In a traditional neighborhood of a small Lebanese coastal town, Leba (Georges Khabbaz) is a music instructor. Social pressure leads him to get married and have children. To the dismay of his family, neighbors, and friends, he has a first girl and then a second one. His beloved wife Lara, a French literature teacher, is pregnant for the third time and yes, it’s a BOY! However, medical tests show that the boy will have special needs. Will Leba and Nay keep the baby? Will he become a burden on the family; or its pride and joy? Expect strange phenomenon to affect the behavior, and beliefs of that little town’s population. Written by Georges Khabbaz
Before saying anything, I must admit that I loved Ghadi even though I was never a Georges Khabbaz fan. I didn’t like the trailer much and thought it would be a disappointment but the movie exceeded all my expectations and I can easily say it’s one of the best Lebanese movies ever made!
Ghadi is the story of a music instructor called Leba who was pressured by society into getting marrying and having children. After his wife gave birth to two girls, he “finally” got a boy but medical tests showed the boy will be mentally ill. As the boy starts to grow up, the family begins to struggle as the town’s population becomes unaccepting of their special kid, and the father decides to resort to all sorts of means to keep Ghadi with his family. I will leave the rest of the plot for all of you to figure out once the movie comes out later on this week.
What I loved most about this movie is that it’s a very positive one, it’s highly entertaining and well-paced and it tackled brilliantly very sensitive topics in our Lebanese society, whether it’s abortion, religion, racism, mental illness etc. Ghadi shows how a family was able to turn their child’s disability into a blessing and how they were able to surpass all the obstacles, encourage town residents to accept each other and live happily in their community. Added to that, the setup in a traditional village was perfect, the cinematography is great, presenting the town as it really is, the actors were brilliant (Ghadi’s mother was my favorite) and you could easily connect with every character in the movie. There are few things I didn’t appreciate, specially some over-dramatized scenes with Khabbaz, but they are not worth the mention.
All in all, it’s a brilliant movie and definitely the best Lebanese movie I’ve seen since Nadine Labaki’s “Halla2 La Wen”. I give it an 8.5/10.