rowmorg Review of The Great Journey

The Great Journey (2004)

Unconvincing ending does not spoil the road movie

[7/10 · 30 August 2013]

When a young man is persuaded by his aged father to drive him, a devout Moslem, to Mecca (3,000 miles away) he obeys but with a heavy heart. The old man is a tedious curmudgeon who throws away the lad's mobile phone that links him to his girl-friend, refuses to stop in Milan or Venice to look around, and accuses their new friend of stealing all their money (which he has actually mislaid). He also refuses to speak anything but Moroccan Arabic. In short, he's a deadly bore who quotes mottoes like "He who hurries is already dead", something that his son throws back in his face later. Reda (well played by Nicolas Cazale) is supposed to come round to his Dad as they arrive in Mecca, and weeps copiously when he finds him dead. I suppose a big crowd of the faithful can have that effect, but it seemed insincere to me and falsely devout, perhaps to secure production money. However, we enjoyed the road movie part, which had some good easygoing laughs and (as Dad required) did not hurry at all.