Herald rating: * *
Based on the memoir of Swiss woman Corinne Hofmann, this wooden, predictable German production tells the story of a cross-cultural marriage as improbable as it is doomed.
Maybe the book took a more thoughtful approach to the many problematic implications of its subject matter,
but the tendency of Hofmann's equivalent Carola (Hoss) to be astonished at just how different the Kenyan highlands are from Swiss suburbia drove me almost to distraction.
The instant she spots the statuesque, barefoot, spear-carrying Masai Lemalian (Ido) on a ferry, tourist Carola is seized by love, or something she confuses for it. She packs her understandably unimpressed boyfriend off on a plane and goes looking for the tall, dark, handsome bloke - or rather, having taken advice, waits for him to come looking for her.
Ensconced in his life, she is surprised to learn that his ideas of marriage, sex, kinship, social roles, pretty much everything, don't really rhyme with hers. She decides to straighten him out. As you do.
Carola's arrogance and complacency are irritating enough but the film itself unearths a whole lot of problems - female circumcision, official corruption, the threat posed by progress to the traditional way of life - only to leave them unattended.
Ido and Hoss work well together - a scene involving the crash of a Land Rover is particularly effective - and the landscapes are impressive, but the film as a whole is plodding, overlong and rather frustrating.
Cast: Nina Hoss, Jacky Ido
Director: Hermine Huntgeburth
Running time: 132 minutes
Rating: R16, content may disturb
Screening: Rialto
Verdict: Plodding, stolid German adaptation of best-selling book fails to engage with any of the complexities of its subject but the scenery is beautiful.
