To think that the sphere filmmaking has made the world a smaller place, where we can understand and relate to different cultures through the lens of a director. Sadly this film does the complete opposite. One thing that clearly proves a point in this movie is that if you have a poor script and a wayward director, then even huge actors like Antonio Banderas and Freida Pinto end up looking like one dimensional amateurs. Sadly the movie crumbles under its own weight. The movie was so bad I actually took the time to notice that even the score was awkwardly placed. Lawrence of Arabia was made almost half a century ago and they were able to nail the costumes, accents, and history. Here on the other hand, anachronisms are a dime a dozen, the accents are terrible, and the cultural background is completely distorted. Its sad to see that till today, not just in this film (which was produced by a prominent Middle Eastern country), but in most films about Arabs, they still cast Indians and Iranians with thick accents, and people keep passing it off as Arabic. The production value is extremely high, which is why the movie ended up as such a disappointment.
The film comes off as pretentious, plain and simple, they were clearly going for a glitzy Arabian flick and ended up with a distorted version of Aladin and Lawrence of Arabia.
The film comes off as pretentious, plain and simple, they were clearly going for a glitzy Arabian flick and ended up with a distorted version of Aladin and Lawrence of Arabia.