as the perfect counterpoint to the grim melancholy of the action.