‘Norah’: Red Sea Review

Dir/scr: Tawfik Alzaidi. Saudi Arabia. 2023. 94mins.

In a small tribal village in Saudi Arabia in the mid-90s, Norah (Maria Bahrawi), a young woman with a restless spirit, dreams of a life beyond the restrictive confines of her community. When Nader (Yaqoub Alfarhan), a new teacher from the city arrives at the village, against the odds (and the strict societal rules) the two kindred spirits forge a connection, bridged by a mutual appreciation of art. Shot entirely in the striking AlUla region of Saudi Arabia, and making full use of the area’s spectacular backdrop and rich heritage, this is a confident and accomplished feature debut from Tawfik Alzaidi.

Walks the tricky line between observing Saudi sensibilities while delivering an emotional hook for international audiences

Riyadh-based director Alzaidi has honed his filmmaking skills with a series of shorts, winning prizes at festivals across the region. Norah’s screenplay also won a fund award from the Saudi Film Commission’s Daw Film Competition, and was also supported by a post-production grant from the Red Sea Film Festival Foundation. Despite a slightly anticlimactic ending, its polished production values and a richly realised sense of time and place should make this a title of interest beyond the domestic market, with further festival exposure likely.

It is a delicately handled story, a piece of filmmaking that walks the tricky line between observing Saudi sensibilities while also delivering an emotional hook for international audiences. There is a yearning for contact between the two central characters, but it chastely stops short of overt romantic interest. Instead, the love affair for both is with creative expression – something that, during this period in Saudi Arabia, is forbidden in all forms.

Nader’s arrival in the village is cause for excitement, not least because the new teacher, with his dashing movie-star looks and his opulent moustache, arrives wearing mirrored sunglasses. The local boys squeal with excitement. Nader is viewed as progressive by the village elders because he aims to teach his students how to read and write, rather than to exclusively study the Koran. It is an approach which is not entirely welcomed within the community, where progress, along with books and electricity, is met with suspicion, and outright hostility from some quarters.

Norah and Nader first become aware of each other, in a fairly overt piece of symbolism, as points of light in the darkness. Both stay awake late into the night, the lights in their rooms burning in the smothering desert darkness. Orphaned Norah shuts herself away from her aunt and uncle to listen to forbidden music cassettes and pore over her treasured collection of magazines. Nader smokes cigarettes (Marlboro Reds, rather than the local brand) and, as the film progresses and largely thanks to Norah, rekindles his love of drawing.

He is prompted to pick up his pencil to sketch a portrait as a reward for the boy who did best in a grammar quiz. The boy happens to be Norah’s younger brother Nayaf (Abdulrahman Alwafi), and his success is thanks to her coaching. And while Norah’s aunt condemns the picture as the “work of the devil”, Norah is fascinated and becomes consumed by the idea of getting her own portrait drawn. It is a challenge for Nader, who is initially resistant. Norah is veiled, but shows her eyes in a series of covert preliminary sittings. Meanwhile, Thafur (Shayim Alanazi), to whom Norah is unwillingly promised in marriage, starts to suspect that something is amiss.

There is a breathless, against-the-clock pacing to the final act, as the village elders act to quash the influence of the teacher. But the conclusion is a little unsatisfying: while Norah’s portrait is released into the wider world, the fate of Norah herself is less certain.