David & Layla  (2008)

Theatrical Release Information:
David & Layla

The exiled Kurdish director Jay Jonroy's warm and breezy romantic comedy David and Layla explores an interracial romance between the unlikeliest of partners: a Muslim Iraqi refugee and a New York Jew. David Fine (David Moscow), the host of a Big Apple man-on-the-street TV show called "Sex and Happiness," never expected to meet and fall in love with a Middle Eastern immigrant - particularly given his marital engagement to a Jewish partner, Abby (Callie Thorne). But his path soon intersects with that of Layla, a young woman orphaned when Saddam Hussein's troops gassed the rest of her family. She now lives with relatives in Manhattan, and (unbeknownst to the kinfolk, who believe she's a nursing student) supports herself by collecting under the table for a slightly suggestive dance act - the warm-up for a local belly dancer. With deportation looming, Layla looks for an out; a customs official suggests a marriage of convenience, but that soon becomes unnecessary when Layla meets David and deep, abiding love blooms. . . to the horror of both families. ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide