Caramel

Barbershop for the Middle-Eastern set, Caramel follows the day-to-day exploits of several closely-knit friends – all of whom happen to work at a beauty salon. First-time filmmaker (and star) Nadine Labaki has populated Caramel with characters that are either underdeveloped or flat-out unpleasant – with a self-centered, would-be actress easily the most obvious example of the latter. Labaki’s propensity for unreasonably broad instances of comedy is lamentable, and there’s ultimately little here that the average viewer will be able to relate to. And while the movie is sporadically an eye-opening look at a culture that possesses more than a few backwards elements (eg there’s a character who goes under the knife in an effort to convince her future husband that she’s still a virgin), Caramel is a tedious, virtually interminable effort that surely doesn’t bode well for Labaki’s future cinematic efforts.

* out of ****