Wadjda
(Wadjda)

Compared to the flat-heeled ballerina shoes of her friends, Wadjda’s trainers are unsightly. In an extremely sexist society, this eleven-year-old Saudi girl’s only dream is to buy a bicycle so that she can race against a boy from her neighbourhood. She couldn’t have set her sights on a less accessible item, as girls are not allowed to ride bikes. Although the storyline recalls a classical weft of Iranian cinema, this first-ever film to be made by a Saudi female director eschews the fable to inhabit the contemporary world. Very rarely seen on screen, life in Riyadh (where the film was shot, not without difficulty) is a daunting obstacle course for women: the mother, respectful of her jealous husband, works in an all-girls school very far from home, while the father is looking for a second wife as she has failed to bear him a son… In this context, the method that Wadjda (outstanding Waad Mohammed) chooses to raise money for her bike calls for an adaptability that is more usually associated with the heroes of slapstick. CG