Tarik El Hob

I saw this film last night as part of the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras Film Festival 2004. It is an extraordinary thesis on islamic homosexuality and a love story. The story concerns a heterosexual french algerian muslim student, Karim, who after seeing a story on television about gay men in Egypt decides to do a video thesis on homosexuality and islam. In the process he discovers his sexuality and falls in love with a gay arab man (Farid) that is one of his interviewees. The movie is about an issue rarely explored in any great detail in cinema and the movie covers and explores many sensitive topics with such skill.It is also a movie full of sensuality and tenderness. When Karim goes to Morocco with Farid we see a part of the country and culture rarely seen. And through Karim, Farid and all his interviewees in 'Tarik El Hob', a sensitive and powerful masculinity and culture rarely explored in cinema. For this avid moviegoer this film was groundbreaking. A must see.

I liked this movie, if for no other reason than its pure exoticism. The story of a Algerian student making a documentary as a University sociology class assignment frames the familiar story of a young male discovering his attraction to men. It's a slender premise, but adequate for the story to be told.

It was interesting to me that the student, Karim, sees homosexuality as a kind of surrender. There is a lot of anxiety about who is active and who is passive, as if there is no middle ground, or as if gay men sodomize and exclude all other sex acts. I suppose this is because Karim's interest is piqued when he learns of the pre-1940 same sex marriages in his culture. He seems only to be able to accept his gayness in this context of faux heterosexuality.

I liked the video-cinema-verite style--it added to the immediacy of the story. I liked watching the relationship develop between Karim and his admirer. And I liked the introduction to Algerian culture. As another reviewer mentions, the actors are attractive and real: there are no bronzed pecs and abs here. That alone makes this gay-themed film exotic . . . .

ROAD TO LOVE is an obviously very low budget independent French film that introduces the audience to the theme of homosexuality as it is manifested among Islamic/Arab men. Writers Rémi Lange and Antoine Parlebas have created a script so natural, so sensitively real that at moments the film feels like a documentary (each of the young actors in the story bear their own names, the technique of storytelling is basically video interviews), but the impact of the move is quietly profound, without a trace of the saccharine or the gush of Hollywood films dealing with gay subject matter.

French Algerian Karim (Karim Tarek) is a student in Paris and spends his time with his girlfriend Sihem (Sihem Benamoune). He happens to view a television program about the gay life in Egypt in the 20th century, a life that allowed gay relationships and even marriages so along as the men gave up the lifestyle when they eventually married women. His interest in the subject results in a sociology project of interviewing gay Arab men to explore contemporary gay lifestyles. After a few aborted attempts (Karim is not sufficiently comfortable with the subject matter to gain the trust of his interviewees) Karim encounters Farid (Farid Tali), a gay, well-adjusted, quietly seductive handsome Algerian lad who not only agrees to be interviewed, but also finds ways to assist Karim with his project. Chemistry develops and the two depart Paris to visit Marseilles and Morocco and Karim discovers why the subject of choice fascinates him so! The beauty of this film lies in the honesty in which it is written, directed, acted, and edited. Not only are we allowed to explore a subject matter few of us knew (Islamic homosexuality history and social mores), we are also presented with one of the more tender love stories on film - tender because it is not overt but rather because it is so naturally evolved. The actors are excellent and though they feel as though they are first time, off the street recruits, they find the core of the script and make the story beautiful. In French and Arabic with English subtitles. Grady Harp

beautiful, rich, you really laugh and have tears well up and so forth. heartbreakingly sweet acting. saw it a couple of days ago and am still processing it lots to think about. really interesting in it's relation to genet and how fictional the film is, very I think... I mean the whole story is I think related to that "you look like your sister in this light boy I could go for your sister right now" thing. only reappropriated by romance lol romantic beyond all possibility. I felt so sad after I saw it but then I met a guy at a gas station breaking several months of being fed up with the menfolk. a weird coincidence anyway this is really a magical movie. and I met the director too and he's really sweet. I want to buy the DVD and read the screenplay.

oh maybe I should mention the actors are all so hot without looking plastic in the least. Je fais le freak out par que ce film est si formidable.

it occurs to me this could be the most deliriously romantic movie I've ever seen. meaning like more potent, worse, if you will, than any hollywood movie. and you can't do anything but just lap it up...