Moroccan wedding does not shy away from cliché, but is lively and well acted ★★★☆☆

You just have to dare to end a romantic comedy with the biggest cliché in the genre: the airport scene. And then one with all the trimmings, from running to the gate (just too late) to talking flight staff around (in the name of love, stop that plane!).

Johan Nijenhuis just does it. The Netherlands’ most loyal supplier of romantic films (Tuscan wedding† In love with Cuba† crazy with happiness and many others) has little shame. If it worked before, it still works, is his motto.

Moroccan wedding, based on an idea by Mina El Hannaoui, is set within the Dutch-Moroccan community. El Hannaoui wrote the screenplay together with Aliefka Bijlsma and ensured that Nijenhuis did not make cultural mistakes on the set. Fortunately, the film offers her view on Moroccan customs, such as the tendency to go wild at parties (think of lavish meals and a bride on a horse) and the obtrusive interference of numerous family members.

26-year-old Yasmine (Soumaya Ahouaoui) starts her first job as a criminal lawyer. Although her parents are proud of her, they are also very concerned. While her sister already has children, Yasmine is still not married, which slowly threatens to become a social disgrace. She is very relieved when she accepts the advances of a plastic surgeon (Nabil Aoulad Ayad).

The background may be a little different, of course it rotates Moroccan wedding just to ask who is the one for Yasmine. The surgeon, or the car mechanic who is suspected of theft? While her father designs a house in Morocco with seven extra bedrooms (‘for the grandchildren’), Yasmine looks for a way to follow her heart without hurting her surroundings.

If you look at it cynically, you can say that Nijenhuis colors his usual prefab romance with exotic details. But for that is Moroccan wedding too lively, too rich in witty characters, too well acted. Ahouaoui in particular is a relief as a romantic heroine: she convincingly portrays Yasmine as ambitious, stubborn and lenient. It clears up all the entanglements just surprisingly enough—until that inevitable end.