Review: A disfigured man and an orphan hit the road in the moving film ‘Yomeddine’

By Michael Rechtshaffen

May 30, 2019 10:26 AM PT

While the subgenre known as the odd couple road picture has seen plenty of mileage over the years, when the pairing involves a 40-ish leper and an orphaned 10-year-old boy, there’s still fertile character-driven ground to be covered, as evidenced in “Yomeddine,” a tender first feature by A.B. Shawky.

Despite being long cured of the affliction that left him with a heavily scarred face and gnarled fingers, Beshay (a remarkable Rady Gamal) has never left the Egyptian desert leper colony that has been his home since he was a young child.

Following the death of his mentally ill wife, Beshay decides to seek out his roots, accompanied by a spirited but lonely Nubian orphan nicknamed Obama (fellow nonthespian Ahmed Abdelhafiz), and the two embark on a peril-filled trek to their ultimate, physical and spiritual destination.

Perhaps in the hands of a more experienced filmmaker, the production’s obvious influences — particularly “The Elephant Man” — might have been more muted and the many tonal shifts better finessed. But, conversely, Shawky’s decision to cast nonprofessionals lends the production a stirring authenticity.

As Gamal, himself raised in a leper colony, knowingly navigates the uncomfortable glares he encounters along the way, “Yomeddine” (Arabic for “judgment day”) takes an affecting path toward belonging and acceptance.

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