Journey to Mecca (2009)

One of the greatest travellers in human history, twenty-one-year-old law student Ibn Battutah set out alone to Mecca from Tangiers in 1325 and returned to Morocco almost thirty years later.... See full summary »

Director:

Bruce Neibaur

Writers:

Carl Knutson, Bruce Neibaur

Stars:

Chems-Eddine Zinoune, Hassam Ghancy, Essam Edriss

2 wins.

Cast

Credited cast:
Chems-Eddine Zinoune	...	Ibn Battutah
Hassam Ghancy	...	Highwayman
Rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Essam Edriss	...	Hamza (voice)
Nabil Elouahabi	...	Hamza
Ben Kingsley	...	Narrator
Nadim Sawalha	...	Ibn Mustapha

Storyline

One of the greatest travellers in human history, twenty-one-year-old law student Ibn Battutah set out alone to Mecca from Tangiers in 1325 and returned to Morocco almost thirty years later. This is the story of his first pilgrimage, book-ended with never-before seen documentary footage of the contemporary Hajj. Filmed for initial presentation in IMAX and other giant screen cinemas.

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Plot Keywords:

14th century | 1300s | place name in title | 

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Genres:

Drama | History

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Details

Official Sites:

Official site

Country:

Canada USA

Language:

English Arabic

Release Date:

7 January 2009 (USA)

Also Known As:

Journey to Mecca

Filming Locations:

Morocco

Company Credits

Production Co:

Desert Door Productions, Cosmic Picture, Dounia Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

45 min

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.44 : 1

User Reviews

This should have never been released for Imax

I saw this film and was blown away by the technical shortcomings, more specifically, how out of focus this entire film is. I'm not a regular Imax viewer, and this may be a very common problem, but it seemed as if virtually none of the film was in focus. I'd say less than 20-30% of footage had a clear focal point, and that was typically less than 10-20% of the total screen. The only exceptions were scenes involving CGI maps.

The topic was interesting, my knowledge of the hajj was limited prior to seeing this, and the film created the 14th century cities with style, but technical issues impacted my enjoyment of this film. It's a shame too, there are so many seemingly beautiful desert landscapes in this movie.