Of Skin and Men' (‘L'Amour des hommes'): Film Review

Hafsia Herzi ('The Secret of the Grain') plays a provocative youthful picture taker in Tunisia in chief Mehdi Ben Attia's third component.

Investigating the female look in a one of a kind and rather forbidden form, Of Skin and Men (L'Amour des hommes) recounts the tale of a current dowager who starts taking eroticized photos of the men around her Tunisian neighborhood.

Set apart by a guaranteed lead abandon The Secret of the Grain star Hafsia Herzi, this third element by chief Mehdi Ben Attia (I'm Not Dead) can be significantly cumbersome in spots and feels extended a bit too thin. However it in any case offers a captivating picture of a young lady beating sadness by investigating the substance of the contrary sex, regardless of whether she does as such principally through the perspective of a camera. After a fall celebration visit and a showy discharge in France, the film could discover extra pickups in Europe and somewhere else.

Amel (Herzi) is a yearning picture taker who, for her first show, has created a progression of provocative self-representations where she wears everything from a hijab to a stomach artist's ensemble. The show is promising, however Amel's life is abruptly overturned when — in an early scene that to some degree extends credulity — an auto keeps running over her better half, striking him dead. After the entombment, Amel is left to lament in the middle class flat of her oversupportive father-in-law, Taieb (Raouf Ben Amor), and her shell-stunned relative, Souad (Sondoss Bel Hassen).

However as opposed to turning into a slave to her distress — which is something that Tunisia's larger part Muslim society appears to expect of her — Amel soon brings matters into her own hands, utilizing her camera to shoot unlawful photographs of young fellows she meets through companions or gets in the road. Why she does as such is never altogether clarified, despite the fact that it appears like these mysterious bodies are intended to fill the void made by her significant other's nonappearance, regardless of whether Amel tests her wants in an entirely creative manner.

Attia portrays the distinctive secret photograph sessions with a blend of sexual pressure and voyeuristic unease, setting aside his opportunity to demonstrate how picture taker and subject understand each other in shut quarters. A portion of the arrangements can be very delicate, for example, one including a neighborhood specialist, Rabah (Karim Ait M'Hand), whom Amel in the long run becomes a close acquaintence with. Others are all the more aggravating, including a scene where one of the men all of a sudden gets forceful, obviously expecting something in excess of an insignificant representation. A later session feels like it could nearly transform into a ménage à trois, yet rather turns out to be ambiguously homoerotic and even somewhat funny.

Those minutes are the features of a film that occasionally feels less persuading as a show, with one drawn-out plot including Amel's relationship to her undeniably scurrilous advocate Taieb, and another enumerating the maturing sentiment she has with a columnist, Sami (Haythem Achour), who ends up being something other than a bounce back person. Attia progressively conveys the two storylines to their intelligent decisions, yet they appear to be somewhat mundane contrasted with the way he examines Amel's stirred photographic cognizance.

Herzia, who was found by Abdellatif Kechiche in his 2007 Venice victor, Grain, convincingly depicts a lady who crosses numerous limits — sexual, masterful, even religious — for her specialty and her prosperity. The on-screen character has an intrepid method for playing scenes that are intended to be both suggestive and lighting up, switching the male-commanded parts normally found in films about innovative provocateurs. (Antonioni's Blow-Up particularly rings a bell in a succession that appears to copy the acclaimed Jane Birkin photograph session from that film, while exchanging up the genders.)

Different exhibitions are solid, with M'Hand (Smart Ass) significant as a hands on kid who turns into a ready dream to Amel's fixations. Tech credits are unobtrusive, with DP Antoine Parouty erratically catching the shadow-filled condo that Amel transforms into her own particular private studio.

Creation organizations: 4 A 4 Productions, Cinetelefilms

Cast: Hafsia Herzi, Raouf Ben Amor, Haythem Achour, Sondoss Bel Hassen, Karim Ait M'Hand

Executive: Mehdi Ben Attia

Screenwriters: Mehdi Ben Attia, Martin Drouot

Makers: Mani Mortazavi, David Mathieu-Mahias, Andrea Queralt

Executive of photography: Antoine Parouty

Creation creator: Rauf Helioui

Ensemble creator: Nedra Gribaa

Supervisor: Raphael Lefevre

Writer: Karol Beffa

Throwing executive: Amel Guellaty

Deals: Loco Films

In French, Arabic

105 minutes