"‘Our Ties’ Review: A Brain Injury Affects the Whole Family in Roschdy Zem’s Well-Observed Dramedy The grown-up siblings of a combative but loving French family are challenged when the kindest and
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		"‘Our Ties’ Review: A Brain Injury Affects the Whole Family in Roschdy Zem’s Well-Observed Dramedy

The grown-up siblings of a combative but loving French family are challenged when the kindest and most pliant of their number undergoes a drastic change of personality following an injury.

Of all the i" "--START AD- #TheMummichogblogOfMalta Amazon Top and Flash Deals(Affiliate Link - You will support our translations if you purchase through the following link) - https://amzn.to/3CqsdJH Compare all the top travel sites in just one search to find the best hotel deals at HotelsCombined - awarded world's best hotel price comparison site. (Affiliate Link - You will support our translations if you purchase through the following link) - https://www.hotelscombined.com/?a_aid=20558 “So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets."" #Jesus #Catholic. END AD---" "mmediate familial relationships agonized over in the movies, it’s probably the bonds of siblinghood that remain the least explored. In his sixth film as director, French multihyphenate Roschdy Zem redresses that imbalance just a little, with the charming, unassuming but hardly inconsequential “Our Ties”: a heartfelt and beautifully played burst of bright chatter that doesn’t reinvent the wheel of the domestic drama, but does watch it turn with an unusually compassionate, affectionate eye.

As it opens, Moussa (Sami Bouajila, winner of the 2019 Venice Horizons Best Actor award for Mehdi Barsaoui’s “A Son”) is in the middle of a crisis, not that you’d necessarily know it from the gently perplexed way he is handling his wife Nora’s sudden decision to end their relationship. Nora is in Morocco, where she spends a lot of her time for work, and Moussa, getting nothing but her voicemail, has finally come to the realization that she is serious about their split. Less angry than he is dazed, according to her wishes he packs up all her things, but is helpless to know what to do with them. His concerned, no-nonsense sister Samia (a note-perfect Meriem Serbah), the only one in whom he’s confided about the breakup, takes charge of giving the clothes and jewelry away.

He may be suffering emotional turmoil, but it’s his youngest daughter’s 12th birthday, and a raucously multigenerational family gathering is planned in celebation. So while his older children Nesrine (Nina Zem) and Amir (Carl Malapa) squabble over Amir’s loony flat-earth beliefs, Moussa, sitting in between the outspoken Samia and their successful TV presenter brother Ryad (Zem), with his elder brothers Adil (Abel Jafri) and Salah (Rachid Bouchareb) plus various spouses in attendance, selflessly slips into his regular role as quiet, reliably good-humored mediator.

With an accurate and amused ear for the conversational dynamics of squabbling relatives, the screenplay, co-written by Zem and Maïwenn and based on an incident in Zem’s brother’s life, cleverly delivers a welter of information about every member of this sprawling clan via an escalating discussion that pivots on whether Ryad ever thanked Moussa for some pastries. Ryad, already bristling at the accusation that he is not attentive to his family or to his girlfriend Emma (Maïwenn), insists that such politenesses are unnecessary between brothers. Samia, rankling on Moussa’s behalf, doubles down on her accusation of Ryad’s callousness. Just when things threaten to erupt, Moussa gently defuses the time bomb of stored-up petty resentments that every family sets ticking whenever they get together.

So when Moussa, lonely after his secret split, goes out drinking with an attractive co-worker, gets pukingly drunk and keels over, we know it’s atypical behavior. And when the concussion he sustains turns out to be more serious, and he starts sleeping through the day and snapping at his kids, the circles under his eyes darkening like some kind of light is being slowly extinguished from within, we understand the hov