A gentle and pleasant soap opera done in a fairly high cinematic style. The characters are far too attractive and the plot too simplistic, but the film grows on the viewer as the minutes glide by
Nadine Labaki’s simmering soap opera for the silver screen features five women who are as different as night and day. Or are they? Like the TV blockbuster “Laverne and Shirley” they are different but at the same time they are the same. They all share the love, joy, defeat and sorrow of human being everywhere. Also, they are all very attractive and hip. And that goes for the men, too.
Labaki plays Layale, the owner of a hair styling salon who is hopelessly enmeshed in an affair with a married man. In the finest soap tradition, the man promises to leave his wife, but never can and never will. The audience knows that but Layale doesn’t. She continues to deceive herself, just as we have all done, especially in matters of love. But the final confrontation between the two women is done with wonderful humor and pathos as Layale deals with the married woman in the only way she can. With caramel.
Yasmine Elmasri plays Nisrine, a stunning beauty engaged to a conservative, but nice, Muslim man. We don’t get a chance to see how nice he really is because Nisrine never tells him she is no longer a virgin. This revelation would open her up to scandal and no marriage; maybe no marriage ever. Fortunately, he never asks such a thing, but apparently assumes virginity.
Therein lies the problem. There is a powerful mystery as to whether or not he is really the fanatical male-supremacist many westerners assume Muslim men to be. This otherwise superficial film could have mined some very strong-worded stuff from a few scenes of her breaking the news to Mr. Right and the audience seeing if he would follow his heart, or his dogma.
As it turns out we get to see the wedding, but not the disillusion, as Nisrine takes matters into her own, well, hands, and makes the appointment for the required minor surgery. Presto, a born-again virgin. Easier than being baptized in the River Jordan. A word of warning to Lebanese surgeons who make a living off this operation, don’t come to America without a second specialty. Something like, say, liposuction would be a good back-up.
The marvelous Jamale (Gisèle Aouad) is an aging actress with two children and an ex-hubby. Jamale is not handling middle-age well. She frets and complains in the styling chair as the strong and confident Rima (Joanna Moukarzel) reminds her that it is more than just her hair that doesn’t look the same as the model. Jamale wonders of she will ever meet the next, and best, prince of her dreams.
Nisrine has the prince but is afraid he will reject her. Layale has a married prince but for some reason he won’t leave his princess for her. Jamale has had her prince but dies every day as menopause draws nearer.
Rose (Sihame Haddad) works next door as a seamstress and as the caretaker of her older sister, Lilli. In Lebanon, after a certain age an unmarried woman is deemed a spinster and is no longer allowed to consort with single men. When Rose catches the eye of a similarly middle-aged foreigner, her life lights up. But in the end she is bitterly defeated by the customs around her. To openly be courted at such an age would be an affront to society that would bring humiliation down on her and her sister. She can’t take the chance.
As Rose’s older, and completely senile, sister, Aziza Semaan steals the show as Lilli. If she isn’t stealing the parking tickets off cars she is openly participating in every private affair of the other women, especially her sister. She is our eyes and ears, the curious outsider who may know more than she lets on.
Although mild in presentation, “Caramel” has a few moments of genuine cinematic inspiration showing the grief of aging, the joy and pain of sacrifice and the humor of the universal reaction of the woman scorned and the universal vulnerability of the male ego. A great way to pass a lazy winter afternoon in the theater, but this film will go nowhere with the male viewing audience. Maybe something for the opposite sex to do during the Super-Bowl?
Release: February 1, 2008
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