Revelations: Muslim and Looking for Love

After the exhumer in the last episode, and the Commando Chaplains in the one before that, Revelations lightens the tone in this fifth entry in the series, with a film about a Muslim marriage agency in Birmingham.

Though it may sound as though its subject matter is dating and arranged marriages, this is perhaps more of an examination of singleness.

Opening interviewee: "The million dollar question is: Why haven't I found anybody? ... If I got even fifty pence for every time I got asked, 'Abid I can't believe you're not married', I would be seriously wealthy."

Lina: "I've achieved a lot in my life. I've got a good career, I do a lot with myself, and I've got a lot to be proud of. But one thing everyone focuses on is 'Why are you still single?' 'Why have you not met someone?'

Instead of getting rated that little bit, just for achieving what I have in my life, everyone focuses on one thing – 'Why aren't you married yet?'

And you know what? I don't know how to answer that question. Like, shall I go away and write a list of flaws down about myself, and then come back to them and be like 'Oh well maybe it's this, or maybe it's that?' Ohh, I get all depressed. I don't know, I just am single."

As the four months of this doco develop, you can't help but root for at least one of these introductions working-out. One potential match meets with their parents present. That doesn't work. Another meet with the guy being outnumbered by the girl's friends. Funnily enough that doesn’t work either. By the end of this film, no-one has found anyone, not even the couple who meet behind closed doors from the camera.

Mind you, with much of this inevitably played-along for the cameras, I guess it's hard to be certain.

Lina: "I understand the importance of marriage, but I would rather be fifty, single and very happy than pressured into something and very depressed in a, in a relationship that I'm just not happy with, just because everyone's talking about biological clocks and sell-by dates. It's just not gonna work on me."

Review of Revelations: How To Find God here.
Review of Revelations: Muslim School here.
Review of Revelations: Commando Chaplains here.
Review of Revelations: The Exhumer here.
Review of Revelations: Divorce Jewish Style here.
Review of Revelations: Talking to the Dead here.
Review of Revelations: How Do You Know God Exists? here.