What with the recent misery in Gaza and Israel, it's hard to wrap your mind around a feel-good story coming out of the Middle East, but here it is, "Salmon Fishing in the Yemen," opening at Japanese theaters over a year after its premiere at the 2011 Toronto International Film Festival.
The movie has three wonderful factors going for it: the reliable Lasse Hallstrom ("Cider House Rules," "Dear John") at the helm, the presence of the incredibly handsome Amr Waked playing an Arabian sheikh, and all the scenes featuring Kristin Scott Thomas. She's renowned for her versatility and sheer willingness to play just about anyone, but here she's hilarious as a press secretary concocting an Arabian "goodwill" story for the British government. Not only does she sport the most elegantly angled cheekbones in cinema, she's one of the few actresses working today who can stride onto a scene and dominate it immediately with an aristocratic ambience. In a parallel world, surely she's sitting on the British throne, being witheringly sarcastic or sparkling with wit and just enchanting the daylights out of the entire court.
In "Salmon Fishing," Scott Thomas is Patricia Maxwell, press secretary to the British prime minister. She's in dire need of a bit of cheery news that will liven things up between Britain and the Middle East. The suggestions that come across her desk are all duds (you know, fluff stories involving dancing girls in bikinis) but there's one item with golden potential: Sheikh Muhammed of Yemen wants to introduce salmon to his desert land so he can go fishing.