Film

Movie theaters, reviews and showtimes in New York, plus articles, trailers and more
 

Immaculate Conception (1991)

Director: Jamil Dehlavi

Average user rating
No reviews

Movie review

From Time Out Film Guide

Eccentric at first sight, this ends up delivering pretty much what you'd expect from a 'Film on Four' movie: thoughtful scripting, solid acting, questions of cultural and sexual identity. Wilby and Leo play a well-heeled white couple in Karachi - she's Jewish-American with free-spirit mystic tendencies, he's a no-nonsense Brit conservationist. Unable to conceive, they have recourse to a holy shrine attended by a bevy of eunuchs in full drag. After a three-day fertility work-out, their dream seems likely to come true; but there, of course, the trouble begins. This is plentiful premise to be getting on with, but writer-director Dehlavi chooses to stitch in more subplot than his two hours can reasonably accommodate: Wilby's relationship with journalist Samira (Azmi) and her dying uncle; Cossins as a camp old colonial who steps out of line with Islam; and Leo's pushy diplomat brother (Choate), who turns up to nudge matters into the international incident bracket. Dehlavi goes out of his way to skirt the risk of sensationalism, but his diffuse, over-cautious approach dilutes matters to the point of tedium.

Author: JRo 0000-00-00 00:00:00

Time Out Film Guide

  • Print this page
  • Send to a friend

What do you think?
Post your review now

clear rating
Min 1 star. Zero stars will be treated as unrated.

*mandatory fields


Cast & crew

Director: Jamil Dehlavi

Producer: Jamil Dehlavi

Cast: James Wilby, Melissa Leo, Shabana Azmi, Zia Mohyeddin, James Cossins, Ronny Jhutti, Tim Choate full cast

Duration: 120 mins


Features

Making a name for himself

Making a name for himself

Sin Nombre's Cary Joji Fukunaga learned his lessons well.

To the letter

Forty years later, Costa-Gavras's Z still brims with fury.

Mind over matter

David Cronenberg reflects on a most bizarre body: his own corpus of work.

Fool's gold

Can an Oscar win lead to a cursed career? Here are five stories of postaward professional meltdowns.

We are the championed

Terrorists and teens abound in this year's "Film Comment Selects."

A history of violence

Matteo Garrone's kaleidoscopic Gomorrah wallops you with Italy's crime crisis.

True romantic

James Gray exchanges urban amorality for amour in Two Lovers.

Playing in the dark

MoMA salutes pianist Stuart Oderman's 50 years as the one-man sound of silents.

Junk bonds

Cast and crew recall the making of the classic NYC drug drama The Panic in Needle Park.