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Beauty and the Dogs(على كف عفريت)

✭ ✭ ✭   Read critic reviews

Tunisia, France, Sweden · 2017
1h 40m
Director Kaouther Ben Hania
Starring Mariam Al Ferjani, Ghanem Zrelli, Noomane Hamda, Anissa Daoud
Genre Drama, Crime, Thriller

When Mariam, a young Tunisian woman, is raped by police officers after leaving a party, she is propelled into a harrowing night in which she must fight for her rights even though justice lies on the side of her tormentors.

Stream Beauty and the Dogs

What are people saying?

What are critics saying?

63

Washington Post by

By the end, the outcome is still unclear, leaving viewers hanging. Such ambiguity might work for pure fiction, but given that there’s a real-life incident behind the story, the lack of closure is unsatisfying.

83

The Film Stage by Jared Mobarak

There’s no better way to show these power dynamics than via long takes. By letting the events play out, Hania refuses to let her lead off the hook emotionally. Al Ferjani is therefore thrown into the fire, her Mariam an exposed nerve reacting on impulse to everything that occurs.

60

Variety by Jay Weissberg

Ben Hania’s decision to divide the film into 9 chapters, each seemingly orchestrated in a single take, works on a cerebral level, but the form doesn’t serve the story, and while the overall choreography of actors and camerawork is impressive, it never fully satisfies.

70

Village Voice by Kristen Yoonsoo Kim

Director Ben Hania has a rhythmic, urgent sense of filmmaking, but she makes the odd creative decision of dividing her film into nine chapters, each a single take.

60

Los Angeles Times by Sheri Linden

Chilling Kafkaesque encounters give way to portrayals of thuggish cops bordering on caricature. In distractingly blunt ways, the film emphasizes what's already powerfully clear: the monstrousness of Mariam's situation and her courage.

80

Screen International by Wendy Ide

Beauty And The Dogs is a forthright and accomplished film which deals with its controversial subject matter without flinching. Tautly plotted, it has a pace and tension which mitigates the exhausting spectacle of watching a vulnerable young woman getting bullied and browbeaten by a selection of utterly horrible men.

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