Titreenp SERIOUSLY. This is what the crap Hollywood still puts out?

Acensbart Excellent but underrated film

Whitech It is not only a funny movie, but it allows a great amount of joy for anyone who watches it.

Orla Zuniga It is interesting even when nothing much happens, which is for most of its 3-hour running time. Read full review

Bene Cumb Social and religious contradictions, gay/lesbian secrecy, and all this in an Islamic/Arab country - plenty of intriguing stuff to issue from and complete with. True, it is difficult to fit it all in a film less than 1.5 hours, and that is probably the reason why the film seemed a lightweight walk over the issues, with the director's apparent desire of being brave and progressive, but not too provoking in showing love and affection (Mehdi Ben Attia comes from Tunisia where the film is shot). The second half or so is less interesting and even more perfunctory, and the ending is rather odd, characteristic to Bollywood films rather than French creations.The aged Claudia Cardinale has somehow lost her charm, and all other performers did not impress me much; I did not fix them in my memory, and their accomplishments did not make me look for films with their presence...Thus, just an average film to me, 1-2 additional points for boldness and pleasant Tunesian scenes - not often shown in films widely available in the Western world. As for gay films, you might want to see respective German and Scandinavian films with meaty approach.

brucelei-1 This is actually a very good film. the plot-line is intelligent and interesting; it is well acted, directed, and filmed. Its major flaw is that, like most gay oriented films, the major characters are all beautiful. This film deals with real social problems that should be able to move gay audiences particularly, but also a straight public. Why, then, must the action be transported to the realm of the beautiful people, whom the majority of the audience can envy and even empathize with to some extent, but somehow not quite identify with? Having the action take place in beautiful surroundings among beautiful people is, of course, not limited to films that treat gay issues. But it seems to be endemic in films with gay social content, and in that sense, it is particularly harmful. What gay audiences need to see, and what straight people interested in gay issues also need to see, are gay social issues treated as taking place among average looking people in average looking surroundings. These are everyday issues touching the lives of the large majority of gay people. They are not abstractions; they are painful realities. This is no place for physical idealization. The issues are too serious for this type of useless, distracting decoration.

howie73 Le Fil(aka The String) promises much but delivers little. This directorial debut by Mehdi Ben Attia is confused by what it wants to be. Starting as a commentary on quasi-French colonialism vis a vis Tunisian servitude, Le Fil then dabbles unsuccessfully in a range of conflicting cinematic genres – from melodrama to thriller to comedy. It seems to favour melodrama but masters none. Ultimately, the film wants to satisfy every genre but ends up a dissatisfying mess. The editing also feels rushed as if the film has to be under 90 minutes. There is not much of a plot to drive the narrative. What starts of as a restrained gay version of Mommie Dearest soon becomes something altogether different.Claudia Cardinale is maniacal enough to maintain her bitchiness as the archetypal overbearing mother, whose closeted French-Arab architect son, Hakim returns home to live with her in Tunusia. Soon enough conflicts arise between both, and the Oedipal attachment is soon erupted by the son's longing for the Tunusian handyman, Bilal. The son is torn between his mother's approval and his desire to live as a gay man in Tunisia. The fact that he could easily have moved back to France with his handyman is not even mentioned. Instead we are treated to a dubious moral fable about the importance of family – the ties that bind can imprison us, but they also liberate us at a price: the façade of social conformity.I also found the conceit of the string, real and imagined, was rather crude. As a symbol of the umbilical cord it might have a Freudian significance, but it felt clumsily realised and out of touch with the film's penchant for realism. The film feels like a reflection of many gay men's reality by saying that gay men must compromise their lives to live in a heterosexist world. In spite of the happy ending that reaffirms the conservative values of family, Le Fil climaxes as a depressing tale for gay men who want to be free of the strictures of family life.

steven-222 When handsome young Malik returns home to Tunisia from France to take up work as an architect, he moves back in with his widowed mom, and why not? She's Claudia Cardinale! And her house is fabulous. (The shaded pavilion with a view of the sea is my favorite part of the estate, but the garden with the huge palm trees and orange hammock is pretty nice, too...and so is Malik's bathroom with the amazing tile...this is world-class real estate.)Unknown to mom, Malik is gay; mostly he seems attracted to the rough trade guys who hang out in a certain part of town just waiting to service rich boys like Malik, but there's this achingly cute young handyman (even cuter than Malik) living in Mom's servant quarters who keeps catching his eye, Bilal. It turns out there is more to Bilal than meets the eye, but you won't find that out until later.Meanwhile, to satisfy mom and give the kid a father, Malik is planning to marry his work partner, a coupled lesbian who's having a baby by artificial insemination. The lesbian's father is unbelievably cool with all this. I want to be as cool as that old guy some day.Where is all this heading? To another tragic gay movie where somebody dies? I don't think I require a spoiler alert to tell you that "The String" is not that sort of movie. This is a loving, wise, subtle, witty, sophisticated, erotic, almost Utopian vision of how life should be, a tonic to all those well-made but often dreary movies about gay life outside the urban gay Meccas of the West.The acting is terrific (Malik's face tells many stories), the sense of humor is spot-on, Cardinale is simultaneously the scariest and best mother a gay boy could ever hope for, and the whole movie is beautifully directed, especially the scene where Bilal comes to Malik and humbly asks to borrow his shoes, because his own outfit isn't classy enough to get him into a trendy club. So much happens in this scene, it's like a little movie in itself. It sets in motion everything that comes afterward.(PS: I just found out that the movie won the Best Feature audience award at the San Francisco Frameline film fest, where I saw it. Well deserved.)