At a film festival, there’s usually a whisper network. As you step in and out of cinema halls, sometimes forgetting what day of the week it is or whether you just had breakfast or lunch (or was it dinner?!), you start hearing names of movies with serious buzz. “Did you see [Insert Name of Film]?” someone will remark in the inevitable lineups for the washroom or rush tickets. At the 2023 Toronto International Film Festival, Inshallah a Boy was one of the films I kept on hearing about. Sure, there was also loud talk of Dream Scenario, American Fiction and Hit Man given the talent involved. But that underground chitter-chatter? That was for Jordanian filmmaker Amjad Al Rasheed’s debut.
Somehow, I kept missing Inshallah a Boy at TIFF. In hindsight, I’m glad I did not watch it in the rush of the festival. There was some serious FOMO, however, especially when I saw Al Rasheed, dressed in an electric blue jacket and pants, his beaming smile eclipsing his charming ensemble, bound upwards on the notoriously steep escalators of Toronto’s Scotiabank Theatre. He was headed to one of his movie’s screenings, where a colleague told me he got a standing ovation. Now that I’ve seen it, I can say that it was clearly well-deserved.
Inshallah a Boy has a quiet ordinariness to it, which I was glad to sink into when I watched it at home. In just under two hours, the film tells the story of Nawal (Mouna Hawa), a personal support worker in her 30s, whose life is upended by the sudden death of her husband.
At first, she has to deal with the grief of losing a spouse and taking care of her young daughter. But then her brother-in-law Rifqi (Haitham Omari) starts demanding payments for the money he is owed. According to local custom, he can lay a claim to Nawal’s home and take guardianship of her daughter. Nawal’s only recourse is a male heir. In order to keep her brother-in-law at bay, she claims to be pregnant. Over a course of three weeks, Nawal faces one challenge after another as she fights to own what’s rightfully hers and to protect her daughter.
From the opening frame, Al Rashad, who also wrote the film with Rula Nasser and Delphine Agut, draws us into the absurdities of Nawal’s life. Inshallah a Boy opens with her trying to retrieve an errant bra that’s somehow ended up hanging on an electrical wire outside her closed-off balcony. She tries reaching it with a broomstick handle, quiet frustration etched out on her face. Any woman who has grown up in a crowded city in the global south, where public spaces seldom feel accommodating or safe for women, will relate to Nawal’s peculiar predicament. Underwear is never meant to be seen, even as a mere garment—forget the concept of airing dirty laundry.
Throughout Inshallah a Boy, we get a sense of Nawal’s fortitude, which hits several breaking points as circumstances keep testing her faith—in her religion, her family, her marriage and ultimately herself. There are no bad guys here. Rifqi genuinely believes he’s entitled to a share in his brother’s belongings, according to religious tenets. Nawal, who is religiously observant and pragmatic when it comes to the more free-thinking views she encounters outside her home, finds it difficult to digest the inherently patriarchal society she’s functioning within. However, her small rebellions are also informed by her personal convictions in her faith. There’s a sense of both human struggle and leaving things to fate.
Palestinian actress Hawa shines as Nawal, and is ably assisted by a supporting cast in her portrayal of a widow sometimes barely grasping at straws. There’s a lived-in weariness that Hawa taps into; her version of Nawal is never distraught, nor enraged—although she has flashes of outbursts. She simply does not have the luxury. The way that Hawa is able to articulate Nawal’s moment of personal crisis, in the furtive look she gives her sister-in-law or the exasperation she reserves for her own brother, makes for a commendable performance.
Inshallah a Boy doesn’t give any clear answers. Instead, the film offers a look at the life of an ordinary woman in Jordan, going through an ordeal likely faced by many like her. In an interview, Al Rashad spoke of being inspired by a real-life incident within his own family. A relative was in a similar situation as Nawal, and he wondered, “What if she says no? What if she decides to fight and what are her options?” It’s remarkable how that inquiry led Al Rashad to write and direct such a compelling drama about the limits and liberations of faith.
Director: Amjad Al Rasheed
Writer: Amjad Al Rasheed, Rula Nasser, Delphine Agut
Starring: Mouna Hawa, Haitham Omari, Yumna Marwan, Salwa Nakkara, Seleena Rababah
Release Date: January 12, 2024
Aparita Bhandari is an arts and life reporter in Toronto. Her areas of interest and expertise lie in the intersections of gender, culture and ethnicity. She is the producer and co-host of the Hindi language podcast, KhabardaarPodcast.com. You can find her on Twitter. Along with Bollywood, Toblerone bars are one of her guilty pleasures.