From A to B

I will give two stars for effort.

The movie is cliché, its not new. Maybe its a new way of making "Arab" films, but the film itself is not new. Minus extreme sexual innuendos, remove the English language and you get A to B. A hard try to create an Emirati image in the Arab cinema, but blatantly struggles to be original.

The only Emirati film I can fully recognize as a well thought and properly executed attempt was "Zinzana" (Rattle the Cage) by Majid Al Ansari.

As an Emirati myself, I feel we should just make films for the sake of making them but for the sake of innovation.

Its a sad attempt for Ali F. Mostafa, but my respects still for making a movie at all.

Hats off to effort.

But I'd like my money back.

We had last night been at the Advanced Screening of Ali F. Mostafa's Movie From A to B at the Vox Cinemas at the Yas Mall in Abu Dhabi. It was the first time for me to be at the Vox Cinemas in the Yas Mall and man was it an experience.

The Movie itself is playing in the year 2011 when Omar finds himself still racked with the guilt over the death of his best friend Hady 5 years ago and whose girl he married which was the reason for the the stress they had.

Just days away from the birth of his first child, he decides to take the road trip they never got to take and reaches out to his estranged high school friends Jay (Albutairi) and Ramy (Alfons) who have lost touch since Hady's death to take the road trip in his memory., much to the dismay of his pregnant wife.

Jay, now a playboy / wannabe DJ, and Ramy, an #activist (with 737 twitter followers!), take some convincing, but finally agree to the trip. The boys decide to drive from Abu Dhabi – via Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and Syria to arrive in Beirut, on what would have been Hady's twenty-fifth birthday.

Their journey is interesting and you will see quite some places you are familiar with in this flick which is pretty awesome. As well the scenery is partially amazing, specially Jordan. It made me feel during the movie already like "I wanna go there".

The story is told interesting and despite the movie being mainly in Arabic I followed the subtitles well enough to get everything. The movie did not bore me for even a minute.

As a classic Roadtrip Movie with Arabic charm of course things have to go wrong during the trip and they do. A camel gets hit, they get arrested by the Police and so on. I don't want to take away to much of the story here but having as well some political influences about the war in Syria and the difficulties in Lebanon itself at that time is enriching the movie very well and I walked out of the Movie still thinking how horrible the situation in Syria must be.

The Actors had been quite good and specially Fahad who plays Jay/Yousef was brilliant in my opinion and very entertaining. Overall it is an entertaining flick which is giving you a good time in the cinema. It is certainly worth watching and having a good time even if you do not speak native Arabic like me.

Different from other Arabic films, The Director is very strong and has great experience, and we enjoyed working like make a movie House district, Mustafa filmmaker Emirati and UAE's expected audience closer to the UAE and the GCC community, Movie from Abu Dhabi to Beirut with the soul comedy to action heroes, beautiful idea, and always looking for public road movies and desires, Our criticism is not great, but absolutely sure that the Director is keen to move on Its for the better, We hope the new more exciting and suspense and Emirati and Gulf representatives renewed love film challenge We want the Director focus on behind the scenes, industry and business workshops for beginner filmmakers, publishing experience, and no doubt that interest would be great

I won't go into the story to avoid spoilers and because the first reviewer did an excellent short summary. I thought at the beginning that it was going to be only a light "road movie" with some interesting irony and wit (especially the twitter activist character, and "eager to please" whereas towards the end there is some added thought and depth and this given the movie a new, and positive dimension. I found the acting generally good with some exceptions which are more average. Interesting to see how a moderate Arab country like the UAE perceives the divergent situations the Arab world is living in, and how distant lives in those countries can be. A fresh look at also how close our lifestyles are becoming worldwide (except where there is war).

Cinematography wise for an Arabic movie, which I found the greatest factor in the movie, it was made by a professional, Michel Dierickx did an excellent job. The story seems to be genuine from a Middle Eastern point of view, although the dialog wasn't its great factor, which I feel in fact affected the acting roles, Ramy (Shadi Alfons) was maybe the best in acting, his script was fit his role and his character. Youssef or J (Fahad Albutairi) he maintained his amazing humor, his character was a stereotypical rich spoiled Saudi "outside the border", did a fine job in the face expressionism, as of Omar (Fadi Rifaai) I'm sadly disappointed in his acting in general, specially too much drama and sensitivity, However he did pull few time a great job of showing love.

Ali F. Mostafa is never the less is a great director, he worked on many projects including the firs Emirati film City of Life, his choices like appearances of cameo and a real American actress Madeline Zima as Samantha.

The movie had too much Hollywood inputs and technique of humor and fast paste editing, not to say it as negative, but not original. The English language in the script is a factor which i don't like in general, BUT i feel that it was actually a smart decision for two reasons. One, it will be more cheesy and lame if it were to be told in Arabic, the second and i think its the main reason, lot of sexual and inside joke that will sound very offensive, which is not in the English literature.

in conclusion, the movie point out lots of social issue and tried to express it in different point of view. lots of liberal moment and reactions. The movie showed lots of smart subtext in the story and commercially too.