The Last Friday

Having gambled away all he owned—in the process losing his wife and son—Yousef lives a humble, stoic life, driving a cab and simply letting the world pass by without ever involving himself in it. Then one day he’s diagnosed as urgently needing an operation he knows he can’t afford, and the sense of his impending mortality pushes Yousef to break out of the shell he’s so carefully created and reach out one final time to those he once cared for. The first Jordanian film to be invited to be screened at the Berlin Film Festival, The Last Friday is touching, carefully observed portrait of a man without a sense of place in a rapidly-changing society. Lead actor Ali Suliman, familiar from his work with Divine Intervention director Elia Suleiman (as well as a stint on Homeland) turns in a carefully measured performance that allows us to feel his pain while never portraying his character as a victim.