The right way to feel love, and the right way to feel part of a family, are the insoluble difficulties at the heart of this mysterious, sad and tender movie from Pakistan, a drama brimming with life and novelistic detail, directed by the first-time film-maker Saim Sadiq. He has been rewarded with the Un Certain Regard jury prize at Cannes, an official entry-shortlisting for the Academy Awards (though not a final nomination), and derision and censorship from Pakistan’s sterner political classes for his film’s supposed sexual immorality.
It is the story of an extended family in Lahore. Rana Amanullah, or “Abba” (Salmaan Peerzada), is an elderly widower in a wheelchair who presides over a large clan in a cramped apartment, near an amusement park called Joyland. One son, Saleem (Sohail Sameer) is married to Nucchi (Sarwat Gilani), they now have four lively young daughters but yearn to give Abba a grandson.
