Desert Flower (2009)

A Major Disappointment

It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

Blistering performances.

Worth seeing just to witness how winsome it is.

In life (I'm 68) there are only a few films that really 'cut into your soul and plant themselves'. Most of the ones that do this to me are real-life stories.Gandhi,Lawrence of Arabia, one of the early Titanic films (I was about 9 years old I think). Desert Flower,for all it's minor failings as a film (I stress minor) planted itself firmly in my heart and will not depart. It shames my manhood (in a good way). It demands of me a greater tolerance of others and a resistance to methodologies/traditions that limit the full potential of another human being.. It tells an incredible story of an incredible woman with an incredible spirit. . Unimaginably important viewing.

"Desert Flower" is based on the life of Waris Dirie (Liya Kebede) who was born into a Somalian desert tribe, then ran away from an arranged marriage as a young teen and made her way to London, where she became a world-famous supermodel. As a child, she was circumcised, as is the custom in many African countries. An old woman in the desert cut away those parts that could someday allow her to feel sexual pleasure.When Waris was sold as a young teenager to an old man who already had three wives, she simply left one day, walking hundreds of miles across desert and scrub land to seek her grandmother in Mogadishu. Amazingly, she found her — and was hired by an aunt in London to work as a maid. The film cuts between her experiences as a young girl and what happened in London, where she ran away, lived on the streets and were befriended by a ditz shop girl named Marylin (Sally Hawkins).It is while sweeping floors and cleaning slop at a McDonalds that she's spotted by fashion photographer Terry Donaldson (Timoty Spell). Donaldson saw something in the bone structure of the cleaning lady that convinced him to give her his card. Waris was all worried trying to be model, but thankfully Marylin knows her fashion and persuades her, several months later, to pop round and see him. She's soon on her way."Desert Flower" is an important movie, and a great one for all African women to see. Dirie's life-story is inspiring for me, her experiences as young girl are tragic, and her ability to speak out against a custom that has long been hidden is impressive. The film certainly has an important message. The scenes that will remain in the memory long after the film concludes are those dealing with Waris' circumcision, particularly an excruciating sequence in which I watch her three year old face as the procedure is performed. It's an angry, damning indictment of a barbaric process. Which I wish it will stop.

This move has a very strong argument and a nice plot, though it is not exactly a biography movie. The way the sequence was constructed works well most of the time, with flashbacks to her childhood in Somalia.However, I see one major and one minor pitfall. The minor one is the unnecessary, and apparently random character of Samuel Jackson, the New York's guy that her met at a disco in London and later take huge effort to meet him in New York.The major pitfall is the unnecessary politicization of some scenes. I have something against movies that "take a stand" or need to explicitly "make a point". This happened twice. One, at her speech at United Nations about her ordeal, she appears very unnatural and what could be the climax of the film is a big let-down with a flurry of clichés about Africa and political correctness (genital mutilation is wrong but I still love my mother and I understood why they do that). Other, when the English caretaker proposes her a convenience fake-marriage under the most lame ever excuse of "my people have done you so much harm so this is the least I can do". Collective guilty at its prime - but only for the English, not for the "pure" Africans who do those mutilations out of tradition or so.

Desert Flower is a weird movie. It is based on the life story of Waris Dirie, a super-model up there with Naomi Campel and Cate Moss. The movie focuses on the time from just before her discovery until her big success, with constant flashbacks of her childhood in Somalia and her way to London. Liya Kebede plays a wonderful Waris Dirie, very lovely and full of surprise and fear of the daily life we all take for granted, while at the same time showing great bravery and a strong will to fight for a better life. The rest of the cast is medium at best, a positive exception only the character of Terence Donovan, the photographer. The director did not resist the temptation to give Waris a sort of "funny sidekick-friend" as well as the stereotypical I-Jumped-Out-Of-"The Devil Wears Prada"-Movie - manager, to add some slapstick-touch, which was totally unnecessary. The movie does not leave anyone untouched though, it has some heartwarming and touching as well as some very cruel and disturbing passages. It is funny and sweet when Waris is struggling with the British everyday life, making friends, and so on. It is hard to bear when you are faced with drastic pictures of a 3 year old girl being circumcised, with a 19-year old woman suffering still from this cruel and brutal violation, and with the fact that a whole tradition tries to justify this. And that is the main weak point of the movie. The changes from the funny, light and sweet scenes to the brutal and cruel ones come without warning. The editor or director does not give you the time to set your mind to that kind of situation, and after a hefty scene they just switch back to the light comedy-part as if nothing happens. While I understand the intention, for me as a viewer I could not enjoy the funny parts - which were never the less intended to entertain the audience. I recommend this movie if you can handle the topic, but do not look for a entertaining biopic with some depth. It has entertainment, it has depth, but it tries to deliver both but never brings it home all the way in the one or the other topic.