The pretensions accumulate as it begins. And yet... there is room for this poetic spirituality. [Full review in Spanish]

| Original Score: 3/5 | Oct 28, 2020

It's not a film for the impatient -- no guns, no chases, no explosions. What it does have is beautiful cinematography and a thoroughly positive vibe.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Aug 14, 2009

The cycle of youth and age and the trope of a journey come together inevitably, maybe predictably, but not without sparks of wisdom.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Oct 18, 2008

[It] proves that, even in our troubled times, East and West can still come together, when necessary, to produce something completely and utterly confusing.

| Original Score: 1/5 | Oct 18, 2008

It is neither engaging nor enlightening.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Sep 11, 2008

A lovely if meandering fantasia about the power of narrative.

| Jun 19, 2008

Cinematographer Mahmoud Kalari (Offside) conjures magic from an array of pastels, shimmering lights, and enigmatic ruins.

| May 30, 2008

The movie never gains much narrative momentum and the religious elements remain a bit obscure to the uninitiated, but the fine Sufi music and skillfully crafted images make for pleasant-enough viewing.

| Original Score: 3/6 | May 29, 2008

More like homework than entertainment

| Original Score: 2/4 | May 22, 2008

| Original Score: C+ | May 13, 2008

Perhaps inevitably, the story and characters in Bab'Aziz never rival the interest of its photography.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Apr 25, 2008

Those who find Rumi's wisdom as unknowable as desert sand constantly reshaped by the wind that blows it, will have the same reaction to Bab'Aziz.

| Apr 17, 2008

There's nothing wrong with being difficult if there's a payoff at the end. Screenwriter-director Nacer Khemir provides that with a visually stunning final scene that makes sense of everything that came before.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Apr 4, 2008

Using a mostly seamless series of narrative techniques, the film spins a string of interconnected stories based on Sufi mysticism.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Mar 14, 2008

[Nacer] Khemir, a poet and a painter as well as a filmmaker... uses the endless, timeless desert landscape to create an existence in which past and present coexist.

| Original Score: B | Mar 13, 2008

With the collaboration of screenwriter Tonino Guerra, Khemir has created a fresh variation on the somewhat tired subgenre of the crisscross, in which the paths of strangers intersect and converge.

| Original Score: 3.5/5 | Feb 22, 2008

An episodic fairy tale that dazzles the eyes and sometimes tries the patience.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Feb 22, 2008

Although beautifully filmed, Bab'Aziz's form mirrors the actions of its characters, wandering the desert and dancing among the tales, returning to the present-day story for Ishtar, with her wise, old face, to say, 'What happened next?'.

| Feb 11, 2008

The arrival of the film is, to misuse a dervish cliche, something worth singing and dancing about.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Feb 10, 2008

As far as fable imports go, Bab'Aziz is a step up from the Disney-grade moralism of Milarepa, but it's even less memorable.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Feb 8, 2008