North Africa & the Metropole
A selection of feature films and documentaries about the peoples from across North Africa from Tunisia to Egypt.
-
Mirages
Directed by Olivier Dury • Documentary • 2008 • 46 minutes
Every day, thousands of miles from here, dozens of people are driven by an incredible sense of hope to set out with the intention of arriving in Europe. During the first few days of their crossing from Agadez to Djanet, from Niger into A...
-
Until the Birds Return
Directed by Karim Moussaoui • Drama • With Mohamed Djouhri, Hania Amar, Hassan Kachach • 2018 • 113 minutes
A property developer is witness to random street violence. A pair of secret lovers make their way across the desert. A doctor is accused of having a criminal past. In these three interconn...
-
As I Open My Eyes
Directed by Leyla Bouzid • Drama • With Marwen Soltana, Youssef Soltana, Deena Abdelwahed, Lassaad Jamoussi, Aymen Omrani, Montassar Ayari, Ghalia Benali, Baya Medhaffar • 2015 • 102 minutes
As I Open My Eyes gives us a look at Tunisian youth on the eve of the Jasmine Revolution as they are pull...
-
A Tale of Love and Desire
Directed by Leila Bouzid • Drama • 2022 • 103 minutes
Ahmed (Sami Outalbali), French of Algerian origin, grew up in the suburbs of Paris. At the university, he meets Farah (Zbeida Belhajamor), a young Tunisian woman, full of energy, who has just arrived in Paris. While discovering a corpus of se...
-
Papicha
Directed by Mounia Meddour • Drama • With Lyna Khoudri, Shirine Boutella, Amira Hilda Douaouda • 2019 • 108 minutes
Set in Algeria in the 1990's, Nedjma (Lyna Khoudri, The French Dispatch), is an 18 year-old student passionate about fashion design who refuses to let the tragic events of the Alge...
-
Razzia
Directed by Nabil Ayouch • Drama • With Maryam Touzani, Arieh Worthalter, Amine Ennaji • 2017 • 119 minutes
In this searing and mesmerizing drama, five Moroccans from different social and religious strata are pushed to the fringe by their extremist government. Spanning three decades and several ...
-
Whatever Lola Wants
Directed by Nabil Ayouch • Drama • With Laura Ramsey, Assaad Bouab • 2007 • 115 minutes
Lola (Laura Ramsey) is struggling to pursue her dream of becoming a dancer in New York, but the rejections are piling up. On top of it all, her day job as a mail carrier is beginning to look more and more lik...
-
In Mansourah, You Separated Us
Directed by Dorothée-Myriam Kellou • Documentary • 2020 • 71 minutes
An older man walks through piles of rubble—stone heaps and the remnants of walls. Like a host giving guests a tour of his home, he points out where kitchen, bedrooms, and other rooms once stood. “This is where I was born and gr...
-
Captain Abu Raed
Directed by Amin Matalqa • Drama • With Nadim Sawalha (Abu Raed) / Rana Sultan (Nour) / Hussein Al-Sous (Murad) / Udey Al-Qiddissi (Tareq) • 2014 • 100 minutes
Captain Abu Raed is a universal story of friendship, inspiration and heroism set in contemporary Jordan. Abu Raed is a lonely janitor at...
-
Rock the Casbah
Directed by Laïla Marrakchi • Drama • With Morjana Alaoui, Hiam Abbass • 100 minutes
The patriarch of a family dies suddenly, prompting a reunion of his daughters, some of whom haven't seen each other for a long time. In the midst of mourning their father, traditions are upheld... and secrets ar...
-
My Revolution
Directed by Ramzi Ben Sliman • Drama • With Samuel Vincent, Anamaria Vartolomei, Lubna Azabal • 2016 • 80 minutes
With the Arab Spring blossoming in the heart of Paris, people take to the streets to show their support. Everyone except 14-year old Marwann, that is. Despite his Tunisian roots, Ma...
-
In the Last Days of the City
Directed by Tame El Said • Drama • With Khalid Abdalla • 2018 • 118 minutes
Tamer El Said’s ambitious debut feature tells the fictional story of a filmmaker from downtown Cairo played by Khalid Abdalla (The Kite Runner, United 93, Green Zone, The Square) as he struggles to capture the soul of a ...
-
Mimosas
Directed by Oliver Laxe • Drama • With Ahmed Hammoud, Shakib Ben Omar, Said Aagli • 2016 • 93 minutes
Winner of the Critics’ Week Grand Prize at the Cannes Film Festival, Oliver Laxe’s stunning new film, Mimosas, is a breathtakingly shot Western that follows a mysterious caravan carrying a dying...
-
Neither Allah, Nor Master!
Directed by Nadia El Fani • Documentary • 2011 • 71 minutes
Winner of the International Secular Prize, Tunisian-Franco filmmaker Nadia El Fani, an avowed atheist, takes a personal approach to this cinematic exploration of secularism in the Muslim country of Tunisia before and after the depositio...
-
Ziyara
Directed by Simone Bitton • Documentary • 2021 • 99 minutes
Celebrated documentary filmmaker Simone Bitton (Ben Barka, Wall, Rachel) returns with her most personal film to date. Inviting viewers on a cinematic pilgrimage to her homeland of Morocco, Bitton explores her Jewish roots through the sp...
-
The Virgin, the Copts and Me
Directed by Namir Abel Messeeh • Documentary • 2011 • 85 minutes
A non-believer born in Egypt and raised in France by his Copt parents, filmmaker Namir Abdel Messeeh has a complicated relationship with his ethnoreligious heritage. THE VIRGIN, THE COPTS AND ME is playful and warm personal account...
-
Tinghir Jerusalem
Directed by Kamal Hachkar • Documentary • 2011 • 86 minutes
In TINGHIR-JERUSALEM, filmmaker and historian Kamal Hachkar goes in search of a community that has vanished - and confronts fundamental questions of his own identity in the process. A Berber Muslim born in Tinghir, Morocco and raised in...
-
Derrida's Elsewhere
Directed by Safaa Fathy • Documentary • 2000 • 68 minutes
An exploration of the man and his ideas, DERRIDA'S ELSEWHERE investigates the parallels between the personal life and the life work of arguably the most important philosopher of the 20th Century, Jacques Derrida.
The film is woven aroun...
-
Tahrir: Liberation Square
Directed by Stefano Savona • Documentary • 2011 • 90 minutes
'Soon after the first reports came about the occupation of Tahrir Square, filmmaker Stefano Savona headed for Cairo, where he stayed, amidst the ever-growing masses in the Square, for weeks. His film introduces us to young Egyptians su...