Mark Cunliffe 🇵🇸’s review published on Letterboxd:
So, there was this Muslim right? Except, he wasn't...he was actually a Jew
The Infidel takes this potentially controversial premise, the kind of thing that Spike Milligan would have made a hilarious and totally non PC sketch about for Q6 in the 70s, and makes a rather safe and ultimately flat movie.
I think I'd rather have seen a Milligan take on it.
I must confess I've never been a fan of the film's writer, David Baddiel, finding him living proof that the stereotype that all Jews are funny simply isn't true. Baddiel is a smug, self satisfied, pretentious hanger on of the British comedy scene, clutching on tight to far funnier people such as Rob Newman, and even the hardly talented figure of Frank Skinner. Nor have I ever been a fan of Omid Djalili as a comedian either. As a supporting actor in Hollywood movies I can tolerate him, but centre stage in the comedy spotlight he's something of a try hard. That said, he does deliver a more subtle acting performance here and Baddiel for his part does provide the occasional funny line directed at both the Jewish and Muslim faiths in the script. But the film does little to engage in anything beyond the cultural swipes and observational points and plots seem to drift off down cul-de-sacs never to return or be resolved (what was it with the 80s New Romantic? I mean, I get where it went with regards one character, and the 'big reveal', but it didn't work at all and was rather corny and pointless) As such talented grounded and believable support from the likes of Archie Panjabi is squandered and wasted, as the film seems more interested in providing cameos from popular TV faces like Miranda Hart, Matt Lucas, David Schneider, Paul Kaye and - hidden under a burka - Mina Anwar. Only Richard Schiff as Djalili's unlikely Jewish Obi Wan and equally unlikely American black cab driver, shines gaining some of the best lines from slim pickings.
Ultimately the film simmers down to little more than a pat 'be nice to each other as we're all the same underneath' message. It's perfectly sound, valid and commendable, but it's a slog to reach it.
Watch Four Lions instead.