By Mariam Khalifa Al Kindi
ABU DHABI — On May 1, I attended the last day of the Zayed University Middle East Film Festival at the ZU-AD Convention Centre. I was able to watch a couple of movies. Those were actually pretty impressing; however, there was one movie that was a bit disappointing, the narrative movie “Kartona” by Iraqi director Hussein Aboode.
The plot of the movie involved two men. One was the courier while the other was the drug dealer. Both exchanged what seemed to be cocaine and the other being a box filled with bombs disguised as pens.
The setting of the movie starts off in the streets of an Iraqi city where both men meet at a local coffee shop. There they sit down for a couple of minutes but get up and meet in the ally to make the exchange.
As soon as the courier receives the drugs, he is to “deliver” the box to an elementary school. However, in the process, the waiter at the local coffee shop reported this suspicious incident to the police.
When the courier reaches the school, he scatters the pensin the playground where a young girl picks one up. After he leaves the school, he is then arrested while the girl clicks the pen, which causes the bomb to detonate.
I found the movie to be pretty cliché and very disappointing. I say that because I’ve seen several movies that included a box with a bomb being delivered to a certain place and boom, the end.
And the disappointing part of “Kartona” was the scene with the little girl after the explosion. It looked like a carton of tomato juice exploded everything. Everything seemed to be too fake with the blood and the reaction of the little girl’s father. The acting especially felt extremely off. However, I have to give the little girl credit because she was the best actor in the movie. Unfortunately, I wouldn’t recommend this movie for others.
This story was originally published on May 9, 2017. It was re-uploaded on Jan. 1, 2021. The photo that accompanied this story was lost due to the loss of the domain name.
