Start the week with a film: In ‘Night Courier', a seriocomic battle for survival
It's not often that we get to watch films from Saudi Arabia. It's rarer still to watch a movie that explores the underbelly of Saudi cities. Night Courier is one such film.
Ali Kalthami's Arabic-language directorial debut from 2023 is set in Riyadh. The original title, Mandoob, refers both to a person who delivers a package as well as a victim of misfortune. Indeed, long is the night and extended the misery of Fahad, who loses his job in a telecommunications company because he hangs up a bit too soon on a customer.
Fahad (Mohamad Aldokhei) puts up a spirited fight, but there is the unmistakeable sense that his bosses are happy to get rid of him. In order to support his ailing father and divorced sister, Fahad becomes a courier of illicit goods, which puts him – and viewers – on a path of discovery of Riyadh's lesser-known aspects.
Underneath a veneer of morality, there's a lot of activity that borders on the blasphemous, not to mention criminal, Fahad finds. His desperate measures to earn money challenge his survival skills, not to mention his mental balance.
Night Courier is available on JioHotstar and Prime Video. The slickly filmed, neon-lit Arab noir is both a cruel comedy as well as a cautionary tale about overreach.
Ali Kalthami's film is like Martin Scorsese's After Hours in its exploration of the pleasures and anxieties that come into view after sundown. Night Courier also resembles Jafar Panahi's Crimson Gold in its exploration of the despair felt by a man who struggles to live up to expectations or provide for his family. Fahad isn't the only one who's striving – his sister too dreams of starting a business that will give her the financial independence she craves.
The lugubrious-faced Mohamad Aldokhei's performance careens between the comic and the tragic. Through his curious eyes, Night Courier dives into netherworlds where a word or a step out a line can be risky for the economically disadvantaged. The film was a domestic hit in Saudi Arabia, proving the viability of local stories that mine lived realities.
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