10 Great Films About Forbidden Love
3. Ali: Fear Eats The Soul (1974)
One of the most acclaimed German films ever made, Ali: Fear Eats the Soul is a romantic drama directed by R. W. Fassbinder, a leading voice in German filmmaking who created numerous classics throughout his career, including The Marriage of Maria Braun (1979) and Fox and His Friends (1975).
The most enduring of his films, however, has to be Ali, a moving and deeply symbolic movie in which 60-year-old German woman Emmi (Brigitte Mira) falls in love with Moroccan immigrant Ali (El Hedi ben Salem). The pair eventually get married, only for their relationship to find them shunned from their community and abandoned by their friends.
It is, at various times, uncomfortably funny, tragic and life-affirming. The way it details the pair's relationship and the prejudices of their community is hard hitting and even cruel, but thanks to the great leading performances of Salem and Mira, Ali: Fear Eats the Soul is still a hopeful tale of love and what it can overcome.