19/06/2023 - Romanian directorial duo and life partners Daniel Bărnuți and Alexandra Lizeta Bărnuți depict the turmoil of their uneasy marriage in this uneven documentary self-portrait

In the digital age, where life goes by live on camera and access to video-recording tools is easier than ever, discussing personal matters publicly via audiovisual means has become an integral part of our daily existence. One step further in this direction comes in the self-reflective Romanian documentary My Muslim Husband, which has been locking horns in the Romanian Days strand of the Transilvania International Film Festival. The two directors each represent one side of the film’s dramatic conflict, exposing not only their individual personalities, but also their turbulent family dynamics. In that sense, it's commendable that the co-creators and main characters of the film, Daniel Bărnuți and Alexandra Lizeta Bărnuți, manage to make sense of all they have been through and keep their emotions relatively in check – if not so much in front of the camera, at least behind it, so that the fable does not crumble. The other major area of conflict in the narrative is their clash with the outside world, or at least that’s how it appears upon first viewing.

Romanian, Christian-born Daniel converted to Islam in his youth, but we never learn any specific details about the reason for this (in the context of the serious local prejudice) unusual decision. The film begins with his modest Muslim wedding to Alexandra, before focusing on her attempts to adapt to this new cultural environment, not least the hijab, which makes her feel unattractive. Despite her best efforts, she senses that assimilating might turn out to be an insurmountable challenge, while the pressure coming from Daniel’s family – who disapprove of their marriage, and of Alexandra in particular – does not make things easier. As they try to release the tension between them with a trip to the Muslim world, a more significant journey turns out to be one of therapeutic self-analysis. It helps them understand that the antagonism they feel originates within themselves, rather than in their surroundings; Daniel’s immature relationship with his parents and overall childish approach to difficulties together with Alexandra’s unrealistic hopes for blissful happiness are an impossible combination for a successful partnership. Аnd spending some time apart is inevitable for them if they really want to restart their relationship.

Casually shot in reality-TV style, My Muslim Husband at first appears to be a series of spontaneously arranged extracts from an intimate self-help diary. A closer look, though, reveals that its content is carefully curated, and digesting it is a smooth process – as befits an HBO Max production, constructed according to certain genre norms. Despite its improvised outward appearance, My Muslim Husband is a calculated romantic melodrama, consciously building suspense through the numerous, abrupt setbacks that the characters go through before a somewhat overly sudden, unconvincing happy ending which nonetheless satisfies the expectations of this particular genre. This takes away from the authenticity of the film as a whole, inevitably leaving the viewer wondering which scenes were real and which were staged.

My Muslim Husband is a co-production between Romanian outfit Two Doc and HBO Max Eastern Europe.