--- title: "Wadjda" year: 2012 kind: "film" canonical: "https://film.one/film/wadjda" fi1m_score: 80 critics_score: 76 critics_reviews: 19 published: "2026-09-17T12:24:56.463615+00:00" updated: "2026-09-17T12:25:09.139091+00:00" region: "US" licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL." --- # Wadjda (2012) Directed by Haifaa al-Mansour · 1h 38m · MPA PG · Drama **Fi1m score: 80** · Critics 76 from 19 reviews *In a sentence:* Purple laces under a black abaya, and a whole city that only ever notices the abaya > Haifaa al-Mansour’s first feature, shot entirely in Saudi Arabia, is a plain, funny story about a ten-year-old who wants a bicycle. It says hard things without raising its voice, and Waad Mohammed is a find. The adults are drawn more simply than she is. ## Synopsis Riyadh. Wadjda (Waad Mohammed) is ten, wears black trainers with purple laces under her school abaya and plays Western pop off a cassette radio in her bedroom. The neighbour boy Abdullah (Abdullrahman Algohani) beats her in every race because he has a bicycle and she does not; girls are not supposed to ride them. When a green bicycle appears in the toy shop near her house she sets out to raise the money herself, selling bracelets and mixtapes at school under the eye of the headmistress, Ms. Hussa (Ahd Kamel). At home her mother (Reem Abdullah) is trying to hold on to a husband (Sultan Al Assaf) whose family wants him to take a second wife who can give him a son. ## Review Wadjda (Waad Mohammed) is ten years old, lives in Riyadh, and wants a bicycle. That is the whole plot of Haifaa al-Mansour’s first feature, which she also wrote, and the first film shot entirely inside Saudi Arabia by a woman. She has kept the plot that small on purpose. A bicycle is a thing a boy can have and a girl cannot, and once you accept that, the rest of the city comes into focus around it. Mohammed is the reason it works. Her Wadjda wears black trainers with purple laces under her school abaya, plays Western pop off a cassette radio, and runs a trade in bracelets and mixtapes at school. She is not cute. She lies to teachers, haggles with the toy-shop owner and trades insults with the neighbour boy Abdullah (Abdullrahman Algohani), and Mohammed plays all of it with a flat, watchful face that gives nothing away. We believed her from the first shot, a line of school shoes with one pair of scuffed trainers at the end of it. Lutz Reitemeier shoots Riyadh in a white, bleached daylight that flattens everything: concrete walls, wide empty roads, a green bicycle on top of a passing van that seems to be gliding along a wall. That shot gave us a lift we were not expecting, and Richter’s piano comes in under it, then goes quiet. Indoors, Thomas Molt’s production design does most of the arguing. The family home has a tree of paper leaves on the wall, every name on it a man’s, and Wadjda notices it before we do. Peter Pohl’s costumes make the same point without a word: black in the street, colour behind the front door. The scene that made us angrier than we expected is over in under a minute. Girls are playing in the school yard, someone spots workmen on a roof across the way, and the whole class is hurried indoors because men can see them. Nobody shouts. Andreas Wodraschke does not hold on it; the film moves on to the next lesson, as the girls do. That is how al-Mansour works throughout. The rules are shown as weather, and it is left to us to mind. Reem Abdullah, as Wadjda’s mother, carries the strand that hurt most. She is driven to work by a man who bullies her because she is not allowed to drive herself, and she spends her evenings trying to keep a husband (Sultan Al Assaf) whose family wants him to marry again and produce a son. Al Assaf plays the father as kind, fond and absent, which unsettled us more than a brute would have. The mother and daughter scenes, singing along to a tape in the back of the car, arguing about the bicycle, are the best written in the film. Not everything is that well judged. Ahd Kamel’s headmistress, Ms. Hussa, is close to a pantomime figure, with a rumoured private life the girls whisper about, and she is mostly there to be against. Al-Mansour makes several points twice: the family tree gets a second scene it does not need, and the business of drivers and who may sit in whose car is spelled out more than once. The children at school, Dana Abdullilah’s Salma among them, are types rather than people. Some critics have found it too soft and too ready to end on hope. We think the softness is deliberate and mostly earned. Al-Mansour was making a film in a country with no cinemas, and she chose a story that could travel. It owes something to the Iranian films about children that came before it, Jafar Panahi’s *The White Balloon* in particular, and it is not as tough as the best of them. It is not trying to be. It is 98 minutes, a PG, and it goes somewhere in its second half that we will not describe, except to say it does not go where the setup suggests. Watch it with a child of Wadjda’s age. They will side with her sooner than you do, and they will ask you why she cannot have the bike, and you will find the answer harder to give than you expect. *Fi1m score 80, published 17 September 2026.* ## What the critics say Most critics warm to Wadjda, and the praise clusters in the same places: Waad Mohammed’s performance as a stubborn ten-year-old set on buying a bicycle, and Haifaa al-Mansour’s light touch in showing the daily restrictions on women in Riyadh without lecturing. Reviewers repeatedly call it gentle on the surface and pointed underneath, a simple story that makes its points quietly. Nearly every review notes that it is the first feature shot in Saudi Arabia by a woman, and most say it stands up without that fact. The reservations are about the plot rather than the setting. The AV Club finds the supporting characters thin and some of the social observations awkwardly inserted; the Los Angeles Times thinks the bicycle quest less interesting than the world around it; Screen Daily calls it relatively safe. Slant is the lone strong dissent, finding the metaphors heavy-handed and the storytelling saccharine. The spread is otherwise narrow, with British critics the most enthusiastic. ### Reviews we read (19) - **Empire**, David Parkinson (90/100, inferred): The film is a simple and charming pioneering debut from a female Saudi filmmaker that is striking by any standards. It singles out the spirited tweenage girl protagonist whose refusal to accept gender restrictions makes the story wryly charming and slyly subversive. [Read](https://www.empireonline.com/movies/reviews/wadjda-review/) - **The Guardian**, Xan Brooks (90/100, inferred): The critic finds the film impossible to resist, praising its blend of rebellion and sweetness in depicting Riyadh society. They single out the young heroine's determined quest for a bike amid cultural constraints as the central charm. [Read](https://www.theguardian.com/film/2013/jul/18/wadjda-review) - **The New York Times**, A.O. Scott (90/100, inferred): The film is a sharply observed, deceptively gentle portrait of a smart, stubborn Saudi girl discovering the limitations placed on women. It presents the facts of her life with calm authority and devastating effectiveness. [Read](https://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/13/movies/haifaa-al-mansours-wadjda-a-saudi-girls-discoveries.html) - **Film Comment**, Violet Lucca (80/100, inferred): Haifaa al-Mansour’s debut presents a firm but understated social critique through an endearing coming-of-age story about an 11-year-old girl pushing back against restrictive rules in Saudi society. The critic praises the film’s visual accomplishment and its tender, hopeful closing image of Wadjda at a crossroads. [Read](https://www.filmcomment.com/review-wadjda-haifa-al-mansour/) - **Little White Lies**, Rebecca Ellis (4/4/5): Al-Mansour's brave debut is a groundbreaking, deeply moving comedy-drama about a rebellious girl pursuing a bike as a metaphor for freedom in patriarchal Saudi society. It delivers an enjoyable, heartfelt tale with comedy and drama that never undermines its subtext on female oppression. [Read](https://lwlies.com/reviews/wadjda) - **The Hollywood Reporter**, Deborah Young (80/100, inferred): Praises the film as a real discovery and one of the most accessible Arab-language films of the year, highlighting its status as the first feature shot in Saudi Arabia by a Saudi woman director. Notes its feminist intent, appealing tone, storytelling, and strong performances by the lead actresses. [Read](https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/general-news/wadjda-venice-review-367170/) - **Time Out**, Dave Calhoun (80/100, inferred): The first feature filmed in Saudi Arabia by a woman makes forceful points about gender politics within a light, unassuming story that is accessible and told with grace, warmth and clarity. It reveals male dominance and conservatism while putting women, girls and hope front and centre. [Read](https://www.timeout.com/movies/wadjda) - **The AV Club**, Ignatiy Vishnevetsky (B): Appreciates the film's detailed portrayal of Saudi Arabian cultural specifics and the realistic, stubborn protagonist, but faults the one-dimensional supporting characters and awkwardly inserted social observations. [Read](https://www.avclub.com/wadjda-1798177946) - **Evening Standard** (70/100, inferred): It is a very decent effort at telling an innocent-looking tale while putting in a few digs, and a brave film. It singles out the lovely performance by Waad Mohammed as the determined 10-year-old girl in a story that would be seen as a children's film in the West. [Read](https://www.standard.co.uk/culture/film/venice-film-festival-wadjda-review-8099517.html) - **Screen Daily** (70/100, inferred): Wadjda is a well-crafted, liberal and humane message film that fascinates with glimpses into Saudi women's lives and will stir debate on women's issues. Blending Iranian and Western influences, it is an affecting but relatively safe slice of world cinema with international distribution potential. [Read](https://www.screendaily.com/wadjda/5045958.article) - **Sight and Sound**, Hannah McGill (70/100, inferred): The film is a fresh-feeling take on the trope of a child protagonist's travails mirroring wider society, notable as the first feature shot entirely in Saudi Arabia by a female director. It succeeds in highlighting female life experiences there while offering hope for a fairer future. [Read](https://www.bfi.org.uk/sight-and-sound/reviews/wadjda-review) - **The New Yorker**, Anthony Lane (70/100, inferred): The film is a slim but distinguished addition to the canon of two-wheeled movies, capturing a girl's longing for a bike as a symbol of change and escape. It avoids being overly cute or preachy while conveying the hopes and constraints of its setting. [Read](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/09/16/how-they-roll) - **Variety**, Jay Weissberg (70/100, inferred): The pic transcends its novelty as the first Saudi feature shot by a woman in the kingdom and delivers a winning, handsomely crafted story with a charismatic lead. It uses a spunky girl to explore women's limitations within Arabian society with enormous sympathy. [Read](https://variety.com/2012/film/reviews/wadjda-1117948144/) - **Los Angeles Times**, Kenneth Turan (50/100, inferred): The film is a remarkable feat as the first feature shot in Saudi Arabia by a woman, offering valuable insight into women's lives there. Its standard plot about a girl's quest for a bicycle is less compelling than the surrounding social observations. [Read](https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-xpm-2013-sep-12-la-et-mn-wadjda-review-story.html) - **Slant Magazine** (30/100, inferred): Criticizes the film for relying on heavy-handed metaphors and conformist Hollywood-style storytelling that undercuts its feminist aims, despite acknowledging its historical significance as the first Saudi feature directed by a woman. Finds the setting intriguing but the execution mediocre and saccharine. [Read](https://www.slantmagazine.com/film/wadjda/) - **The Skinny**, Philip Concannon (★★★★★): Wadjda is a simple tale of a ten-year-old girl determined to buy a bicycle, but its complexity and courage emerge from being made in Saudi Arabia by a woman director. The critic highlights how the film conveys female experience through everyday examples of oppression integrated into a deceptively simple, human story that feels vital. [Read](https://www.theskinny.co.uk/film/cineskinny/wadjda) - **Collider**, Matt Goldberg (A-): The critic praises the film's insightful look at Saudi society through the story of a determined young girl, highlighting the terrific performance by Waad Mohammed and the director's subtle approach. [Read](https://collider.com/wadjda-review/) - **Paste**, Tim Grierson (7.3): The film is a quietly radical, gentle story about a girl in Saudi Arabia seeking independence via a bike, with compassion towards the culture and strong natural performance by the lead. [Read](https://www.pastemagazine.com/movies/wadjda) - **Eye for Film**, Jeff Robson (4/5): The critic praises the film as a universal coming-of-age story that succeeds on its own merits beyond its groundbreaking status as the first Saudi feature directed by a woman. They highlight the natural performances, especially the lead child actor, and the director's truthful depiction of everyday restrictions alongside hope and human connections. [Read](https://www.eyeforfilm.co.uk/review/wadjda-2012-film-review-by-jeff-robson) ## Details - **Director:** Haifaa al-Mansour - **Director:** Haifaa al-Mansour - **Screenplay:** Haifaa al-Mansour - **Cinematography:** Lutz Reitemeier - **Editor:** Andreas Wodraschke - **Music:** Max Richter - **Production design:** Thomas Molt - **Costume design:** Peter Pohl - **Producer:** Gerhard Meixner, Roman Paul - **Cast:** Reem Abdullah as Mother; Waad Mohammed as Wadjda; Abdullrahman Algohani as Abdullah; Ahd Kamel as Ms. Hussa; Sultan Al Assaf as Father; Dana Abdullilah as Salma; Rehab Ahmed as Noura; Rafa Al Sanea as Fatima - **Runtime:** 1h 38m - **Certificate (MPA):** PG - **Release (the US):** 13 September 2013 - **Genres:** Drama - **Box office:** $6 million - **Trailer:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=neU-ycIOCWY ## Where to watch in the US - Amazon Prime Video: rent $3.99, hd - Apple TV: rent $3.99, hd - Amazon Prime Video: buy $12.99, hd - Apple TV: buy $12.99, hd *Checked 2026-09-17.* Also available in: AE, AR, AT, BG, BR, CA, CH, CL, CO, CZ, DK, EE, ES, FI, GB, GR, HK, HR, HU, ID, IE, IN, KR, LT, MX, MY, NO, PA, PH, PL, PT, RO, RS, SE, SG, TH, TR, UA, US, VN, ZA. Add `?region=XX` to this URL for another country. ## Awards - International Submission to the Academy Awards 2014: International Submission to the Academy Awards (nominated) ## If you liked this - *The White Balloon* (1995): Panahi’s Tehran girl and her goldfish money: the film Wadjda most closely resembles. - *Mustang* (2015), Fi1m 84: Five sisters locked in a Turkish house; angrier than Wadjda, and just as alive. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/mustang.md) - *Offside* (2006): Iranian girls dressed as boys try to get into a football match. Funny and furious. - *Bicycle Thieves* (1948), Fi1m 92: The bicycle film all others answer to, and still the hardest to watch. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/bicycle-thieves.md) - *The Perfect Candidate* (2019): Al-Mansour back in Saudi Arabia with a grown woman running for office. --- © Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/film/wadjda