Bab'Aziz: Le Prince Qui Contemplait Son Âme

I came across this wonderful movie in a DVD shop in Basel and was attracted by the well designed DVD cover. I ordered the DVD from net and the Movie turned out one of the best movies I have ever seen where the visible indicates towards the even bigger invisible world.. and the outer images turn you joyfully inward. Sufism is a hidden mystic tradition and its secrets are well hidden. But in this movie if you are alert will be introduced to some of most beautiful dances and recitals. The music is uplifting and the photography simply beautiful.I congratulate the director of the movie for his courage and sense of beauty. In addition the movie is full of paraables and portrayal of desert which is ever so associated with Sufis. The temple in the sand and the Zikhr cereomony left me asking for more..

Although there are moments when the movie may seem to progress slowly; nonetheless it kept the audience at the cinema glued to their seats. I went to watch the movie twice. It did not attract huge audiences; which in great part may be due to its lack of adequate advertising; but those few who did come to see the movie were glued to their seats. The movie has two great features. One is the soul stirring choice of music and its perfect adaptation to the scenes. Secondly, the movie successfully achieves the difficult undertaking of introducing and explaining in graphic terms and with simple stories the almost exclusively Oriental world of mysticism. The setting might not reflect the physical or material reality of the East, but it definitely does add to the magic and facilitates the viewer's transit from the material world outside to the spiritual world within. Highly recommended.

Images are of a haunting beauty: the immensity of the desert, the rare trees, birds, rocks trying to make their life there, the sudden oasis with houses made of clay, the paradox of ghost houses surrounded by myriads of people, the mosque, unexpected and weird, like the church from Tarkovski's Stalker.

The music is great, and makes the movie a ballad: it is like the songs make the statement and images and dialog just emphasize. Of course songs are not translated, but give you the mood.

It is not easy at all to follow the story: it comes from a very different culture, with its own rhythms, its own poetry, its own logical connections. For us it is like floating in plain paradox.

For those who haven't seen it yet, think at the movies of Parajanov. It is not an easy movie, but if you overcome the difficulties, you'll get the incomparable beauty of the story.

There are moments that do not come often to us - we should be prepared for them. Encounter with love, with death. Death as the way to enter the great realm that we lost at birth.

And the granddaughter, learning this lesson of life on the way, along with us, who are watching the movie and follow her journey.

Great movie!

I went today on a film festival in Izola, Slovenia and this was the first movie I saw. I'm in a youth jury.

I have to say that this is one of the best movies I have ever seen. Everything is going on in a desert and you completely feel like your a part of this story. Movie photography is amazing. There are four stories that all tell one message. Maybe it's a little hard to follow all the stories, but in the end everything makes sense. I loved the message, but I can't tell you what it is, I want you to see the movie.

The music was also amazing. Arabic music makes you feel like your there, in the movie, but sometimes it's a little bit to loud...you can't hear the desert. But maybe that's what the director wanted. I recommend it to everyone!

"Bab'Aziz: The Prince Who Contemplated His Soul" is a magical retelling of a Sufi mysticism; the mystical side of Islam, the time-honored concept of oneness with God, the peace and harmony with the universe. Bab'Aziz (Parviz Shahinkhou)is a very old blind dervish who hit the desert for a dervish reunion that is held once in every thirty years. A sort of a Sufi congregation where dancing ,singing, reciting poetry are all performed in a dhikr-like meditation and ecstasy to realize a sense of oneness with God, to reach the Creator. Ostensibly, his only accompanier is his high-spirited but patient granddaughter Ishtar(Maryam Hamid) who enjoys the mystic tales of the dervishes which somehow intersect with the tales of those who are on the desert for the same reunion.Bab'Aziz tells the story of a titular prince who goes missing one day.The fastidious prince who enjoys himself with the worldly-deeds follow a little gazelle that happens to be near his palatial tent. After he is gone missing, his loyal subjects look for him only to find him to be enraptured by apparently his own reflection in the pool but his loyal server knows that there is more to it than meets the eye. En route to the congregation they meet others whose stories are mystically interwoven with the tale of the old dervish. A young man who is on the desert to avenge a brother who was killed by a red-haired dervish(Hossein Panahi)whose only concern is to 'sweep with his soul, before his beloved's door', Osman(Mohamed Graïaa) who years for the beautiful Zahra who mystically meets in a palatial well, Zaid(Nessim Khaloul)who looks for the enchanting woman (Golshifteh Farahani) who is bewitched by his poems at a poetry contest but fled away from him to find her long-lost dervish father...

Dedicated to the father of the director Nacer Khemir, the movie is a subtle on-portrayal of Muslims in a hostile,gradually increasing Islamophobic world. In an interview in Al-Ahram Weekly,Nacer Khemir says "Suppose you were walking with your father on the street and he fell and got mud on his face. What do you do then? You help him up and wipe the mud off his face." The mud--the wrongly attained image of Islam due to those guys who take wows of violence with their guns is trying to be clarified by a man who could say "When I became an orphan I understood that I was at the center of a whirlpool, that I would never know comfort. I felt it was necessary to start expressing that..."

Teemed with vivid desert imagery, thought-provoking and enchanting remarks by self-less dervishes,Bab'Aziz is definitely not a movie for a layman. If you don't like a journey which will take you literally nowhere but mystically everywhere the movie won't be making much sense for you. If you have never read anything about sufi poets like Rumi let alone the possibility that you may never heard of him, then this movie won't be an easy one for you to relate to, because Sufism,in a way, is ripped away from rationality. I mean what would you say to a granddaughter who says "we've lost the way" on the desert. Bab'aziz says "He who has faith will never get lost, my little angel.He who is at peace won't lose his way." That's I mean about the "rationality" in Sufism.So if you really want to watch this movie get ready for the mystical journey that will become obscure if you lose your faith,concentration and attention!