What struck me so forcibly was the freshness and spontaneity of the performances. The director doesn’t explicitly side with or condemn either Casim’s traditional Muslim family who have planned an arranged marriage for him, the lovers themselves, or the Catholic community to which Roisin belongs. He presents the very real emotions in all three groups so that the audience can fully experience the very real inner struggles that are taking place.

One of the most dramatic scenes is that between Roisin and her priest. She expects him to sign a character reference for her that will enable her to gain promotion in her job. The priest however knows of her extra-marital affair and confronts her with her sinful state. This scene has great power because of the simplicity and directness of the presentation. Hollywood could never have achieved this level of dramatic truth.

The camerawork is always discreet and there is no artificial heightening of emotion. The plot and denouement are essentially very straightforward and thus throughout the film we can concentrate on the characters dilemmas and how they interact with one another. This is filmmaking of rare intimacy.

We see with honesty how Casim and Roisin cannot help their mutual attraction in spite of their very different backgrounds. Roisin’s difficulty in understanding the attitude of Casim’s family is powerfully shown through the couple’s quarrels and separations.

This is a film about the difficulty of living and loving in multicultural Britain but there is no preaching which is perhaps what might be expected from a director like Ken Loach. It seems a pleasantly impartial film from someone who so often has a very overt agenda to put forward. The audience can make their own decisions about what they have seen. This is above all a film more likely to provoke questions rather than to provide answers.

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Julian Allen was born in Folkestone in 1961 and now lives in South London where he works at City University Library near the Angel in London. He studied for a degree at Manchester Metropolitan University in English Studies and a Postgraduate Diploma in Librarianship also at Manchester Metropolitan University. His main interests apart from films are bird-watching and classical music.

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© 2004 Laura Hird All rights reserved.