Khamsa

Khamsa is the story of an 11 year old half-Gypsy, half-Arab boy growing up in Tunisia. The predictable stuff for a "troubled youth" plot shows up -- entanglements with crime and thievery, family troubles, run ins with the law, etc. But what makes Khamsa stand out a bit is the quality of the acting, and the general pacing.

The dialog (at least the translations in the theatrical release) are pretty well nuanced, and for a group of relatively young actors the cast does quite well. There's no tendency to over-emote like many of these films end up with, and while they don't hit the extreme dramatic highs, the whole thing is very believable.

The cross-section of life in that particular culture is well done, and the character comes off as reasonably sympathetic by the end. The direction and editing especially do plenty to keep things moving along, and I found my interest held pretty evenly until the climax. Which, by the way, is well worth it. My opinion of the film went up quite a bit in the last half hour, even though I was relatively pleased with it before then.