The Journey

Echoes of Youssef Chahine's Cairo Station (1958) and Hany Abu-Assad's Paradise Now (2005) reverberate around Mohamed Jabarah Al-Daradji's tense drama, which follows Ahlaam (2006) and Son of Babylon (2009) in examining the impact of the American invasion on ordinary Iraqis. Set on 30 December 2006, the action follows suicide bomber Zahraa Ghandour, as she seeks to cause devastation at the grand re-opening of Baghdad Central Station on the first day of Eid. Initially distracted by the various hawkers and buskers on the concourse, Gandour is waylaid by cocky prosthetic limb salesman Ameer Jabarah, who tries to talk her round after he discovers her mission and she takes him hostage. Keeping his camera moving and pushing his luck with a couple of implausible plot points, Al-Daradji uses a flower seller and her brother, a reluctant teenage bride, a band of musicians, a couple of coarse American soldiers and a furtive woman with a holdall to generate a neorealist sense of atmosphere and suspense, while just about skirting sentimentality.