Ordered to drive his father in a car from Aix-en-Provence to Mecca, the young man crosses, throughout the 5000 kilometers, the Croatian countryside, the snow covered outskirts of Sofia, and soon the dry lands of Jordan and Saudi Arabia. Culture shock: Reda is not a believer, or, in any case, not a practising one. His father speaks Arabic most of the time and believes in the virtues of piety: the journey to Mecca is one of the pillars of Islam.

Aurélien Ferenczi http://www.telerama.fr/cinema/films/le-grand-voyage,196324.php (extract- slightly adapted)