These Girls

Depressing and sad, These Girls follows a group of homeless Egyptian women (and some men) over several weeks as they attempt to forge some kind a life for themselves and their children. Filmmaker Tahani Rached doesn’t shy away from portraying the relentlessly bleak nature of her subjects’ existence, though there’s absolutely no denying that the film suffers for precisely that reason. The repetitious structure and lack of likeable figures transforms These Girls into an increasingly frustrating experience, as there’s not a whole lot of new information to be gleaned as the movie progresses (we get it; life sucks for these people). And while Rached is occasionally able to cajole heartbreaking revelations out of her subjects – ie one woman claims she’ll kill her unborn child if it’s a girl – the whole thing never quite manages to rise above the level of slight (awfully slight) curiosity.

*1/2 out of ****