I can see a lot of thought and effort went into creating this film. All the actors did great. It has some nice cinematic shots, my favorite one actually being used as the cover. At the same time, the dialogue is telling not showing. One example is the long drawn-out scene of his wife being still on the bed while Habib talks to himself. It has an abrupt tone shift from "Can you say something? Are you going to stay in bed all day?" to "You don't believe me but it's okay cause I was lying." It feels drastic because nothing happened in those 30 seconds. Unprompted, Habib overly narrates to the audience and both men at the pawn shop. His background and ethnicity give depth to the character but within the film itself, it's awkwardly stated and adds nothing. The events between Habib and his wife would be more impactful to the audience if you cut to flashbacks to hear and see what happened in real-time instead of Habib retelling it.
Review of This Modern Man Is Beat
