Amjad Al Rasheed gives a Farhadi-like look at the life of a Jordanian widow.

Nawal (Mouna Hawa) has a perfectly ordinary life in Amman. A job as a carer, a husband and a daughter. But when her husband suddenly dies, she learns how little she is entitled to under Jordanian inheritance culture.

The antagonist is her husband’s brother Rifqi (Hitham Omari) and the greatest injustice, in Nawal’s eyes, coalesce around him. He has rights to her husband’s truck, their apartment and even their daughter. The paradox is that the claiming of the inheritance by him is what will undermine her ability to provide for her daughter.

Rather than make Rifqi the monster, Rasheed and writers Delphine Agut and Rula Nasser show how the externalised and internalised patriarchal restrictions are upheld by all. From female neighbours to a work colleague who is ‘in love with her’ – they all would prefer her to concede and raise her daughter quietly.

This is what reminds me of Farhadi; the domestic detail and social and family dynamics that slowly build a picture of the cage that Nawal is in.

It has a nicely carthartic ending, underplayed enough to not feel conveniently neat and an antidote to the depressingly reality of women’s rights in the Middle East, even in a country that is seen as relatively progressive.

Director: Amjad Al Rasheed
Origin: France, Jordan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia (2023)
Language: Arabic with English subtitles
Genre: Drama

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