The Last Friday
(Al Juma Al Akheira)

Broken-down : this seems to sum up the life of Youssef, a former car dealer who is debt-ridden and now drives taxis. A broken-down car, an electricity failure, a physical disorder that intimately affects him… And his teenage son, a nonentity with poor results at school, seems to be following his father’s downward path. Depicted as an atypical character through a mise en scène that accentuates his emotional and social isolation, the divorced Youssef is surrounded by scintillating women. His enterprising neighbour, the fiancée of his former boss and particularly his ex-wife are all clearly attracted by very bourgeois comforts and in sharp contrast with his decline, with a defeated masculinity. It is no coincidence that Youssef and his son’s mother are played by actors as famous as they are talented, Ali Suliman (seen in Elia Suleiman’s films as well as Paradise Now and Lemon Tree) and Yasmine Al Masri (Caramel): for his first feature, Yahya Al Abdallah has found in his actors the gender archetypes that usefully help him complete his dystopian analysis of modern-day manhood. CG