What Moroccan Cinema? A HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL STUDY, 1956–2006
SANDRA GAYLE CARTER
What Moroccan Cinema?
After the Empire: The Francophone World and Postcolonial France Series Editor Valérie Orlando, University of Maryland Advisory Board Robert Bernasconi, Memphis University; Alec Hargreaves, Florida State University; Chima Korieh, Rowan University; Mildred Mortimer, University of Colorado, Boulder; Obioma Nnaemeka, Indiana University; Kamal Salhi, University of Leeds; Tracy D. Sharpley-Whiting, Vanderbilt University; Nwachukwu Frank Ukadike, Tulane University See www.lexingtonbooks.com/series for the series description and a complete list of published titles.
Recent and Forthcoming Titles Time Signatures: Contextualizing Contemporary Francophone Autobiographical Writing from Maghreb, by Alison Rice Breadfruit or Chestnut?: Gender Construction in the French Caribbean Novel, by Bonnie Thomas History’s Place: Nostalgia and the City in French Algerian Literature, by Seth Graebner Collective Memory: France and the Algerian War (1954–1962), by Jo McCormack The Other Hybrid Archipelago: Introduction to the Literatures and Cultures of the Francophone Indian Ocean, by Peter Hawkins Rethinking Marriage in Francophone African and Caribbean Literatures, by Cécile Accilien Two Novellas by YAE: A Moroccan in New York and Sea Drinkers, by Youssouf Amine Elalamy, translated by John Liechty Frankétienne and Rewriting: A Work in Progress, by Rachel Douglas Charles Testut’s Le Vieux Salomon: Race, Religion, Socialism, and Free Masonry, Sheri Lyn Abel What Moroccan Cinema?: A Historical and Critical Study 1956–2006, by Sandra Gayle Carter Voices of Exile in Contemporary Canadian Francophone Literature, by F. Elizabeth Dahab
What Moroccan Cinema? A Historical and Critical Study, 1956–2006 Sandra Gayle Carter
LEXINGTON BOOKS A division of ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD PUBLISHERS, INC.
Lanham • Boulder • New York • Toronto • Plymouth, UK
Published by Lexington Books A division of Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc. A wholly owned subsidiary of The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc. 4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706 http://www.lexingtonbooks.com Estover Road, Plymouth PL6 7PY, United Kingdom Copyright © 2009 by Lexington Books All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote passages in a review. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Carter, Sandra Gayle, 1955– What Moroccan cinema? : a historical and critical study, 1956–2006 / Sandra Gayle Carter. p. cm. — (After the empire: the Francophone world and postcolonial France) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN-13: 978-0-7391-3185-5 (cloth : alk. paper) ISBN-10: 0-7391-3185-0 (cloth : alk. paper) eISBN-13: 978-0-7391-3187-9 1. Motion picture industry—Morocco—History. 2. Motion pictures—Morocco— History. I. Title. PN1993.5.M6C37 2009 791.4309642'09045—dc22 2009013063
⬁ ™ The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American
National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992. Printed in the United States of America
Contents
Acknowledgments
xi
Introduction Chapter 1: Laying the Industry Foundations, 1956–1970 Chapter 2: Looking to Define a Moroccan Aesthetic, 1971–1985 Chapter 3: New Developments, New Audiences, 1986–2006 Chapter 4: Recent Developments, Themes, and Conclusions Methodology Moroccan History and Culture Related to Film Berberity Ancillary Media Related to Film Radio Television Marocaine (RTM) Cable Channel 2M Newspapers
1 2
1
Laying the Industry Foundations, 1956–1970 The Context and the Institutions Preindependence: Formation and Initial Roles The Centre Cinématographique Marocain Postindependence Centre Cinématographique Marocain Exhibition and Distribution Pivotal Institutions Censorship Cinema Clubs Cinema Caravans Films and Filmmakers v
3 3 4 4 13 18 22 25 29 31 43 44 45 46 50 54 57 57 60 62 64
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Main Players and Short Films Mohamed Osfour Larbi Benchekroun Larbi Bennani Mohamed Tazi B.A. Latif Lahlou Ahmed Mesnaoui Feature Films: 1956–1970 Vaincre pour Vivre Soleil de Printemps Wechma Conclusion 2
Looking to Define a Moroccan Aesthetic, 1971–1985 The Context and the Institutions The Changing Role of the Filmmaker The Issue of Technical Mastery Film Style The Centre Cinématographique Marocain Administrative or Cultural Agency? Laboratory Training Taxation More Problems Cinematic Support Funds Private Finance Film Collectives Support Funds and Award Committees Exhibition Funds Production Funds Exhibition and Distribution Relations between Moroccan Filmmakers, Exhibitors, and Distributors Pivotal Institutions Censorship Cinema Clubs Criticism and Publication Cinema Caravans Cinema Festivals in Morocco Rencontres Cinématographiques de Khouribga National Festivals of Moroccan Cinema
65 65 65 66 68 69 70 71 72 74 76 78 89 90 91 92 93 97 100 101 102 103 105 107 108 108 109 110 111 113 116 119 119 122 126 129 130 130 131
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First National Festival of Moroccan Cinema: October 1982 Second National Festival of Moroccan Cinema: December 1984 Films and Filmmakers Al Hal/ Trances De L’Autre Côté du Fleuve/Au-dela du Fleuve Cauchemar Kabous Main Players and Short Films Mohamed Laalioui Ahmed Mesnaoui Kouider Bennani Feature Films: 1971–1985 Jilali Ferhati Nabyl Lahlou Mustapha Derkaoui Conclusion
133 134 135 141 141 142 144 144 145 145 147 147 153 158 165
New Developments, New Audiences, 1986–2006 The Context and the Institutions The Role and Function of Cinema Relations between Morocco and Other Countries The Moroccan Audience The Centre Cinématographique Marocain Le Cinémathèque Marocain Cinematic Support Funds Coproduction Cooperative Production Particulars of the Support Funds Complaints against the New Funding Anticipated Changes to the Fund Exhibition and Distribution Distribution Exhibition New Trends in Distributing and Exhibiting Moroccan Films Exhibition and Distribution Outside Morocco Pivotal Institutions Censorship Cinema Clubs Cinema Caravans Cinema Education and Training Initiatives in Morocco Cinema Festivals in Morocco
187 188 188 193 195 198 202 203 203 204 205 208 209 210 210 212 213 215 216 216 217 219 220 220
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National Festivals of Moroccan Cinema Other Festivals in Morocco Rabat Festival Films and Filmmakers Documentaries and Short Films Filmmakers-Living-Abroad Nabil Ayouch Miriam Bakir Rachid Boutounes Ismail Farroukhi Nour-Eddine Lahkhmari Hassan Legzouli Moroccans-Living-in-Morocco Daoud Oulad Sayed Mohamed Meziane Cinq Films Pour Cent Ans Feature Films and Filmmakers: 1986–2006 Farida Benlyazid Abdelkader Lagtaâ Hakim Noury Mohamed Abderrahman Tazi Mohamed Asli Nabil Ayouch Laila Marrakchi Conclusion
220 222 223 225 226 227 229 231 231 233 234 235 236 236 237 239 242 244 253 256 260 268 270 272 276
Policies, Recent Developments, Themes, and Conclusions What Future, What Conclusion for Moroccan Cinema? The Context and the Institutions CCM and Sustainment Funds Exhibition and Distribution Other Institutions and Media Films and Filmmakers Filmmakers Moroccan Cinema Represents the Nation and People Women Emigration, Displacement, Alienation Tradition Versus Modernity The Colonial Experience State Bureaucracy and Power Plays
301 301 301 303 304 305 306 306 307 309 311 313 314 316
Contents
Pessimism and Failure What Future for Moroccan Cinema?
ix
318 319
Appendix Shorts & Documentaries Listed by Filmmaker Feature Films Listed by Filmmaker
325 325 333
Bibliography
343
Index
369
Acknowledgments
So many people have been important to me over the years that have culminated in this moment, in this book, that I can mention but a few: Coby Condrey and Bert Milling, long and persistent friends who also kept PeeWee safe while I was researching in Morocco; my mother Billie Youngblood, who persistently supports my distant and sometimes desperate endeavors; Deborah Kapchan who always manages to choose the moment when I am blue to make me feel important, talented, and smart; Tom and Julie McCourt who send me such funny letters, cards, and emails that tears stream and I regain my “perspective” on life; Jamila Bargach who taught me so much about Morocco, friendship, and not giving up; Norja Hasnaoui and Rachida Okmeini who enlightened me about Tamazight issues, incorporated me into their families, and gave me my first hairy slippers; Mieke Curtis, crochet buddy, who mothered Chuy, poor abandoned cat-child, while I worked in Indiana; and Mary Vogl who kept encouraging me through thick and thin. I single out two exceptionally influential individuals in my life and in this book. Bob Fernea opened my eyes to a new world of cinema, and an honesty and zest for living, learning, and overcoming obstacles. BJ (Elizabeth Warnock) Fernea led me long ago to try to merge academia, filmmaking, teaching, and concern about the welfare of others. She has been a difficult role model because I can in no way match her energy, creativity, astuteness, warmth, and generosity. But I will always try to live up to her praise and encouragement, and strive to receive and encourage others with the warmth and generosity of both Ferneas. I most gratefully acknowledge John D. H. Downing, who came in answer to my academic prayers but provided as much learning and guidance outside of the class as within. I offer my thanks for his friendship and incredible inspiration in life and work. Another indomitably energetic, brilliant, creative, xi
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and caring role model, JD has left an indelible imprint upon this book, but much more importantly upon my heart and mind. Funding to conduct field research in Morocco was provided by Fulbright Study Abroad, American Institute for Maghrib Studies, and National Security Education Program. I acknowledge these programs sincerely for making this research possible. Also I must acknowledge the fantastic support I received from the CCM in Morocco, which ranged from full access to their film archives, partial access to their print archives, invitations to national festivals and conferences, access to the cinematheque, and overall helpfulness in my endeavors. Access to additional research materials at the Institute of Journalism in Rabat was made possible by Dr. Ali Ziyati, who I must thank profusely. I was also granted permission by the RTM to view selected videotapes of their program materials concerning Moroccan cinema, for which I thank the intervention of the U.S. Embassy Cultural Affairs office. I benefited tremendously after the research phase from support provided by the Department of Radio-Television-Film at the University of Texas at Austin. The University of Texas office of the Texas Rehabilitation Commission also generously supported my work. And this book would never reach you but for the fantastic efforts of my editor at Lexington Books, Michael Sisskin.
Introduction
My treatise on Moroccan cinema begins with a question that I heard a multitude of times during my research, and which I have come to believe fully represents my overall goal in this writing and inquiry. “What Moroccan cinema?” was the standard reply to my statement that I “studied Moroccan cinema.” At first I thought that the phrase only signified that quite a number of Moroccans had never seen a Moroccan film, which was somewhat the case I eventually learned. However, the question became nuanced over time as I learned much more complex significations: a deep ambiguity among Moroccans about the role that cinema should perform in Morocco; a never-ceasing conflict over the type of cinema that Moroccans should promote and produce; an ongoing deeply seated critique of the minimal number of films produced over time; a long-standing complaint by filmmakers on the difficulty of disseminating Moroccan films to the Moroccan public; and, finally, a statement that for decades the films made by Moroccans were “Moroccan” only by dint of the filmmakers’ nationality and not a reference to the content or orientation of the films. These several points comprise a large part of the book that follows, in which I portray the ambiguities and complexities that weave around and through a domain that I once thought could be simple. Multiple agents shape Moroccan cinema: the people working in the field, the government’s priorities, the economy of the country, and the overall organization and development of society. The content that represents the nation and the people of Morocco is also quite diverse and a variety of forces shape it, such as colonialism, the international exchanges of cinema, and the backgrounds of the filmmakers. In the pages and chapters that follow, I present a holistic perspective—one that interrelates textual analyses of films to their contextual referents and influences—to provide an overall historical summary and critical insight into Moroccan films and related cultural concerns. 1
2
Introduction
The complexities of the filmmaking domain within Morocco since independence in 1956 to 2006 comprise one aspect of my book. I do a historical analysis of the industry, films produced, and filmmakers during the relatively short period of five decades during which a rather small number of films were produced, both short films and features. Given the short time frame and limited quantity of product I treat, I am able to address numerous aspects of the industry, such as the interrelationship of exhibition and distribution to production, and the ancillary roles that social agents play, such as cinema clubs and other media. Further, I am granted the opportunity to view and thus offer analyses of a variety of films (shorts and features) to provide a more detailed picture of the cinema field in Morocco. Therefore, within a historical framework I offer historical influences and trends that I couple to the overview of the products that Moroccan filmmakers and institutions generated in the following chapters.
CHAPTER 1: LAYING THE INDUSTRY FOUNDATIONS, 1956–1970 Chapter 1 lays the foundations of the development of cinema in Morocco by posing the pertinent questions about what kind of cinema would be created, and how would it be encouraged or shaped by social and State forces? The early independence era nation-building efforts required that most cinematic production occur under the auspices of the Centre Cinématographique Marocain (CCM), whose role was increasingly elaborated and defined during this period. Filmmaking was limited to documentaries, short films, and development films, as well as newsreels, although first feature films were produced. Few filmmakers were prepared to enter the field at this time, and all were able to cement their position and to dominate production for at least a decade, in both cinema and television. Simultaneously, the French tradition of cinema clubs flourished in Morocco. Yet Morocco also imported quantities of Egyptian films, whose repercussion on national cinema is readily visible. This era’s films and documentaries most reflect the nation-building and nation-defining efforts of independence leadership and emergent leaders and trendsetters. Relationships between urban and peripheral communities, filmmakers, and exhibitors/distributors and the State, and other emergent media institutions are overviewed for their impact in this era. Several short film and documentaries are briefly described, and more detail is paid to the following feature films: Vaincre pour Vivre (al Hyat Kifah, Life Is a Struggle) (1968)—Tazi and Mesnaoui Soleil de Printemps (Spring Sun, Chams Rabi’i) (1969)—Latif Lahlou Wechma (Traces, Tattoo) (1970)—Hamid Bennani
Introduction
3
CHAPTER 2: LOOKING TO DEFINE A MOROCCAN AESTHETIC, 1971–1985 Morocco embarked upon a program of social development that included Arabization and proliferation of education and institutions, increased urban migration, public dependence upon government employment, and emergence of women into the public sphere. Government institutions took precedence in many areas of life, and were primarily responsible for modernization and the dissemination of nationalist ideology, particularly through newspapers, magazines, radio, and television, while cinema clubs were increasingly informed by Third Cinema discourse arising from Latin America and Algeria. Contradictory positions were taken by filmmakers, cinema club critics, and audiences who sought very different cinema expressions.1 This chapter discusses in more detail how the CCM lost its position as the sole source of film productions, how cinema funding procedures were institutionalized, and how the CCM revised its rules and regulations to more carefully control the emergent filmmakers, though not always with the intended success. I delve into developments in censorship, cinema clubs, and cinema related events such as festivals. This chapter presents information specifically pertaining to individual films and filmmakers, highlighting selected producers and short films, paying more elaborate attention to the following features: Al Hal (Trances) (1981)—Maanouni De L’Autre Côté du Fleuve (The Other Side of the River) (1982)—Abbassi Cauchemar (Kabous, Nightmare) (1984)—Yachfine Poupées de Roseau (Straw Dolls, Arayiss Min Kasab) (1977–1981)—Ferhati Brahim, Yach? (Brahim, Right?) (1981)—Nabyl Lahlou Derkaoui trilogy: De Quelques Evénements Sans Signification (1974–1975) Les Beaux Jours de Shaharazade (1981) Titre Provisoire (1983–84)
CHAPTER 3: NEW DEVELOPMENTS, NEW AUDIENCES, 1986–2006 Moroccan films underwent dramatic changes in terms of style and content; several films even garnered rave reviews and huge Moroccan audiences, and short films reemerged. Moroccan cinema moved into a new direction, in which filmmakers, the CCM, the public, and cinema critics all pushed for different goals, each group blaming the others for the “problems” that plagued Moroccan cinema. Contradictory strategies were pursued: numerous cinema festivals made Moroccan cinema more accessible to the public, while simultaneously theaters
4
Introduction
all over Morocco closed and cinema caravans minimized their activities in rural areas, and rural as well as urban populations turned to VCRs and satellite dishes for entertainment. The CCM further restricted national filmmakers through new laws and regulations, while simultaneously courting and encouraging Moroccans-from-abroad to infuse new life and ideas into Moroccan cinema. In addition to detailing the Moroccans encouraged to return to Morocco from abroad to make films, other films discussed are: Une Porte Sur le Ciel (Door to the Sky, Bab Smah Maftouh) (1987– 1988)—Benlyazid Un Amour a Casablanca (Love in Casablanca, Hub Fi Dar al Beida) (1991)—Lagtaâ L’Enfance Volée (Stolen Childhood) (1994)—Noury A La Recherche du Mari de ma Femme (Baht And Zawj Marati, Looking for the Husband of My Wife) (1993)—Mohamed Abderrahman Tazi In Casablanca Angels Don’t Fly (A Casablanca les anges ne volent pas) (2003)—Mohamed Asli Ali Zaoua—Prince of the Streets (Ali Zaoua—Prince des Rues) (2000)— Nabyl Ayouch Marock (2005)—Laila Marrakchi
CHAPTER 4: RECENT DEVELOPMENTS, THEMES, AND CONCLUSIONS Chapter 4 is concerned with film infrastructure and institutions, focusing upon providing more of a summation with an occasional move to discuss projected developments to the various sectors, including: that audience interest finally led distributors and exhibitors to loosen their blockade against Moroccan films and to aid national films;2 the CCM and support funds; exhibition and distribution; and other institutions and media. I discuss how Moroccan films function to represent Morocco, looking at films for their representations of the following: Women; Emigration, Displacement, Alienation; Tradition versus Modernity; The Colonial Experience; State Bureaucracy and Power Plays; and Pessimism and Failure. I also offer projections, hopes, and doubts about the future of Moroccan cinema.
METHODOLOGY My research into the film culture of Morocco is premised on an assumption of the interrelationship between media and cultural development, an assump-
Introduction
5
tion that all media introduce and reflect effects on culture. Since culture is not static, but constantly in flux and adaptive to new impetuses, study into a media culture should take into account several facets or levels of inquiry: the ideological, such as influences that political restraints and goals have on content and development; the economic, such as how funding of production, along with economic determinants on acquisition of technology and its use, effect film development and content; and the artistic influences on this medium, such as aesthetics, production techniques, and the interrelationship of film artistry with other cultural arts. Because Morocco is a developing country, it is particularly imperative to discuss the links that exist between the broad forces of globalization, international trade in film and audiovisual media, and the construction at the local level of identity and creativity in this domain. I look at whether the foreign film importation and exhibition have a significant effect on the ways that Moroccan audiences and/or filmmakers perceive, evaluate, and value Moroccan films. Furthermore, I construct the system of foreign film distribution and exhibition nationally to evaluate the environment that constrains the mere circulation of Moroccan films or promotes films from elsewhere. I therefore delve into the relationship between Moroccan films and import films, and also the relationship between Moroccan films and television. Another significant axis is the interrelationship of the nation and its cinema. As national identity and cultural identity play more influential roles in national development and sway a nation’s international political relations, research into a nation’s films and film industry provides insight into the process and outcome of that nation’s identity formation, and the populace’s identity construction. To unpack film’s relationship to the nation it is important to be able to address film content, the types of films made, and the overall film culture within the nation. I consider whether or how Moroccan films speak of the nation and its people, and how the cinema domain integrates with general social domains, classes, and locales within Morocco. I offer a history of Moroccan cinema and films that is also a history and analysis of Morocco. Although Morocco achieved political independence in 1956, the country continues to struggle with its own identity, its own development, and its relationship to France, Europe, Africa, North Africa, the Middle East, and developing countries in general. These struggles are quite evident in film content, in the social discourses about film, and in the political/intellectual effects on the industry and individual films. While France (the former colonizer) played, and continues to play, a strong role in developing and orienting Moroccan film, other factors enter from Africa, North Africa, the Middle East, and even Latin America. Intellectuals in Morocco are quite aware of the international
6
Introduction
movements outside their borders, which renders it imperative to discuss filmmaking within a broader context of influences. In this endeavor I delve in small measure in this introduction into other domains besides film, such as television and other delivery mechanisms. These industries and technologies indelibly alter Moroccan filmmaking, and also shape identity and public perspectives about media. As well, the fact that the cinema domain, controlled by the State and adapted to State requirements, marginalized Berbers3 and constrained them to adopt alternative media obliges a foray into the Berber cultural movement occurring across North Africa and how it is now changing audiovisual production within Morocco (developed further below). I address how over time the film industry and content and style of films reacted to and accommodated forces of change in Morocco. I provide a deep description of the film industry and other influential forces and the films that result. I also include information and analysis that elucidates the interrelationship of Moroccan cinema to the Moroccan nation, to the effects from French colonial and postcolonial policies, and to world cinema. Thus this book interrelates the study of culture, national identity, and regional politics with the study of Morocco’s film industry. Film, as product and industry, necessarily involves all these three diverse levels: general cultural (the artists, the subjects, the themes, the aesthetics, etc.); the personal (the filmmakers, the interrelationship of filmmakers to their public, etc.); and the political (who gets to make films, where do the funds come from, what audience exists, what does the government perceive to be at stake in film production and representation, etc.). My historical analysis includes the structural/functional level of analysis, as all facets intertwine and interrelate as controls and ramifications on film as representer and shaper of thoughts, ideas, individuals, and, thus, culture. In other words, this research considers, in the vein of cultural studies, that many diverse elements and levels of analysis need to be drawn together to create the most vivid overall picture and knowledge base concerning the subject matter. Cultural studies allows me a significant degree of freedom to interrelate textual analysis, ethnography, interviews, historical research, and other disparate orientations into one overall research design. I am allowed to interweave facets of political economy with elements of content analysis, patches of historical and cultural analysis with forays into postcolonial psychological effects, and mass media issues particularized into local reception and meaning production.4 I combine textual analysis with institutional analysis, personal interviews with ethnographic observation, participation with reception. I chose to present a general overview and a detailed history because I can lay a foundation for a topic studied in more specific orienta-
Introduction
7
tion by authors Roy Armes and Kevin Dwyer in their seminal works on Moroccan cinema.5 Importantly, cultural studies requires that evaluations of industrial practices and texts and their potential readings consider issues of power, which requires investigating social and cultural processes, and applying Gramsci’s hegemony theory to uncover relations and structures of power. Particularly in an environment such as Morocco’s, in which the King and State control many significant facets of the lives of the population, hegemony occurs particularly in the sectors of film, media, and identity issues. The cultural studies paradigm links descriptions of cultural texts and practices to analyses of how structures of power operate. The medium, the message, and the environment in which they exist are all significant factors to interrelate in describing, analyzing, and historicizing a media industry. Thus, I look at industrial practices and laws that impact the cinema domain, individuals and films, and I consider historical context in general to be influential. In doing so I am able to find conjunctions with traditional narrative forms along with disjunctions that arise from the colonial experience, foreign filmmaking educations, European models, exposure to Western cinematic forms and procedures, and modernization developments. The cultural studies approach also requires that I expose and discuss the influences that structural opportunities and constraints have on content, exhibition, and consumption. Maghraoui6 emphasizes that both “historical” and “autobiographical” memory must be tapped in order to get a more nuanced and complete picture of historical events, effects upon people, and other issues. I drew upon his approach when I combined both “historical” and “autobiographical” sources as I conducted my research, and yet recognize that both would be sites of “selective” remembering and forgetting of causality, events, and details. Historical memory and history are contained in CCM and other official documents, newspaper records, retrospective screenings, and printed materials, while “autobiographical” memory and history came to me through informal conversations, interviews, and “participation” in events relevant to cinema, Moroccan society, and culture. Both types of history are necessary, and even called for by cultural studies’ Foucauldian and Gramscian orientations that require institutional and State constructions be interrogated for their underlying or hidden objectives, which oral histories and other sources of information can render more visible. An additional component of cultural studies, as important as informed historiographical inquiry, is the necessity to look at texts, or products, themselves. Rather than stopping with just a view of the industry and people and context for films, it is imperative to include research into actual films and to
8
Introduction
provide descriptions and analysis when possible to broaden discourse about Moroccan cinema. I also looked at the types of subjects (or themes) that films encompassed, and searched for dominant thematics overall. Moroccan film themes reflect the indigenous circumstances that shape society and social concerns, but also and quite interestingly incorporate motifs specifically from the international arena. Themes, as well as genres, in Moroccan films both reflect the world at large and replicate some signs specific to Moroccan culture. It is possible that films that reflect recurrent themes, situations, and characters represent significant attitudes within a culture—that films hold a mirror to society. Alternatively, films may be revolutionary, leading audiences toward new attitudes, perspectives, and ideas. Both points of view about content pertain to Morocco’s quite divergent films and filmmakers. Several themes are primarily important, such as the role and social position of women, modernization versus tradition, urban versus rural depictions, representations of power, migration, and alienation. I look at these topics of most significance in the Moroccan filmography to reveal how they are developed in film content—which gives insight into society as well as into the images of the society that filmmakers wish to project, and upon the gender-classideological positions occupied by the filmmakers themselves. I include abstracts and short synopses (textual analysis) of films in the following chapters, to offer more detailed and full dimensions to Moroccan cinema history. Because each film serves as an important and multifaceted vehicle for conveying social and cultural developments, I present a number of films that offer particular views on Moroccan society, stages of film development, and orientations to the product and industry. It is imperative to understand the types of images and messages that Moroccans create(d) of themselves for themselves since films function to help shape or reflect identities and can bring forward critical issues to a wide population. Whereas I reference the bulk of the Moroccan filmography in most discussion (183 feature films, and 305 short films), I somewhat cursorily in most cases present a small number of either, due to space limitations. From the total filmography, I discuss in more detail (though not in “close analysis” several short and feature films per “era,” or, in each chapter. I chose works based upon my evaluation of their significance and to represent a variety within the historical period covered by the chapter. (See Appendix One for lists of films by date and filmmaker). I include brief analyses of a few films that significantly impacted the Moroccan film industry (ushering in new trends or giving hope for the future of Moroccan films), such as short films made by Moroccans-living-abroad7 or by individuals of Moroccan descent. Since content and representation are important elements for understanding the construction of “the nation” and
Introduction
9
“Moroccan-ness” it is opportune to compare “insider” and “outsider” perspectives and orientations. Moroccan spectators have been raised on film imports from the United States, Egypt, India, Hong Kong, and Europe, while Moroccan filmmakers have themselves been raised on theories and practices of aesthetics originating in Europe (where many filmmakers received their film educations) and in highly specialized schools. However, Moroccan filmmakers are expected to make indigenous films that would attract “the Moroccan spectator.” But which spectator? Those raised on imported films for whom musicals, action films, and melodrama constitute the narrative norm? Or those Moroccans who have remained relatively immersed in traditions and traditional aesthetics, and for whom narrative structures should replicate the oral traditions indigenous to Arabic or Berber culture? No cinema can appeal to “the Moroccan” because there are many different layers and segments of Moroccans. Research indicates that “commercial cinema” (the Hollywood or Bollywood aesthetics) is the least produced in the Maghreb (North Africa) overall, in contrast to the primary dominance of auteur cinema or expressive cinema that are the norm. There has long been a great deal of conflict over narrative structures and Moroccan audience preferences because Moroccan expressive and auteur cinema long “refused any concession to popularity” and instead adopted “hermetic avant-gardism.” Thus, additional arenas of this book concern the interaction of influences from highly divergent cultures and mores, and a unique dilemma over whose aesthetics and desires a cinema funded by and labeled by the Nation should meet. The overarching question that threads then, throughout this book, concerns what Morocco could and should be represented, to satisfy whose needs, and to accommodate whose aesthetic orientations? Influential notions—that culture can be and is expressed in media, and that said media are influential on the citizens of the nation, and that the nation must protect both its media and its citizens, that media influences identity and thus national stability—are debated hotly. Morocco has changed its media policies several times since independence, and continues to effect changes in the domain of cinema in particular; at first cinema was the “par excellence” vehicle for cementing national identity, then became problematic, and is now reemerging as a powerful vehicle. The pages that follow help define the parameters of the arguments about how nations and people utilize media and render more clearly the strategies Morocco has tried and still experiments with. It is recognized that culture incorporates elements such as language, race, and ethnicity that extend beyond nation-state borders and therefore render “national culture” difficult to define. Yet national culture must be defined in some aspect in order to sustain the argument about the necessity of preserving “national culture” in the face of international repercussions (those that might
10
Introduction
have shaped the “nation” in the first place).8 There are as many debates about “what is a nation?”9 as there are about forms of “nationalism” and “national identity.”10 In Morocco, efforts to construct a viable nation-state led to procedures designed to erase racial and linguistic differences that previously divided the region. Regional identification was to be replaced with national identification and the culture industries were enlisted to play a strong role in this process —but were also highly regulated by the State they were required to support. Stuart Hall emphasized that culture is never static, nor can it be turned off and on by colonization or liberation.11 The colonization process alters culture, as does the liberation process, but culture is indeed a sum of the plethora of influences on politics, individuals, ways of living, and ways of perceiving the self and others due to whatever inducements arise. In Morocco, neither culture nor identity are static but are indeed dynamic and in perpetual recomposition, which is why debates over culture, representation, and representative activities such as cinema are so significant to analyze.12 As well, contrary to assumptions about the homogeneity that identification with collectivities automatically confers, collectivities such as Morocco exist composed of individuals with shifting and malleable identities, which maintains cultural malleability as well. Even though France colonized Morocco only relatively briefly, from 1912–1956, these decades affected citizens tremendously and continue to foster an internal division within the country. Groups within Morocco decry the influence on Moroccan culture from French colonialism and neocolonialism. However, Morocco looks to Europe rather than to other North African, African, or Arab countries for trading and investment partners. As in many developing countries, cities such as Rabat (the capitol) and Casablanca (the industrial and banking center) became highly modernized very quickly while smaller towns on the periphery incorporated modernization’s structural and cultural changes only very slowly. Therefore, the divide between core and periphery within Morocco has developed to display characteristics similar to the divide between core and periphery internationally. Morocco’s core contains the centers of business, industry, cultural industry, government, mass media, health services, communication, banking, and capital along with most infrastructural developments such as indoor plumbing, electrification, paving, construction, trash and sewage disposal, among others. The peripheral cities and towns, in varying degrees depending upon distance from the core centers, maintain more “traditional” ways of living and producing, and have only minimally incorporated infrastructural changes. As well, linked to the core-periphery separation internally, and relevant to the subject of film and identity construction, individuals and groups in the core more than the periphery face the dilemma of dual identification: Moroc-
Introduction
11
can versus European, or, specifically, French. This dual identity has been the subject of literature, films, and culture debates, and pervades institutions that replicate the duality such as education, business, and cultural industries. In the core, elites tend to incorporate and replicate elements of French culture, such as language, style, and direction, whereas in the periphery elites still tend to take identity from religion and place, locale, and tradition.13 Therefore, it is significant to recognize that film, as a cultural industry, tends to be a core/elite endeavor and resonates with core/elite concerns although films may be distributed (limitedly) throughout Morocco. Especially important is to recognize that individuals located and responsive to the core and elite needs direct film importation, although they primarily serve the less advantaged classes. The power differential effects the types of films introduced to all Moroccan audiences, whether exhibitors in the core and periphery have business profits or culture uppermost in their minds. In developing countries such as Morocco that, in effect, straddle the first world/third world divide, film occupies a very particular place in the State’s efforts to define itself. Morocco is termed a “developing” country because both modern and traditional concepts and ways of life circulate within the nation. In fact, Morocco could be characterized as a nation whose people grapple on a daily basis with rapidly emergent forms of modern life, technology, and mores that contradict many traditional values and modes. Film, literature, and research on this country highlight the turmoil, disruption, and confusion that many individuals face as their nation inserts itself into the global economic and political spheres. Film, as some other culture industries, occupies the liminal position of both reifying the “new” State and national identity, while also being the preeminent tool for revealing the resulting disruptions and alienations. Furthermore, film is one avenue through which colonial powers continue to exercise power and center-periphery relations still play out forcefully with effects on culture and economies.14 Moroccan film history, policies, and strategies reveal numerous disruptions and alienations caused by competing identities and identifications. While some segments of the population want more European influence and support in the cinema domain, other segments want a uniquely Moroccan cinema that does not model after world-circulating films or depend upon the largess of European supporting institutions. Some within Morocco, content with the long-standing relationships between Moroccan elites and France, perceive no problems in maintaining French “tutelage” of the cinema domain, while other Moroccans perceive that France is wielding undue influence on Moroccan development and culture and should be regulated, minimized, in favor of a more indigenously focused development. These are some of the same debates that have concerned imperialism and media for decades in many contexts.
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Introduction
One of the primary arguments against a nation accepting films and cultural products from another nation is based on the posited negative relationship between “seeing” and “modeling.” Indigenous audiences seeing imported films will want their national films to emulate the imported ones, and the people themselves will want to emulate the imported lifestyles and behaviors. Exporters of cultural goods such as film and television from the U.S. claim (in contradiction to earlier espoused theories about the strong effects relation of media to modernization impulses) that seeing U.S. produced media does not affect recipients—no effect, no modeling; therefore, there should be open and unrestricted global trade in film and television. Others, in particular France in the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) talks, claim that constant reception of foreign cultural products does produce effects, which are deleterious to national identity and development. This same argument, interestingly, occurs in Morocco, but the players differ. Exhibitors and distributors, as well as France, are adamant that importation of foreign products into Morocco is not deleterious to Moroccan culture or audiences; audiences do not compare Moroccan film to international films, nor do Moroccans emulate or envy the lifestyles represented on screen. In contradiction, cinema clubs and filmmakers claim that there is a strong effect on Moroccans when many foreign films are imported, because their films are held in comparison to foreign films. Indeed, research indicates that Moroccan filmmakers compare themselves against foreign film industries and films, and see themselves lacking. They also see that their films are not distributed either nationally or internationally; in competition with foreign films on screens, Moroccan films are neglected. Furthermore, incorporating Fanon’s thesis of how colonialism effected the colonized, we must factor that indigenous cultural production (such as films) will display the marks on identity left by the colonial experience and continuing efforts of the colonized to integrate into the world constructed by the colonizers. Colonized elites will have internalized worldviews and values of their colonizers, which will then impact the style of their films and the society represented in their films, and the types of films they prefer. Thus, especially when elites control film importation and exhibition in countries such as Morocco, they may agree with worldwide distributors that there is no harm in massive local consumption of completely foreign cultural products. Internally, there will be conflict between cultural producers who seek local audience and local effect, and individuals seeking capital gain whatever influence on consumers results.15 The outcome is that local audiences are first dominated by their internal elites, then by national goals and policies, then by international goals and policies in media distribution and exhibition. However, we must temper these concepts of industry domination by questioning whether people identify wholly with those products or whether they
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13
only present alternative influences on national cultures in ways that national cultures have always been influenced—by the incorporation and adaptation, not wholesale adoption, of forces from “outside.” In the same way elements of Hollywood production and U.S. culture may attract Moroccan individuals, particularly music and dress, nevertheless they will be adapted to fit Moroccan style and tastes rather than completely adopted wholesale. In a similar move to that made by the European Commission’s (EC’s) Television without Frontiers, Morocco has implemented a political commitment to fund national film production. One EC action was to create “an extensive array of assistance programs for European producers” that was very well funded.16 Although Morocco is not in Europe’s position financially and cannot divert funds from necessary development projects, there are other avenues available to encourage low-budget national film production and exhibition, avenues that could tax imported films and stimulate smaller format production to target local audiences and generate income thereby. Currently, the older generation of Moroccan filmmakers are loath to pursue such options, while the newer generation and those disenfranchised from cinema production are quite enthusiastic. France, as did other European countries, implemented support policies such as requiring television to broadcast a quota of national productions and to put a percentage of income into local production—including filmmaking.17 Some analysts decry the intervention of the state in cultural production and predict that state intervention will harm rather than encourage local film production; the results of policies such as those implemented in France remain to be seen.
MOROCCAN HISTORY AND CULTURE RELATED TO FILM Morocco is an intriguing country to investigate because it is a site of intersecting, contending and even conflicting, forces and identities. The country plays a unique role in North Africa and the Middle East. Once colonized, now negotiating the tightrope of tradition/modernity, Morocco remains the site of a rich traditional culture and history while simultaneously embracing modern Europe and a significant role in postcolonial power relations. Morocco specifically seeks alliance with Europe and the West while essaying to maintain and forge a more dominant political and cultural position in her own region. The country achieved political independence from France in 1956, but continues to struggle with its own identity, its own development, and its relationship to France, Europe, Africa, North Africa, the Middle East, and developing countries in general.18 Being African—North African—Arab and Berber—Middle Eastern—uniquely Muslim—Morocco exists in a web of
14
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Africa’s, the Arab World’s, and Europe’s interfacing yet conflicting cultural and political forces. Consequently, national identity in Morocco has never been stable or a “given.”19 These ambiguous positions and identities and contending cultural forces shape the Morocco that makes films and the Morocco that is represented in films. While the Protectorate began the process of using cinema among other media to propagandize the colony, the new nation also turned to cinema as a preeminent tool to lead Moroccans toward identifying with the completely new environment, players, and rules. Never before had the people been united under one leadership in such a way as required by nationalism in the 1950s. Some cinema practices quite quickly polarized the citizenry into “elites” and “masses,” a polarization that matches many other polarities in the country. In the past such polarities were like checks and balances on power and authority because the locus of power and control was constantly shifting and accommodating. However, constructing the nation of Morocco solidified the polarity in such a way as to disenfranchise a large segment of the population. Sometimes the challenges that Moroccans face is reflected in the content of films, but sometimes it is important to know what is not reflected, and to understand that the lack of representation has definite signification. Further, in addition to film content, the actual industry and ideology underlying the industry/practice arose and continues to be shaped by the history and social relations, social situations, and social stressors. Modern Morocco, an Arab-Islamic kingdom (constitutional monarchy), both shares cultural and historical characteristics with, and differs remarkably from, her Arab Middle Eastern and North African neighbors. On a broad level, many Middle Eastern and North African countries and individuals seem to be negotiating modernity and global change with similar cultural capital: previous colonial domination or influence; institutionalization of Islamic thought, principles and practices; patriarchy coupled with strong familial and kinship relations; predominantly rural agrarian or nomadic populations facing urban industrialized modernization; ambivalent or even conflicting relations with Arab and African neighbors, which reinforces national sovereignty; and Western rather than Middle Eastern or African orientations and allegiances. However, how this cultural capital evolved and now interfaces with modernity and social change mark Morocco uniquely. There was not the sense of “unity” of what is known as “Morocco the nation-state” until modern colonization. Modern colonization changed indirect control over economies and modes of living into direct European administration and laws. This point is significant because no “primordial” unification linked people in Morocco prior to the protectorate era. Even the process of colonization did not unify the country in more ways than in protest against the
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15
French. Without the interrelationship of the rulers of Morocco to the former colonial authorities to keep order and institutions functioning, Morocco could have easily redivided into the factionalisms that formerly characterized regional relationships. The French worked deliberately to dissolve tribal loyalty in order to build loyalty to the King and thus to the State. But in weakening tribal loyalty and strengthening affiliation with the State, the French created the basis for a nationalist movement that would not have happened if tribes had struggled against tribes for individual power.20 Because the Sultan in 1947 publicly declared his support for the 1944 Independence Charter, Protectorate authorities dethroned him along with his family who were deported to Madagascar in 1953; France put Ben Arafa, widely viewed as a French puppet, onto the throne. Werth indicates that the new Sultan immediately signed into effect a decree that the former Sultan had refused to sign (another reason he was ousted) that made the Council of Government half French and half Moroccan in cooperation.21 This action only spurred more nationalist support for Sultan Ben Youssef (later known as Mohamed V), formerly a potentially marginal figure, and encouraged more terrorism and rebellion against the French.22 The French finally capitulated and Ben Youssef was allowed to return to Morocco; Moroccans declared independence on March 2, 1956. Several Moroccan films pertain to the protectorate period and independence movement, although not as intensively as was the case in neighboring Algeria. Maanouni’s Al Hal (Trances), a semidocumentary film about the musical group Nass al Ghiwane, includes historical footage of the Protectorate period, filmed clips of repressions, reprisals, and the king’s exile. Another film, Bamou, is a more melodramatic reconstruction of the problems faced by villagers whose omda was unscrupulous, and how the nationalist movement became significant even to peace-preferring people. The film Mirage begins with a rural peasant waiting to be supplied with flour by the military authorities; Cauchemar (Nightmare) includes realistic scenes of food being rationed to villagers, while the French military authority dispenses justice in a makeshift court, and youths are rounded up indiscriminately to be taken to fight for France. Most notable is the few number of postindependence short films that dealt with independence or the Protectorate, perhaps in an attempt to play down vilification of the French who remained so indispensable to the management of the country’s institutions, and to de-emphasize the period prior to Mohamed V becoming sole and undisputed ruler over a unified country. Again, these events created repercussions in today’s Morocco. The people continue to follow the King’s lead because his deportation only heightened his power in the popular imagination, his mythological status, his place in public esteem. The same royal family now controls the throne and most
16
Introduction
threads of power. More radical nationalists were marginalized and the old, established Makhzen families and loci of wealth were protected. Few if any contradictory voices have been permitted in Morocco, and figures of power throughout the country are appointed by the King. Sultan Mohammed V (formerly referred to as Ben Youssef) reigned over independent Sultanate of Morocco.23 At independence, government and infrastructure were manned primarily by French administrators and technicians at higher levels while an equal number of Moroccans worked in the lower echelons. Thus, an extensive French presence was necessary to maintain the smooth operation of the country for a number of years, and the economic system remained under European control. In effect, the upper and middle classes were to benefit most from the independence situation, since they had been the most interactive with the colonial forces and economic institutions.24 Further, the middle and upper classes preferred to maintain a status quo situation, to keep power localized and centralized; France also benefited from maintaining a tight relationship with its former colony, and in 1961 even created a Ministry of Cooperation to aid former colonies financially and technically, and to simultaneously maintain French hegemony in the region.25 When Mohamed V died in 1961 and was replaced by his son Moulay Hassan, who then became King Hassan II, the new king quickly realized that “the key to the preservation of the monarchy in Morocco was for the king to become and remain the pivotal center of Morocco’s disparate political forces (that is to divide and rule).”26 Hassan II then rapidly suppressed the emergent political factions that threatened the monarchy’s domination of national politics, economics, and religious institutions. Zartmann27 emphasizes that when France deposed Mohamed V and installed Ben ‘Arafa in 1953 they in fact situated Mohamed V to become a symbol for the nationalists, so that nationalism became equated with allegiance to the king not to a political organization; this undermined a secular State and the person of the king then became the head of the Nationalist Party. After independence, these two kings often pitted the political parties against each other to maintain the centrality of the throne.28 When King Hassan II inherited the throne, however, there was widespread discontent over the economic situation in the country, along with student riots and civil unrest in 1964. The only film I am aware of that even tackled any period of unrest after independence was Chraibi’s Chronique d’un Vie Normale (Chronical of an Ordinary Life) (a more recent film), which showed scenes of student riots and labor disputes being violently disrupted by police. Otherwise, no visual media reference any turmoil or problems between the populace and the government during this period, due to the heavy restrictions placed on what films could be made and what subjects would be funded, cou-
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17
pled with heavy persecution of dissident voices up until the accession of Mohamed VI, King Hassan’s son. The years of the 1960s and 1970s witnessed harsh repressive measures employed by the King to maintain his power and the order and function that he wished for the country, a period of time that became known as the “Years of Lead” that would become a dominant theme for filmmaking in the new millennium under King Mohamed VI. Morocco’s population is very young (50 percent of the population under the age of twenty), unemployment is high, and more than a third of the country’s people live below the poverty line. The many demonstrations and strikes, particularly those of university graduates who have been unable to find jobs for a decade (as many as 70 percent), seem to indicate a subcurrent of unrest throughout the country.29 The king did not rank highly on the “human rights” meter when he applied for membership in the European Union (EU). Eventually, Morocco became the recipient of one of the EU’s closest partnership treaties30 when the king made some overtures to improve his image to curry higher approval from Europe. He closed a notorious political prison in 1991 (although some journalists and trade unionists remained imprisoned elsewhere). He cracked down on drug smuggling and illegal immigration,31 although thousands of Moroccans still attempt passage into Europe each year due to the immense unemployment and bleak opportunities in Morocco. (Clandestine emigration has been one of the most notable subjects of Moroccan feature films and never discussed in documentaries. I refer you to Tazi’s Ibn Sabeel (Son of the Road) and Ferhati’s Chevaux du Fortune (Horses of Fortune) in particular.) The State expended great efforts to keep a lid on its population because there were so many arenas which State efforts were not able to manage effectively. Accompanying the solid power of the ruling families were tremendous increases in population due to improvements in medicine, an enormous migration to cities (30 percent of population lives in Casablanca) which caused extensive problems for both urban and rural areas, disastrous unemployment figures and attempts at clandestine migration to Europe, exploding criminal activity and drug abuse, degradation and insufficiency of schools, terribly slow economic growth, and steady decimation of agricultural land due to urban growth and rural depopulation.32 Estimates put the number of illegal Moroccan immigrants in Spain at 43,500, compared to 16,500 Moroccans there legally. Yet migrants, whether legal or illegal, supported the Moroccan economy; in 1990, money sent to Morocco from abroad was more than the combined foreign investments and foreign aid.33 While many immigrants are unskilled, agricultural laborers or youths with primary educations (up to 300,000 rural migrants leave in search of a better living), many are also well-educated youths who cannot find employment in the nation.34 McIvor also puts the estimated number of unemployed graduates in Morocco near
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Introduction
250,000, with approximately 180,000 new graduates each year. Unemployment in urban areas exceeds 25 percent,35 although the State claims a figure of only 16 percent, as though that is more acceptable. The largest group of unemployed remain the fifteen to twenty-four-year-olds (31 percent of the total), while over half of the urban unemployed are under thirty-five.36 These figures emphasize the economic and social problems of the country and people, which then have direct ramifications on the cinema industry and the types of structures and representations that would in later years be demanded. The primarily youthful population did not want to see intellectual films that no longer represented the problems of identity of their generation; they wanted films which more accurately reflected and dealt with their current problems, such as employment, sexual relations, marriage, family, illness, migration, divorce, drugs, and disappointments of expectations. When Moroccan filmmakers began to realize the requirements of their new audiences, films changed and began to become more popular. In particular, films such as Amour a Casablanca (Love in Casablanca), Enfance Volée (Stolen Childhood), and La Plage des Enfants Perdus (The Beach of Lost Children) more closely touched the sensibilities of the “new” Moroccan filmgoers. An ancillary development was enacted by Berbers who fought against their elision on Moroccan screens, large and small.
BERBERITY Berbers claim a heritage predating the Arab Islamic conquest of North Africa and activists contest the sociopolitical marginalization of Berbers in the modern era. Berbers are the original inhabitants of Morocco prior to the influx of Arabs who came to spread Islam in the 600s. Their aboriginal languages and cultures were and are different from the Arabs, and differ according to their location within the country. While many Berbers also speak Moroccan Arabic or Classical Arabic (of the Koran), a large percentage of individuals only speak and understand Berber. The population self-identified as Berber and speaking Berber comprises approximately 45 percent of the Moroccan population.37 The overarching term Berber references indigenous inhabitants from Morocco to Egypt, while in Morocco three main subgroups are identified by region: in the north, Riffians (reef-ee-ans) speak the dialect Tarifit (taaree-feet); in the center, Amazigh (aa-maa-zeeg) speak Tamazight (taa-maazeegt); and in the south, Chelha (shell-ha) speak Tachelhit (taa-shel-heet).38 The collectivity of subgroups throughout North Africa or within Morocco are called Amazigh as well, or plural Imazighen (ee-maa-zee-gen), and the
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19
collective for the variety of dialects is Tamazight. I will continue to use the term Berber herein when referencing the collectivity. Moroccan Arabic is a slight mixture of Berber words and pronunciation in Arabic, but would be unintelligible to Berber-only speakers, and vice-versa.39 Classical Arabic is the Arabic in which the Koran was written and along with Modern Standard Arabic is the linguistic bond between countries in the Arab world which all have mutually unintelligible local dialects, but only individuals educated in formal Arabic can understand and utilize the formal languages. Given that Morocco went from being a primarily illiterate country to one in which more than half the population is still illiterate, only a very small percentage of the population will have mastered Classical or Modern Arabic. Furthermore, the French protectorate required that many children be educated in French, so some literacy is primarily in French rather than Arabic. One result of the State’s move to enthrone Arabic over French as a national language was that Berbers realized the necessity to reify Berber along with Arabic as a national language since such a large percentage of the population still spoke the language. The overall situation is a country with a variety of linguistic as well as subcultural groups whose needs were not being met by the overarching national self-definition or national media that primarily used French, Classical Arabic or Moroccan dialect, and eschewed Berber. Since Berber identity is based partly on heritage but also on language, campaigns have been waged for several decades to have Berber language reified by the state; particularly, Berbers want more media and education in Berber language. Only after 2003 have the three Berber dialects been taught in schools, and until the mid-1990s no mass media—with the exception of radio—existed in Berber language. In this instance, Berbers both claim “primordial identity” but also have a stake in “identity’s” use for political and economic power. Individuals who speak and understand only Berber have been rendered powerless in a State in which all information, media, laws, signs, commerce, education, and other forms of communication occur only in Arabic or French. Most urban Moroccans are constantly exposed to vast quantities of foreign/Western ideas, music, and images, through music, imported clothing, imported products and trends that are exposed on television, in films, in magazines, and through satellite transmissions. In order to maintain a cultural and/or ethnic specificity in the face of media that only represent Others, Berbers have realized that they must produce their own media and represent themselves, discussed further below. The State hegemonically mandated that the radio television marocaine (RTM), the national television organization, promote an overarching Moroccan Arabic national identity. However, there have been and are frequent French language programs on Moroccan television (as well as on radio).
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Introduction
Morocco was more interested, in terms of national development, in orienting itself toward France and the Arab-Islamic world than in accommodating its unique Berber populations, and many Arabization and educational policies were designed to eradicate Berber and introduce both French and Classical Arabic so that some sort of homogeneity might eventually result. In spite of State and institutional blockades, the Berber cultural organizations have won some concessions and modifications to Moroccan national policy. Berber cultural organizations are no longer illegal nor persecuted, although some repression has been necessary to keep activities under State control.40 The Moroccan government has conceded in the 2000s that Berber be taught in schools41 while state support exists for an important research institution targeting Berber culture and history.42 However, no university programs encourage nonlinguistic research into Berber culture, no films for decades were permitted that used Berber language or reflected Berber environments. Only in the mid-2000s have a feature film (In Casablanca Angels Don’t Fly) and a few shorts begun making inroads in representing Berber populations and culture and language. While radio targeted Berber groups for many years43 with programming in all three dialects,44 there were no nationally circulating film or television productions depicting Berber culture or utilizing Berber language except for musical productions and folklore. Even cinema caravans had to have multiple dialect speakers on hand to translate CCM development and newsreel films from Arabic and French into the regional dialect. Once television service began, Berber representation was limited to song and dance performances. Moroccan cinema, replicating this pattern, marginalized Berber populations in favor of emphasizing a Moroccan-Arab-Islamic national population. The CCM indicated no interest in supporting productions targeting the Berber segment of the Moroccan population, for two reasons: because non-Arabic speakers were perceived to be predominantly rural and poor, thus not appropriate targets for film productions; and because national identity politics had long been oriented to fostering Arabic identity and recuperating various regions and identities into one nation. Furthermore, CCM director Ben Barka believed that there were no qualified filmmakers, technicians, or actors who were or spoke Berber; he reiterated the viewpoint that the population was unimportant in the eyes of State media organizations, such as the CCM and RTM, because the population was poor. Only radio accommodated Berbers because it was cheaper and thus more appropriate to those regions which, it was presumed, would eventually Arabize and no longer require specific programming. Eventually, however, Berber cultural organizations won some concessions and modifications to Moroccan national policy. The State permitted a ten-
Introduction
21
minute news program to air each day at noon, starting in the mid-1990s, in which the three dialects were allowed to reiterate portions of the news program originally delivered in Arabic.45 While radio and television news were controlled by the State, Berber activists adapted private communication tools. The Moroccan government permitted a number of Berber language print materials to emerge—books, newspapers, magazines, and journals46—and Moroccan Berbers began using other communications technologies—audio and video recording (along with the internet and websites)—in order to validate Berber culture and identity.47 One strategy used to preserve local and thereby multivocal national heritage was local video productions,48 which southern Berbers took on quite actively. They produced music videos and also narrative features. Thus, since the mid-1990s or so, Berber groups and individuals challenged the national cinematic construct by producing their own feature films in video format, utilizing Berber language, locations, actors, and stories. These films on video function diversely as entertainment as well as political statements of Berber cultural specificity and Moroccan cultural and ethnic heterogeneity. Berber videos do not fill a void created by neglect, but by repression of cultural identity, which is quite different. Even though the State no longer represses public demonstrations of Berber identity, Berbers still face a form of cultural elitism, which in essence forced them to utilize more marginalized media rather than cinema and filmmaking, although this is beginning to change with Mohamed Asli’s well-received In Casablanca Angels Don’t Fly, and a few new filmmakers making short films funded by the CCM using Berber language. While each year fewer and fewer film theaters operate in Morocco, with almost no screens in any rural areas (no theaters in more than 50 percent of the country), and more homes are hooked up to satellite dishes and VCRs, video production is more sensible than film production even if it does not have the same elitist value attached; video is cheaper to produce, reproduce and, most importantly, circulate. Thus, video technology and entrepreneurship has resulted in as many features made in Berber language videos as in Arabic language films in Morocco over the last several years. More than seventy-five features were circulating in 2006, in Tachelhit dialect, with several impending new releases and sequels. Local individuals and groups found they could use video technology to preserve, promote, and manipulate their own histories, practices and perspectives. Importantly, these videos indicate that Berber culture groups are not yet willing to have their identity subsumed into the wider homogenous Moroccan, Arabic, and Muslim identity fostered by the State. While the low cost and flexibility of video technology facilitate production, videos need appeal only to a select audience to recuperate costs. This permits localization of cultural forms and expressions for a limited audience
22
Introduction
which wishes to see itself, its cultural and linguistic specificities rendered on screen. Videos were marketed to their specific target audience—as well as any other interested consumers—via cultural centers, rental in video clubs, and/or sale in audio and videotape shops. Because fewer copies had to be sold to return a profit, videos circulated widely and effectively. This section on Berber video production is offered to detail the activities of producers of videos in Berber languages, but to also emphasize all the ways in which culture and identity are served by these videos for artists and consumers that Moroccan films do not for filmmakers or any population. Moroccan filmmakers have taken decades to realize they need to reflect and appeal to their local audiences in order to actually have consumers. But filmmakers still believe in the very elitist conception that film is “high art” and that filmmakers should be cultivated as artists, supported by the State, and expect to make high incomes from their elitist endeavor. Filmmakers claim to be concerned that their films are seen by Moroccans, yet simultaneously decry the rampant video piracy that makes those films available to Moroccan consumers because the piracy deprives the filmmakers of their income. In contrast, video makers, by avoiding the necessity to be lauded as “high art” makers, are able to get their products to consumers, make profits from their distribution even though rampant piracy does exist too, and not worry that they are seen internationally as valued “artistes.” The community they want to be valued by are the consumers of their videos, and their goal is to make some money and to reify Berber culture in a medium less State controlled than other nationally circulating media.
ANCILLARY MEDIA RELATED TO FILM Television is an integral part of our daily lives. And it will be more so in the coming years. More than a product for entertainment and news, it has become a powerful utensil transmitting ideas, cultural models, representations of the world. In consequence, only the countries having a strong televisual industry can continue to spread their culture and to protect it from abuse, even from disappearance pure and simple.49 This section introduces the institutions of television, the cable channel 2M, and satellite, with a slight foray into newspapers since they often serve as one of the primary vehicles for disseminating information about media and cinema. Evidently, media other than films do play important roles in the development of cinema made by Moroccans. In Morocco, local filmmaking faces serious constraints but potentially significant rewards in terms of film’s ability to show audiences their own
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23
cultures and problems and thereby stimulate identity construction or at least discourse. Films are difficult to separate from television in some respects since both combine visual and audial spheres to impact the receiver’s multiple senses, especially when the advent of television and video/DVDs blurred the boundaries between the various media. However, films, in whatever delivery medium, are instrumental in conveying a sense of place and identity because various other cultural forms are incorporated into a unified product. Popular personalities, music and musicians, trends, fads and fashions, as well as stories, histories and narrative and other traditions resonant with a specific culture and people can be integrated. Unlike literature and newspapers that require advanced literacy, Moroccan films (along with other visual media) can reach illiterate audiences. Filmmakers focus upon the dilemmas created in Moroccan society by modernization, emigration, colonialism, class struggles, widespread unemployment and poverty, and the objectification of women. However, countries such as Morocco face the constraint imposed by a limited number of cinema screening facilities. Although there may be a few venues for film exhibition in a limited number of smaller towns—though they might be cinema clubs, community facilities, or even town plazas—other access problems further limit film viewing in general. In face of restraints which will be elaborated upon in later chapters and need only be foreshadowed here, the other media delineated in this section become significant either in their replacement of cinema, or in their interrelationship with that medium. Television, very popular in Morocco, funnels money from filmmaking into television production. Although televisions are expensive for most of the population (ameliorated somewhat by the sets brought by family from Europe, or those bought from the black market) and require high-powered antennas or satellite dishes to receive basic broadcasts in rural areas, televisions are quite common. Because cultural practices additionally restrict film audiences in Morocco, television has a more important role to play in this environment than perhaps it would in others; marriage-aged girls and married women of child-bearing age are discouraged in general from frequent excursions into the public domains of cafes, cinemas, and other locales frequented by young men. Unless accompanied by husband, father or brother, many girls and women would not be able to attend the cinema without gossip spreading about their “wayward” characters. Although the major cities display a lessening of restrictions upon women’s activities outside the home, such gender-specific cultural constraints persist and render home viewing more convenient. Therefore, television and film viewing via television and video/ DVD are attractive alternatives for women. Yet young men and husbands prefer not to remain at home, the women’s sphere, and spend most of their
24
Introduction
time outside—either in other houses, at coffee houses, playing soccer, or at the movies. Therefore, cinema houses tend to be male domains in some environments, especially small towns and neighborhood theaters, while in upscale and urban settings such as in the industrial or political capital the middle class and elites tend to frequent the theater and cinemas as couples and families. Male children, youths, young adults, and adults of all classes attend cinemas freely, but also consume numerous films on video/DVD since it is relatively inexpensive. Thus, keeping in mind Morocco’s high unemployment rate and skyrocketing inflation, most youth and young adults are subject to the severe financial constraints impacting most of Morocco’s population. Therefore, the majority of moviegoers tend to frequent cheaper venues that can only afford, generally, to show cheaper imports. Most films imported into Morocco originate in Hong Kong (kung-fu, martial arts), India (musical dramas), France, Egypt (melodrama and comedy) and Hollywood (blockbuster movies)—which can permit a cheaper admission price. These are often the same fare found on video/DVD, but in comparison cable 2M and satellite channels may offer more upscale movies and programs. Moroccan movies that are actually distributed find outlet usually only in more upscale houses with higher admission prices. They therefore attract a middle- and higherclass audience, couples, and families. Except when shown on television, and because they are not distributed on video (except for a very few pirated titles), Moroccan films often reach a miniscule percentage of Moroccans. Therefore, it has become increasingly important for film production to be integrated into television broadcasting as a maintenance strategy. Although all areas of Morocco’s media face competition from foreign products (except the newspapers), films are the most stridently impacted negatively because of the costs involved to generate local product. Therefore, there are problems inherent in film as a source of identity conference, but in other ways all media reveal problems in both representing and speaking to the entirety of the Moroccan audience. Film in developing countries could have the added advantage of circulating national issues and values, images and concerns, both within and outside the nation. Again, however, film is problematic because limited numbers of films can be produced due to financing restrictions, and the distribution problems and costs that make indigenous films difficult to distribute even in the nation of their origin. International circulation is also limited generally to festival competitions, select venues or limited television circulation. Thus, on one hand, in national terms Moroccan films could be significant because Moroccan audiences would see and hear themselves and their unique concerns expressed on screen; yet, on the other hand, these films received limited exhibition in their own country. Television could serve the function to cohere the nation, except that for most of its ex-
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istence certain language groups (Berbers) have been elided, and most issues and concerns expressed must of course correlate with the State’s. It is also interesting that, in Morocco, Moroccan films do not gain a wide video/DVD circulation, compared to even neighboring Algerian films. Video/ DVD stores do sell/rent Moroccan music videos and some carry Berber videos, but Moroccan movies have not been strongly marketed in this venue. Pirate Video/DVD stores, which abound, carry Hindi, Kung-Fu, Egyptian, French, and American films primarily. Recently, efforts have been launched through individual city cinema clubs to focus upon Moroccan cinema in order to foster an appreciation of local talents; films are shown in accommodating theaters—but at a much higher admission price than typical neighborhood theaters—or are shown in cinema clubs. Although Moroccan films would be able to reach a very large audience if distributed on video/DVD, producers claim to be deterred by the lack of return on investment that piracy creates. Finally, Morocco is one Arab country that is experimenting with several alternative delivery modes for entertainment besides TV and video/DVD. A national cable system was implemented, with minimal but potential success; satellite dishes proliferate in even moderate- and low-income dwellings. Dwellers in the north or along borders with Algeria are able to capture Spanish and Algerian television and radio respectively.50 Thus this indigenous cinema faces numerous obstacles not only to gain a profit but to even gain an audience, even though Moroccans are highly appreciative of their own culture and consider themselves unique in Africa and the Arab world. Therefore, it seems that Moroccans need to pursue various strategies to promote local production, although cinema theatrical venues may be declining in number. State financing of an industry, tie-ins to television, video releases, and increased support of cinema clubs and traveling exhibitions may be imperative to maintain a local industry.
RADIO TELEVISION MAROCAINE (RTM) RTM is a government institution with an extremely limited “public” nature. Programmers, journalists, and all employees are considered government personnel who must exercise extreme caution and care in the dissemination of information. State control functions to minimize critical or divergent points of view, and to regulate new forms of expression whether in fiction, drama, debates, news, reports or documentaries.51 Because RTM is a State agency, no audience polls or preferences are solicited to determine programming strategies. Primarily, the State sees the public not as individuals with preferences and tastes, but as a collectivity, a nation—a monolithic public. Since
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media primarily serve the State and the function of unifying and informing the monolithic public, audience preferences or tastes are not important.52 Importance lies only in the State constructing and unifying the monolith through making programs that satisfy State goals. The most significant element about television is that it is the medium that most supports or undermines the development of cinema in Morocco. The role that television has played in tandem with cinema has changed over decades, and still changes. As often emphasized, the diminishing number of theaters throughout the Arab world, and noticeably in Morocco, calls for the television industries to support film production.53 While television throughout the Arab world has programmed cinema from numerous countries, often the cinema of the Arab countries has been most ignored. One reason is that television, such as in Morocco, would have been expected to pay more in support of local filmmakers than for a film being marketed worldwide. Although it has been economically difficult for television in Morocco to pay the sums often expected for Moroccan films, because of the low budget allowed to television programming, both sides urged that compromise be sought. The film producers do not want to bear the sole burden of making their films extremely cheap, nor do the television buyers want to bear the burden of providing the main financial reward to filmmakers. Television had its own burdens of trying to produce more quality programs on very tight budgets and short schedules. Several filmmakers who had moved to work in television emphasized that they had practically no budget or time for their work, and found that working on film was much more a luxury than producing in television. The goal was to find a reasonable middle ground where both industries could benefit; current tendencies have been for television to contribute to film budgets in the production phase in exchange for rights, as well as to participate in other ways. A true hiatus made Moroccan television a foreign television in the lives of all Moroccans. In this deleterious climate extremely influenced by governmentemployment, the incapacity to produce fictions of quality nourishing to the Moroccan imaginary has become expected. It is dramatic, for a country that wants to approach modernity to see itself amputated of its images, of its creativity, of its imagination.54
While such was the case for most of television’s history, changes in programming in the 2000s render television occasionally much closer to Moroccan needs to see themselves, their culture, and language on screen. RTM and 2M have both contracted with filmmakers to produce fictions for television, which means that more fictions occur in local dialect, representing local issues and people, and appealing to the viewer.
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The issue of the relationship between television and film first emerged in the era, 1971–1985. The first notable interaction was the television show The Maghrebian Movies in 1984/85 hosted by Nourredine Sail, who was the first to put a program on television about Moroccan cinema and show Moroccan films.55 While Moroccan television was showing “films” already, the issue of showing “Moroccan” films on television had spurred great debate. One position averred that television exhibition would end the life of a film because so many people would see it at one time; there would be no attraction for them to attend the theatrical screening of the same film. This point of view preferred that TV only “promote” Moroccan films, by: talking about the film during its production phase and afterwards, showing clips and advertising the film, reviewing the film, and interviewing actors and producers and others. TV should do everything in terms of publicity except show the actual film.56 From the opposite point of view, a film shown on TV could still show in the theater because not everyone would have seen it on TV, word of mouth would spread about the film afterwards, and some films bear seeing several times and are not “used up” when shown.57 Of course, the issue to be resolved soon became how much the RTM would be willing to pay for a Moroccan film. An alternate point of view that emerged in this period and gained much more adherence after 1985, was that television should aid Moroccan films by contributing to the budgets of the films, or by supplying technical materials, technicians, or other material aid. In return, as was done in other countries, television would retain the rights to show the film on television after a suitable period reserved for theatrical release.58 Progressing from the mid-1980s, television became increasingly called upon to support cinema in some way,59 either by advertising films,60 advertising filmmakers, having programs that talked about Moroccan cinema, programming films, and even funding films. While the number of theaters in the country declined, and huge populations were not ever served by a theater, even though population almost tripled, television coverage expanded to approximately 75 percent of national territory,61 and 100 percent if everyone had a satellite receiver to get RTM via Eutelsat.62 Moroccan filmmakers knew that a screening in a theater may have some effect, but a screening on television made a film seen and talked about throughout most of the nation; thus getting one’s film onto television became more imperative over time.63 The reach and impact of Moroccan TV was driven home to me after I had appeared on one Ali Hassan program, along with several other individuals including the main actress and the director of the film being shown, Looking for the Husband of My Wife. For months afterwards, in even remote parts of the country, individuals would tell me they remembered me from television. If they remembered me, then certainly they remembered the director and his film.
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Theater owners, distributors, and other elements of the cinema sector clamored for television to play a stronger role in supporting cinema. Since filmmakers often could not afford publicity on their own, and distributors were unwilling to invest much in publicity for Moroccan films, television seemed one of the more appropriate ways to disseminate information “about” the industry as well as to disseminate the films themselves. Theater owner: It is not the responsibility of theater owners to go out and drag people in to watch Moroccan cinema. That is television’s responsibility. Moroccan TV should introduce film people, produce some interviews that will publicize cinema people. TV is within the houses, unlike cinema. I cannot go to a client and tell him to go and find out who Tazi or Belyazid is. If they see Belyazid on TV, they will become interested to go and see what film she made. TV can really help us, the directors, the distributors, the producers and the actors. Since not everyone in Morocco is literate, Moroccan TV is the best alternative to promote cinema and films.64
Several cinema professionals hosted television shows focused upon cinema and bringing Moroccan cinema to television, beginning with Sail and Tazi in the 1970s, while during the 1990s Ali Hassan had a weekly RTM program, Le Grand Écran, that devoted at least the month of Ramadan to Moroccan cinema (four films), supplemented in the 2000s by programs such as Zawaya and other cinema-oriented programs on both RTM and 2M that publicized a number of aspects of film in Morocco, but usually emphasizing Moroccan films and filmmakers. In addition to television advertising and buying films, or contributing money to filmmakers, some people believed that emerging filmmakers should train in television and then be allowed to progress to cinema, which would help television get new programming as well as train the individuals. Furthermore, actors could get experience in television,65 and other technical positions such as script, decor, makeup, costume, and so forth could also be trained on video productions, or television productions. This solution was thought to benefit the entire audiovisual industry including cinema.66 As mentioned previously, however, the margins between cinema and television became less rather than more permeable over time. Television did not want to be the training facility, nor did that sector have the untold wealth assumed by many, considering the number of programs RTM TV was required to generate. Furthermore, Moroccans needed to become aware of the demographics of the cinema audience versus the television audience. Only certain ages predominated in theaters, while a wider audience was available through television.67 Therefore, certain films would have better box office success while others would have better reception with television audiences, if only Moroc-
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can television would be willing to contribute more reasonably to assist filmmakers. A related complaint was that the funds available to RTM to purchase a Moroccan film were totally insufficient, in the eyes of the filmmakers. The standard price RTM would propose to pay for a feature was 25,000 dirhams for one airing.68 A filmmaker might agree to sell a film to RTM for such a low price just in order to have it seen by the majority of the Moroccan public. Therefore, in some ways television did not provide a financial avenue better than exhibition, but did provide a better avenue to reach an audience. Two other media, video, and 2M had completely contradictory roles to play with Moroccan cinema. Video was never pursued much by Moroccan filmmakers because piracy would always deny them any profits from distribution on video. On the other hand, while RTM had limited funds to spend to support Moroccan films, 2M, as a private cable channel initially and then a more highly funded “public” channel, could and did more effectively contribute to a few Moroccan films.
CABLE CHANNEL 2M The first cable and private television initiative in Africa was launched in Morocco in Casablanca in March 1989; the cable service labeled 2M was originally a project of Omnium Nord Africain (ONA), Sofirad, Videotron, and Maxwell, a combination of Moroccan, French, Canadian, and UK investors.69 Intended that continued operations would be financed by subscribers, sponsors, and advertisements, the cable service would originally serve Casablanca, Rabat, Fez, Meknes, and Marrakesh, or 59 percent of Morocco’s urban population (50 percent of national territory), broadcasting seventeen hours per day.70 Although Morocco would be the cable channel’s core market, service would also be supplied to expatriate workers in northern France by Region Cable. The channel broadcast entirely in French, ostensibly providing a more upscale programming and quality fare than found on RTM. 2M invested in several Moroccan feature films, which earned it popularity among that sector of the population, and was also known for its better film projections in general. Unfortunately, by 1995 it was evident that 2M was in financial distress; it suffered from extensive signal pirating that meted much less in revenues than either expected or necessary to keep the station functioning autonomously.71 2M primarily faced the limitation that it could not track and prosecute signal pirates, and thus lost most of its revenues. Thus, the State [Moroccan government] came to take upon itself a participation in the capital of 2M. It was the only means to assure the continuity of the broadcaster while awaiting a restructuration of the audio-visual domain globally.”72 In effect, the Moroccan
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government felt that the substantial investments already made in 2M should not be sacrificed, particularly since the introduction of 2M was to be an important coup for Morocco in the audiovisual domain in Africa. In order to give the company time to work out its problems with pirating and to encourage more subscribers, the State invested heavily and indicated it would only temporarily support 2M, which would be unencrypted and available to all viewers by the end of 1996. Temporary support has become somewhat permanent as the station is still publicly owned as of the time of this writing. 2M was willing to invest generously in Moroccan film productions. Although subscribers were limited, a film broadcast on 2M would garner up to 500,000 viewers, which was excellent promotion for Moroccan filmmakers, elaborated by the additional viewership in Europe and Africa for satellite viewers. Furthermore, 2M was willing to invest more in a Moroccan production than the usual fees paid to buy a European film. A general European film would cost 22,000 francs, while 2M bought several Moroccan films for 40,000 francs each: Enfance Volée (Stolen Childhood), and The Hammer and the Anvil, which had both been previously released.73 The channel gave Tazi 100,000 francs, based only on his script, for the TV rights to his film A la Recherche du Mari de ma Femme (Looking for the Husband of My Wife), as they did for Bennani’s La Priere de l’Absent (The Prayer of the Absent).74 Ferhati sold La Plage des Enfants Perdus (The Beach of Lost Children) to 2M for 200,000 francs, including exclusive TV rights and theatrical release. Unfortunately, the company never pursued the theatrical release option and Ferhati was very disappointed that his film was not released in theaters. Furthermore, when the film was selected for a prestigious screening, neither the press nor 2M celebrated or advertised for Ferhati.75 However, films broadcast on 2M would generally be subtitled, which would render the film more marketable in Europe. During the new millenium, 2M diminished the number of films it purchased and instead pursued an alternate avenue to support filmmakers—offering them the opportunity to produce for television. Quite a number of established and emerging filmmakers took advantage of the offer, and a whole series of Moroccan made-for-television productions emerged. It would be a chapter in itself to discuss how these productions differed from cinematic productions; all I will intimate at this time is that most filmmakers made quite different and highly melodramatic productions for television that diverged light years from their works on film and were not usually very popular with audiences except for the fact that Moroccans do desire to see their national productions, and would tune in to national television for such broadcasts. However, this type of support for filmmakers did not necessarily help make them better filmmakers, since working in television has its own constraints on time, budgets, technology, and so forth, and did not factor in to the production history required by the cinematic support program to allow directors to seek funds to make films.
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The drawback to the screening of Moroccan films on television or 2M, or even on European channels received in Morocco via satellite, was that films were immediately videotaped from the airwaves and circulated through the Moroccan population.76 Such practices would greatly inhibit the filmmakers from reaping benefits from their own videotape release in such a small consumer market, as the filmmakers themselves constantly complained.
NEWSPAPERS (FOR CRITICISM AND ADVERTISING OF FILMS) Most interesting is the relationship of the press to cinema, which occurred in the arenas of advertising of films for exhibition, advertising of films by discussion and critique, and general discussion of cinema and the audio-visual in newspaper columns and editorials. While there was some minor advertising of theater screenings, which in some areas were more often advertised on city walls with posters, there were more often discussions of cinema and in particular of Moroccan filmmaking. All the major newspapers consecrated pages or partial pages at least once a week to discussions of cinema and television. Al-Bayane had a staff critic, as did Libération and L’Opinion and most others. These articles made it possible for ideas that arose in closed circles to circulate to the wider public and thus influence public perception of events. Unfortunately, most critical reviews of Moroccan cinema and the Moroccan industry, for example, were quite negative. A critic published negative views, and that opinion became public circulating discourse quite soon, even in regions with no cinema. Akharbach indicates from her research that a large number of commentators had announced that they had not even seen the films themselves, but that they have heard them spoken about, which lends to the thesis that much criticism and opinion stems from word of mouth or what others say and not personal experience.77 Brahimi indicates, further, that newspapers generally only focused on the inadequacies of TV and cinema, the mediocrity of programs, how they do not meet the needs or expectations of the Moroccan people, and other similar views. In some journals whole pages were dedicated to cinema and television to allow people free range to express their dissatisfaction with what was available.78 In result, almost anyone in the country could certainly tell you the various “problems” with Moroccan cinema almost verbatim to the criticisms published in the press, even if that person had also never even seen a Moroccan film. Another facet of newspaper criticism is that it existed in preponderance to the numbers of cultural products that were critiqued. More criticism of Moroccan film occurred than Moroccan film production, but then criticism was much cheaper to produce.79 Unfortunately, because cheap to produce,
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criticism and those who produced it were generally not closely scrutinized for their qualifications to judge products or the industry. Very few writers in the press came from formal educations in universities or journalism programs, but most came from informal training in the cinema club movement. As will be discussed in later chapters, the role of the cinema club in promoting criticism was a many-edged saber. One tendency among cinema club critics was to blame the Moroccan audience for being “underdeveloped” and “undereducated,” because cinema clubs did not receive enough support to develop and educate them or because the audiences were unappreciative of the high discourse of well-educated critics. The public charged the critical field itself for its own underdevelopment, that the critics did not have educations in the fields of criticism or cinema analysis, or that the few educated critics too closely mimicked the models they inherited from France and Paris, which was too intellectual for the majority of Moroccan readers.80 In spite of the recognitions on both sides of lacks in the “others,” only rarely was there an initiative to develop criticism along with the development of the audience and the sector itself, so that a more supportive and accommodating communication resulted. One initiative was undertaken by the “Association of Cinema Critics of the Maghreb” as long ago as the mid-1970s, resonant with the Third Cinema movement, in which the critics agreed to give more prominence to cinema in newspapers, to question the cultural and economic domination of the cinema market in the Maghreb, and to reorient film criticism away from esthetic analysis and more toward a political perspective.81 However, more than twenty years later, the same demands were being put forward by audiences who wanted more informed, understandable, and Maghreb-oriented criticism. While the following chapters focus more intently upon the cinema domain and ancillary areas such as cinema clubs, censorship and the influences of emerging social perspectives about cinema and media, it should be kept in mind that the previous discussion of differing media has influenced the cinema sector through each of the subsequent eras. Therefore, it serves well to have a preliminary background of other media sectors which influenced and are continually influenced by the cinema sector. NOTES 1. General positions included: Moroccan films are bad because they are not similar to American films; Moroccan films represent only the points of view of elites and the Francophiles; Moroccan films only represent the backward and traditional in order to folklorize and thus appeal to foreign audiences; Moroccan films will get better with more funding because it is lack of money that hampers creative filmmakers; Moroc-
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can films will never get better no matter how much funding is provided because filmmakers are inept, etc. 2. Public announcements were made at the Fourth National Festival of Film, the Rabat Cineclub Roundtable on the future of Moroccan cinema, and during the Ali Hassan television show concerning Moroccan cinema. 3. I use the term “Berber” rather than other preferred terms such as Amazigh for the people and Tamazight for the language because it is a more well-known term for Western readers and avoids some of the problems inherent in understanding the differences between Amazigh as one segment of the larger Berber population within Morocco and the same term Amazigh to refer to the collectivity of Berbers throughout North Africa. I do not enjoy perpetuating the use of a term disapproved of by Amazigh activists, but hope herein to be able to at least introduce the more preferential terms for future reference. 4. Stuart Hall, “The Emergence of Cultural Studies and the Crisis of the Humanities,” October, 53 (Summer 1990), pp. 11–23; Stuart Hall, “Cultural Identity and Cinematic Representation,” Framework 36 (1989), pp. 68–81; Stuart Hall, “Our Mongrel Selves,” New Statesman and Society 5 (June 19, 1992), p. S6; Jere Paul Surber, Culture and Critique (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1998); David Schwartz, Culture and Power: The Sociology of Pierre Bordieu (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998); Simon During, ed., The Cultural Studies Reader, 2nd edition (London, New York: Routledge, 1999); Erika Repovz, “Culture, Nationalism, and the Role of Intellectuals: An Interview with Aijaz Ahmed,” Monthly Review 47 (July/August 1995), p. 41; J. D. Y. Peel, “Culture through Time: Anthropological Approaches,” History and Theory 32 (May 1993), p. 166. 5. Roy Armes, Third World Filmmaking and the West; Postcolonial Images: Studies in North African Film; Dictionary of African Filmmakers; African Filmmaking: North And South of the Sahara. Kevin Dwyer, Beyond Casablanca: M. A. Tazi and the Adventure of Moroccan Cinema. 6. Driss Maghraoui, “Moroccan Colonial Soldiers: Between Selective Memory and Collective Memory” (Beyond Colonialism and Nationalism in North Africa) Arab Studies Quarterly 20 (Spring 1998), p. 21, in Academic Index Database, UTCAT, copyright 1998, Association of Arab-American University Graduates; see also: Philip Schlesinger, “On National Identity: Some Conceptions and Misconceptions Criticized,” 26 Social Science Information (London: Sage, 1987), pp. 219–264, 255–256. 7. Since the Fourth National Festival of Cinema invited individuals from abroad to participate with their work in the festival in 1995, it became problematic to simply designate individuals as Moroccans. Because some of the individuals were born abroad of Moroccan parents but never self-identified as Moroccan, and others born in Morocco permanently emigrated to Europe and made it their home, it became imperative to designate some people as “Moroccans-living-abroad” versus those Moroccans “living-in-Morocco” who continuously reside and work only in Morocco. 8. Chris Berry, “Chapter 4: A Nation T(w/o)o; Chinese Cinema(s) and Nationhood(s),” in Colonialism and Nationalism in Asian Cinema, ed. Wimal Dissanayake (Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1994), pp. 42–64.
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9. John Hutchinson, Modern Nationalism (no location: Fontana Press, 1994); p. 6: “. . .Gellner claims that modernization has given rise to nationalism, and nationalist elites have invented nations”; p. 7 : “. . . John Armstrong and Anthony Smith . . . rejecting primordialism . . . argue that the formation of nations needs to be examined in la longue durée. This leads them to contextualize the emergence of nations within the larger phenomenon of ethnicity. By ethnicity they mean different things, . . . Smith [adhering to] the importance of intrinsic meanings given by myths, symbols, and cultural practices. . . . But each rejects as the core of nationality the political definition focusing on citizenship which is preferred by modernists. The nation is thus an ethno-cultural community shaped by shared myths of origins, a sense of common history and way of life, and particular ideas of space, that endows its members with identity and purpose.” 10. At this time I conflate “nation” and “State,” to signify the geopolitical body internationally recognized as such by other geopolitical bodies—although I fully recognize the alternative definitions of “nation” to transcend geopolitical borders and reifications; M. Spiering, “National Identity and European Unity,” in Culture and Identity in Europe: Perceptions of Divergence and Unity in Past and Present, ed. Michael Wintle (Avebury, England: Aldershot, 1996), pp. 98–132, 104: “Building on Max Weber’s celebrated pronouncement that the state is that agency within society that possesses the monopoly of legitimate violence, and following similar statements by others, Gellner defines a state as a territorial political unit within the boundaries (or jurisdiction) of which one or various institutions are specifically concerned with the enforcement of order”; see also Vian Bakir, “An Identity for Europe? The Role of the Media,” Culture and Identity in Europe: Perceptions of Divergence and Unity in Past and Present, ed. Michael Wintle (Avebury, England Aldershot, 1996), pp. 177–201; Thomas K. Fitzgerald, “Media and Changing Metaphors of Ethnicity and Identity,” Media, Culture and Society 13 (London: Sage Publications, April 1991): 193–214; Thomas K. Fitzgerald, “Metaphors of Identity,” A Culture-Communication Dialogue (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1993). 11. Stuart Hall, “Cultural Identity and Diaspora,” from Identity: Community, Culture, Difference reprinted in Colonial Discourse and Post-colonial Theory: A Reader, ed. Patrick Williams and Laura Chrisman (New York: Columbia University Press, 1994). 12. Hobsbawm, p. 11: “First, official ideologies of states and movements are not guides to what it is in the minds of even the most loyal citizens or supporters. Second, . . . we cannot assume that for most people national identification—when it exists— excludes or is always or ever superior to, the remainder of the set of identifications which constitute the social being. In fact, it is always combined with identifications of another kind, even when it is felt to be superior to them. Thirdly, national identification and what it is believed to imply, can change and shift in time, even in the course of quite short periods.” 13. Hobsbawm, p. 123: “Men and women did not choose collective identification as they chose shoes, knowing that one could only put on one pair at a time. They had, and still have, several attachments and loyalties simultaneously, including nationality, and are simultaneously concerned with various aspects of life, any of which may at any one time be foremost in their minds, as occasion suggests.”
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14. John D. H. Downing, “Post-Tricolor African Cinema,” in Cinema, Colonialism, Postcolonialism: Perspectives from the French and Francophone World, ed. Dina Sherzer (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1996), pp. 188–228, p. 192: “There have been continuing critiques of French coproduction policy as a prolongation of colonial assimilationist policy . . . control film production, either through the initial choice of projects to fund or by refusal to distribute.” 15. In this very interesting instance, Smihi elevates Hollywood over France in terms of who has a negative influence on culture through cultural imperialism. Latifa Akharbach, “Le Cinema Marocain” (Memoire pour le Diplôme d’Etudes Approfondies en Sciences de l’Information et de la Communication, Université de Droit, d’Economie et de Sciences Sociales de Paris II, Paris, 1984), p. 118. Moumen Smihi interview with Guy Hennebelle, “Cinemas du Maghreb,” L’Afrique Littéraire et Artistique (59/60), p. 222. 16. Claire Andrade-Watkins, “France’s Bureau of Cinema—Financial and Technical Assistance 1961–1977,” in African Experiences of Cinema, ed. Imruh Bakari and Mbye Cham (London: British Film Institute, 1996), pp. 112–127, 113–114: “The importance attached by France to maintaining post-colonial cultural, economic and political ties can be seen through the creation of the Ministry of Co-operation in 1961 by the de Gaulle government. Through the Ministry critical and significant financial and technical resources to the former colonies were provided, which also preserved France’s dominance in the region—culturally, linguistically, and economically. The Ministry remained a dominant vehicle for economic, cultural, and technical assistance to the former colonies in areas such as agronomy, diplomacy, filmmaking and other areas requiring technical specialization and expertise. 17. Moustapha Sghir, “Projection de ‘La plage des enfants perdus,’” Le Matin (January 27, 1993): 9. Madame Tasca, the Secretary of State of Francophony and Exterier Cultural Relations: “I believe that today no one can deny that cinema . . . has a very important role in cultural exchanges, in the circulation of ideas, in the confrontation or meeting of cultures. I believe that cinema in francophone countries . . . [is] one of the vibrant sectors of cultural relations among francophone countries. France must invest in this domain, while knowing that film must find other vectors of distribution than the traditional circuit of film, and in particular must absolutely get to the point of making television more open to cinema products. Because the TV screen plays a large role in the world today in conveying anglo-saxon fictions, even if they are dubbed when seen in France. While French public and private TV channels do not occupy a strong place in the screens of the south, France created a foundation, Screens of the South, whose mission is just to encourage the production of images by the south and not just images of the south, images made by people of the south—and to contribute when possible as a complement to financing productions itself. . . .” 18. E. J. Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism since 1780, 2nd ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), p. 138: “On the other hand territory-oriented movements for liberation could not avoid building on the foundation of what common elements had been given to their territory by its colonial power or powers, since often this was the only unity and national character the future country had. The unity imposed by conquest and administration might sometimes in the long run produce
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a people that saw itself as a ‘nation,’ just as the existence of independent states has sometimes created a sense of citizen patriotism.” 19. Hobsbawm, p. 10: “With Gellner I would stress the element of artifact, invention and social engineering which enters into the making of nations. ‘Nations as a natural, God-given way of classifying men, as an inherent . . . political destiny, are a myth; nationalism, which sometimes takes pre-existing cultures and turns them into nations, sometimes invents them, and often obliterates pre-existing cultures: that is a reality.’ In short, for the purposes of analysis nationalism comes before nations. Nations do not make states and nationalisms but the other way round.” 20. Bidwell. 21. Werth, p. 628. “This was precisely the type of reform, perpetuating the presence of the French in Moroccan institutions, which the deposed Sultan refused to sign on the ground that he could not buy elective institutions at the price of destroying the principle of Moroccan sovereignty, that is, by allowing French citizens to participate in Moroccan parliamentary life.” 22. Werth, pp. 629–630 “. . . warehouses in Casablanca began mysteriously to burst into flames, and ‘collaborators’ were being stabbed in the street; a bomb was thrown at the new Sultan himself, and during the two years that followed, a minor civil war was waged between French and Moroccan ‘terrorists.’ The editor of the diehard Vigie Marocaine was murdered; an attempt was made to assassinate M. Boniface; Moulay Idriss, one of his stooges, was murdered; similarly, the French extremists murdered not only many prominent Moroccans, but also some Frenchmen who were too ‘liberal,’ and tended to fraternize with ‘the enemy.’ In June 1955 French terrorists assassinated M. Lemaigre-Dubreuil, the owner of Maroc-Presse, an adventurous and legendary figure in the history of French North Africa, who had, however, in the last few years, conducted, both in France and Morocco, a vigorous campaign for a more humane and liberal policy.” 23. By the end of 1956, Morocco had recuperated the Spanish northern zone and Tangier (the southern Spanish zone was not released until 1958). 24. Marais, p. 186. 25. Andrade-Watkins. 26. Stuart Schaar, “King Hassan’s Alternatives,” in Man, State and Society in the Contemporary Maghrib, ed. William Zartman (London: Pall Mall Press, 1973), pp. 229–259: p. 230. 27. Zartman, “Political Pluralism in Morocco.” 28. Zartman, “Political Pluralism in Morocco,” p. 249. 29. Jane Kokan, “Letter from Rabat,” (Islamic Fundamentalism in Morocco) New Statesman & Society 7 (March 18, 1994), p. 11, in Academic Index, UTCAT. 30. Andrew Album, “Casablanca Investors Pray for Rain,” Middle East 254 (March 1996), p. 28, in Academic Index, UTCAT, copyright 1996, IC Publications Ltd. (UK): “The recent signing of a free trade agreement with the European Union will, perhaps, have the greatest impact on the Moroccan economy. Two thirds of its trade is already with EU members and that looks set to increase as tariffs are reduced, over the next 12 years.” 31. M&M.
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37
32. Mekki Bentahar, Villes et Campagnes au Maroc (Rabat: Editell, 1988). 33. “Moi, Aziz, le paumé, je vais tenter ma chance ailleurs,” Notre Epoque, Teleplus 78, August 1996, pp. 33–36. 34. Chris McIvor, “Too many people chasing too few jobs,” Middle East 250 (Nov. 1995), p. 29, in Academic Index, UTCAT, copyright 1995 IC Publications Ltd. (UK). 35. Chris McIvor, “Caught by Surprise . . . Again,” Middle East 252 (Jan. 1996), p. 29, in Academic Index, UTCAT, copyright 1996 IC Publications Ltd. (UK). 36. IBC International Country Risk Guide, February 1992 (electronic version), citing figures for 1989 employment. 37.
[email protected] (5 Mar. 1997), “Après Deux Mille Ans De Mépris, Renaissance berbère au Maroc,” Le Monde Diplomatique, Janvier 1995, p. 18; http://www.ina.fr/CP/MondeDiplo/1995/01/DONNET/1115.html. Specialists estimate that Berbers make up some 40 percent of the Moroccan population, as compared to between 25 and 35 percent in Algeria and Tunisia. 38. I refer to the main categories, because there are smaller lingual groups in various regions. For example: Maarten Kossman, “Grammaire du Berbère de Figuig,” CNWS Newsletter 19 (Dissertations in Progress): http://www.leidenuniv.nl/interfac /cnws/newsl/news19/dissert.html. 39. Rachid Nouaim, “La Chaine Berbère a la RTM Section Tachelhit” (These, Année Universitaire 1981–1982, Institute Supérieur de Journalisme, Rabat), p. 7. Les berberes sont concentrés dans les zones montagneuses. Le dialecte berbère marocain a maintenu sa particularite linguistique. Mais cela n’empeche de dire que l’arabe (langue officielle) est apprise soit lorsqu’on est commercant, soit on entrant en relation avec le Makhzen, or lorsqu’on emigre en ville. 40. Denoeux. “Cooperation among Berber associations also increased significantly. In August 1991, six of them signed the “Agadir Charter,” a document designed to publicize their common demands. Decrying “the systematic marginalization” of the Berber language and Berber culture, this charter called for the achievement of seven objectives, including the insertion of the Tamazight language and Berber culture in teaching programs, and the inclusion in the constitution of a provision describing Tamazight as “a national language, next to Arabic.” Faced with this upsurge in demands for the recognition of Berber cultural rights, the king responded in a manner consistent with his strategy of political dualism. On the one hand, he showed himself willing to broaden the space within which Berber grievances could be expressed. It is also seen in the ability of Berber activists to reach a wider audience through the established press as well as new publications. Over the past few years, the monarch has also made the defense and promotion of Berber traditions a more frequent component of his speeches. All in all, by allowing proponents of Berberism to publicize their views and activities, by permitting them to take advantage of greater associational pluralism, and by articulating a discourse that stresses the contribution of Berber culture to Moroccan civilization, the king projects the image of a ruler far more willing than in the past to accommodate minority rights within a democratic framework”;
[email protected], April 17, 1997. A Berber association in Errachidia, Morocco is called Tudert, and it occurred on March 21, 1997 that the general secretary of the organization Tudert, Mr. Didi, Mohamed, was detained by the
38
Introduction
sureté nationale d’Errachidia to be taken to Rabat to be questioned about the activities of the association. 41.
[email protected] (5 Mar. 1997), “Après Deux Mille Ans De Mépris. . . .” “En décidant, le 20 août 1994, que la langue des Berbères, le tamazight, parlée par plus d’un tiers de la population du Maroc, serait désormais enseignée “au moins au niveau du primaire,” le roi Hassan II a pris une décision qui fera date. Elle ouvre la voie, dans l’ensemble du Maghreb, à une réparation historique à l’égard de la communauté berbère, dont la culture, l’identité et les droits ont été longtemps méprisés. Partout, les associations se multiplient, les revendications se précisent, les avancées s’accumulent, au point que beaucoup n’hésitent plus à parler d’une véritable renaissance berbère.” 42. Ben Massaoud, “Culture et Enseignement en Algerie et au Maghreb,” Lamalif 31, July–August 1969, pp. 60–63. 43. Rachid Nouaim, “La Chaine Berbere a la RTM Section Tachelhit” (Annee Universitaire, 1981–1982, Institute Superieur de Journalisme, Rabat), p. 16. Dans le cadre de realiser un meilleur equilibre entre l’information nationale et l’information regionale, plusiers stations radiophoniques furent ouvertes dans plusiers provinces; Agadir, Oujda, Casablanca, Marrakesh, Fes et Laayoune. La station d’Agadir diffuse des emisions en berbere, une heur et demi par jour sauf le dimanche. Il n’existe aucune coordination entre la section tachelhit et la radio d’Agadir meme si cette dermiere est rattache a la RTM, p. 17. La section tachelhit a commence a diffuser des l’annee 1938. 1/2 hour per day. Diffusion in other dialects only began in 1952 in tamazight and in 1954 in tarifit—the first one and a half hour, the other ten minutes. During protectorate the radio programs were used solely to propagandize the politics of the protectorate, p. 18. Sa creation ne visait nullement de developpement social ou faire participer les populations berberes rurales dans le processus du changement. Mais de les faire isoler au maximum de la lutte que menait dout le people contre l’occupant français. Peu a peu, on commence a s’adapter aux emissions de la section surtout apres l’introduction de quelques emissions a caractere recreatif telle que les transmissions de pieces theatrales radiophoniques du celebre “oncle moussa” et depuis la radio a etendu son champs d’ecoute car c’etait un grand evenement pour les auditeurs, meme si ce theatre ne transmettait en fait aucun discours instructif ou educatif. Ce theatre radiodiffuse a connu un grand success devant le vide beant que regnait a l’epoque. . . . 44. Berbers complain that the language used attempts to undermine the authenticity of Berber language by inserting many Arabic words and styles—of course this is also due to the people hired to work on radio, which probably are urban and have automatically infused the language with much Arabisims anyway; Nouaim, p. 27. Author criticizes how the berber radio reemits programs about international events and ministerial events which cannot be understood by a peasant who has never been thirty kilometers beyond his own home. How would this individual, uneducated and illiterate, know about Poland and Afghanistan in the terms used by the information services. In fact, this individual may not even know other Moroccan regions, p. 31. The radio programs don’t even answer to the needs of the rural berber populations, but address only urban Moroccan issues, p. 33. La poesie, la chanson, le folklore font partie de la litterature orale berbere, cette literature est transmis depuis des siecles a
Introduction
39
nos jours. Une literature enrichi en symboles et en messages socio-culturel le patrimoine culturel marocain. L’emission culturel transmise chaque semain, ne fait aucun effort pour communiquer aux berberes leur culture sauf quelques poesies chantees par des chanteurs tres connus. L’emission ne transmet aucun message culturel (except for one poetry reading on Saturday at 7 p.m.). 45.
[email protected] (5 Mar. 1997), “Après Deux Mille Ans De Mépris. . . .” Depuis le 24 août 1994, la télévision présente un journal de douze minutes, reprenant trois fois les mêmes informations avec un présentateur différent pour chacun des trois parlers imazighen : tarifit du Rif (Nord), tamazight du Centre-Est et tachlahit du Sud. A cet égard, les critiques sont nombreuses chez les berbéristes (trop d’arabismes, volonté de diviser en insistant sur les dialectes, insuffisance des programmes en tamazight sur la chaîne publique. Mais tous sont d’accord pour parler d’un “pas positif.” “Grâce à la télévision, des millions de Berbères se sentent enfin pris en considération,” note M. Ali Harcherras. 46. Denoeux, p. 104. The early 1990s, however, saw unprecedented activity in Berber circles, resulting in the emergence of a half-dozen new associations. Perhaps the most militant and dynamic, Tilelli (“freedom” in Tamazight), organized several conferences and established close ties with Berber associations abroad. In addition, Berber activists were able to take advantage of greater press freedoms to spread their message. In 1994 alone, four new publications exclusively devoted to Berber issues were created, including the bimonthly Tifinagh (a word which refers to the Berber alphabet and also means “Our Discovery”) and the weekly Tidmi (Watchfulness), both of which found a receptive audience. Even more striking perhaps was the fact that, by 1995, the dailies of two left-wing parties, the PPS and the USFP, devoted two pages a week to Berber issues; my own observation: Al Bayane newspaper is very interesting in that it has begun to carry pages now and then dedicated solely to Tamazight issues and language. 47. Nouaim, p. 8. Les berberes n’echapent pas au phenomene d’analphabetisation dont le taux demeure tres eleve parmi la population totale (70%). Si ce taux cache des distorsions entre le milieu rural et le milieu urbain, on peut dire qu’il cache egalement des distorsions entre le milieu rural du nord et le milieu rural du sud du pays. La presse ecrite n’a aucun effet sur ces populations que dans leur majroite ne savent ni lire ni ecrire. Le berbere est donc le seul langage dont doit etre vehiculee toute information destinee a ces populations qui ont bien besoin d’etre informees. La presse ecrite dans sa forme actuelle, ses problemes techniques, de distribution la langue par laquelle vehicule les informations (arabe ou francais) meme si elle parvient a des localites eloignees des grands centres, elle ne sera pas lue. Notant que cette presse n’est meme pas lue dans le centre urbains que d’un degre tres bas; An amazigh troup of theater in Morocco is Tammounte Izenkade, which presented an Amazigh piece in 1996 which they recorded on video and distributed through shops: Assgasse Ambarki. 48. Interview with Majid R’chich. Now there is a search, especially in the countryside and with Berbers, for a cultural identity and that takes form in wanting to have film and visual production much more oriented to smaller group identities and languages and milieus and problems. This is a new trend and will take off more in the future if it is allowed.
40
Introduction
49. La télévision fait partie intégrante de nôtre quotidien. Elle le sera davantage dans les années qui viennent. Plus qu’un produit de divertissement et d’information, elle est devenue un outil puissant véhiculant des idées, des modèles culturels, des représentations du monde. Par conséquent, seuls les pays disposant d’une industrie télévisuelle forte pourront continuer à diffuser leur culture et la protéger de l’usure, voire de la disparition pure et simple. (“L’entrée de l’état dans le capital de 2M: première étape de l’organisation de l’audiovisuel marocain,” 2M advertisement, Teleplus 75, May 1996. What I keep remarking is the notation “preserving our cultural identity” as Moroccans, but yet that means there are no Berber speakers on TV, particularly not on 2M, although there are documentaries and specials on music and moussems that deal with rural areas.) 50. Article 19, p. 89. In the north, approximately 3 million people are loyal viewers of Spanish TV, as are those on the eastern edge who receive Algerian TV. 51. Article 19, p. 57. 52. Mimoun Brahimi, “Audio-Visuel et Video au Maroc, Cas Pratique de Rabat,” (These pour le Doctorat d’Université en Sciences de l’Information et de la Communication, Université de Droit, d’Economie et de Sciences Sociales de Paris, Paris II, July 1984), p. 84 . 53. Arab Cinema Roundtable, Oudayas, Rabat Festival, July 1995. 54. Un véritable hiatus qui a fait que la télévision marocaine est devenue une télévision étrangère à la vie de tous les Marocains. Dans ce climat délétère et fonctionnairisé à l’extrême, l’incapacité à produire des fictions de qualité nourries de l’imaginaire marocain est devenue patente. C’est dramatique, pour un pays qui veut accéder à la modernité de se voir amputé de ses images, de sa création et de son imaginaire. (Khalil Hachimi Idrissi, “Petit Ecran, Grands Enjeux: RTM et 2M à l’épreuve de l’alternance,” Maroc Hebdo International 268, 5–11 April 1997.) 55. Sijilmasi. 56. Boutarka, p. 59. 57. Ahmed Boughaabah, “Interview with Jilali Ferhati (Houaar m’a: Jilali Ferhati),” Dirassat Cinimaiya , Etudes Cinématographiques, Revue de la Fédération National des Ciné-Clubs du Maroc, 6 (Kenitra, Morocco, Avril 1987), pp. 21–25. 58. Boutarka, p. 64. 59. Arab Cinema Roundtable, Oudayas, Rabat Festival, July 1995. 60. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, Roundtable about Moroccan cinema and production fund. 61. “Morocco—electric power systems.” 62. “RTM Launched Its 12-hour Daily Schedule on Eutelsat 11-F3 on Feb. 12,” Broadcast, February 19, 1993, p. 8. 63. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, nd., with the brothers Derqaoui, Rashid Sbaghi and film First Story. 64. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, May 7, 1991, Cinema in Morocco (roundtable). 65. Ali Hassan interview with Larbi Batma on Oct. 21, 1993 re al naoura. 66. Zawaya, July 17, 1996, with film Noeh, and interview with Rachid Fekkak. 67. Zawaya, 1996, with Bachir Skirej and Nabil Ayouch. 68. Fassi-Fihri, “Une production en chute accélérée.”
Introduction
41
69. “Morocco,” 1992 Walden Publishing Country Reports. 70. “Morocco: ONA in Private TV channel agreement. . . .” 71. “La publicité peut-elle financer l’audiovisuel?” pp. 54–56. 72. L’entrée de l’état dans le capital de 2M: première étape de l’organisation de l’audiovisuel marocain. 2M advertisement. Teleplus 75, May 1996. 73. Fassi-Fihri, “Une production en chute accélérée.” 74. Fassi-Fihri, “Une production en chute accélérée.” In 1995 2M’s budget for film purchases on national and international level was about 28 million dirhams which needed to cover more than 400 films. 75. Fassi-Fihri, “Une production en chute accélérée.” 76. Tetouan festival, March 1995: when Canal Plus buys a film that it negotiates with filmmaker to disseminate in encrypted form to four African countries, the film is actually seen throughout Africa by anyone who has benefitted from GATT liberalization of decoder sales, and these can be taped and copied. 77. Akharbach, p. 107. 78. Brahimi, p. 101. 79. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, Sept. 26, 1991, with Khalid Khodari. 80. Akharbach, p. 109. 81. Mohamed Hamdane, “Le Regime du Cinéma au Maghreb,” (Thèse de Doctorat d’état en Droit, Université de Droit, d’Economie et de Sciences Sociales de Paris, Paris II, 1975–1976), p. 39.
Chapter One
Laying the Industry Foundations, 1956–1970
Moulay Ahmed Aloui, current (1979–1980) Minister of Tourism, speaking at the XVth Congress of the International Association of Scientific Cinema in Tangier in 1968: It is not a question of whether cinema is for us a diversion. Certainly, it is necessary to be entertained, but in the periods of construction or restructuration one must, above all, educate, train and instruct. . . . In the realm of training in a country such as ours where it is necessary to train in a very short time period the largest number of workers possible, cinema is an important factor. For the masses, it is a means of spreading knowledge. In effect . . . thanks to the cinema, the masses can become conscious of the modern era in which they live and thus live at the level of their era.1
The French colonizers left behind a conception about cinema, a model that Morocco would follow, and a nascent infrastructure—cinema production practices and institutions did not change drastically with Morocco’s move to independence in 1956. Because French colonialism has been a major historical and cultural marker upon Morocco, this chapter begins by interweaving the cinematic inheritance left to Morocco by France. But France’s influence, obviously, would not have been limited to its cinematic activities; the overall process of colonialism would lend a more urgent dynamic to the use of cinema by Morocco subsequent to independence. The climate in Morocco during the last years of French occupation was, as would be expected, somewhat tense and conflictual. France used media such as film and radio to try to crush the independence movement but also to create a notion of Morocco as a unity, united under the Protectorate. The Protectorate led to cinema being housed under the Ministry of the Interior because the 43
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Chapter One
French saw cinema as a propaganda tool to direct the population in a way more in tune with the mission of the Interior. Furthermore, the French envisaged that after they had crushed the independence movement they could strengthen the country by using cinema to challenge/compete with the Egyptian cinema that had taken advantage of World War II to capture the North African market. Some media institutions and practices implemented during the last decade of colonial rule would carry over into Morocco’s independence period, and some would be allowed to collapse. The State needed constantly to monitor but also to support the activities, and thus filmmaking tended through the protectorate period to remain a State enterprise. This is the situation Morocco inherited in 1956—thirty years of filmmaking by France. Although independence did mean that Morocco would consider itself an Arabic Islamic country, no longer under French rule, it did not mean Morocco was no longer under French influence. That influence could not so immediately be eradicated, nor did Morocco want that. The Moroccan State immediately emphasized a few groundrules—primarily, no one was permitted to criticize Islam or the Royal Family; no one should threaten the stability of or question the authority of the State—, and then relied upon Moroccan traditions to govern other areas of the practice of making media. The new Moroccan leadership wanted to retain some elements of French influence and practice, and not surprisingly the State turned to cinema as a tool to cement the image of the new nation under an Arabic Islamic ruler, a new nation that had defined borders and one central authority, and a new nation that had to progress and modernize in order to be a leader in the region.
THE CONTEXT AND THE INSTITUTIONS It is important to note that the State, crafting a role for cinema in Morocco, chose to follow the Western model against a more indigenous model that did try to operate until efforts were curtailed by State regulation. Prior to 1946, indigent film exhibitors would take their nonmotorized projectors around the country showing films to rural audiences. This was a case in which the local model was implemented: small showings, small receipts, and small rewards were sufficient. But when the State eventually demanded control in 1946, requiring exhibitors to be licensed, films to be licensed, and film circulation controlled, then the individual small entrepreneur could no longer function and gave way to that model which could only function with State support. Some critics have always maintained that cinema should be considered as more than entertainment and spectacle. It should be considered the unifier of the nation, the disseminator of group information and values or ideas and
Laying the Industry Foundations, 1956–1970
45
ideals. Thus, the State should give money so that individuals can make films. But what does State support mean for the autonomy of the filmmaker? What if the films are no good? If a storyteller or performer in the souk is bad, she/ he will be out of business quickly. The same applies to masons and skilled tradesmen. But not so for filmmakers under the State-supported Moroccan system. As the system evolved, filmmakers were hired into virtually permanent bureaucratic positions; they worked for the State and were paid a salary whether they produced films or not, or whether their films were actually good or bad. This situation allowed for experimentation, as will be discussed later, but also meant that filmmakers were less tied to Moroccan audiences and more tied to State decisions and goals. PREINDEPENDENCE: FORMATION AND INITIAL ROLES The French opened the first Moroccan laboratory in Casablanca in 1939, which became a French film production company known as Cinéphone. The cinema industry was put under State control and regulated by the dahir of December 9, 1940, then modified by the dahir of August 14, 1941, and again by that of April 18, 1942. . . . By 1942 the field was characterized by “a very strict regulation of cinematic activity touching even the exercise of the profession, notably conveying the imperative measures by which distributors and exhibitors are constrained to conform themselves in contractual relations.”2 Maillot3 says that further government regulation of the industry occurred with the arrêté résidentiel of November 2, 1944, that required that all the cinema theaters had to show the filmed news France Libre Actualités at each screening period, which was repeated in the dahir of January 8, 1946. Maillot4 further indicates that the French realized that they had to not only control the contents and institutions of cinema, but the individuals within the domain as well. They implemented the process of issuing identity cards to practitioners of filmmaking, exhibition or distribution, or even projection, as a measure of control. (And these practices continue today.) The profession was/is not at all liberal or open. The decree of January 7, 1940, stipulated that it was possible to exhibit a film in Morocco only with permission from the French government censorship committee. A public organization known as Le Groupement de l’Industrie Cinématographique (GIC) was formed in 1942; this Groupement was transformed into the Service du Cinéma (SDC) by the Résident Général on Feb. 3, 1944, and was charged with regulating the cinema field. It/He is placed under the authority of a government commissioner named by residential decree on the proposal of the director of the General Service of
46
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Information, and charged to take every measure or to insure the execution of those which have been edicted by residential decrees concerning the cinema profession in Morocco, notably those concerning the authorizations to exercise the profession, the organization of cinema businesses, the system of cinema screenings. It encompasses a central service in Rabat, and an administrative inspection in Casablanca, economic capital of Morocco, and principle center of cinema industry activity.5
Since its creation by dahir of April 20, 1942, followed by its reorganization in 1944, the Service du Cinéma was charged with setting the prices of cinema tickets and other means of regulating the profession. This service’s mission is to study the general questions of interest to the body of the cinema industry and to solve problems posed by this industry. In this respect, the chief of the Cinema Service has the power to edict, in the form of organic texts, a regulation of the exercise of the profession. His decisions concerning the programming of screenings, containing measures relative to the management of theaters, reminding of the obligations on multiple occasions of the members of the profession. In the terms of the residential decree of February 3, 1944, they must be countersigned by the director of Information. The chief of the Cinema Service formulates equally advice and recommendations in the form of circulars addressed to members of the profession. Quite close to the profession that it controls, this service is also the counsel to the State on the politics to follow and the regulation to elaborate in cinema matters.6
A dahir of January 8, 1944, modified by dahirs of March 15, 1945 and November 29, 1949, separate from the Department of Cinema, offers in its first article: A CCM has been created and placed under the authority of the director of political affairs and has as its object the production, distribution and projection of cinema films “as well as the construction of a cinémathèque.” This organism is a public establishment given a civil personality and financial autonomy.7
THE CENTRE CINÉMATOGRAPHIQUE MAROCAIN (CCM) The Moroccan CCM was created on the model of the French CNC (National Cinema Center). The CCM was very much the product of the colonial period. But perhaps the system of following convention, and following the “civilizing” lead of France, made it difficult to design a CCM that truly met the needs of modern Morocco.8 Although the CCM and the Service du Cinema merged in the postindependence period, the activities of each were a bit different in 1945 and they remained somewhat separate institutions. “The creation of the
Laying the Industry Foundations, 1956–1970
47
CCM marks an essential turning point in the history of the administration of cinema in Morocco. Unfortunately, the State no longer limits its exercise to political or professional control of the cinema industry, it has become a producer. Not content to regulate and administer, it also exhibits.”9 It is important to recognize that the CCM’s creation as producer and not just regulator stemmed from the protectorate that needed a State agency to produce propaganda. After 1944, the CCM was responsible for licensing producers and productions; controlling importation, export, production and distribution; controlling the proceeds of film exhibitions with the Ministry of Finance; preparing and distributing tickets among exhibitors; organizing professional and technical training; contributing to deciding how much tickets and rentals should cost; arbitrating between different branches of the cinema field; organizing national and international festivals to encourage Moroccan film; creating a national library of films; encouraging creation and development of cinema clubs; circulating Moroccan experimental films; producing, distributing, and exhibiting films and Moroccan filmed news; making films for public institutions; and building studios and labs for filmmaking. Again, both the CCM and SDC were created or restructured in 1944; in 1945 the Chief of the SDC was ordered to direct the CCM (the two agencies weren’t yet merged, but were headed by the same director) and the semicombined unit became known just as the CCM.10 In the early 1950s the CCM was funded by: taxes on exhibitions, contributions from administrations that needed cinema production services, and grants from the State.11 The CCM was designed to house and make available production equipment and facilities for producing the daily newsreels (Actualités) and other films as needed by the Moroccan government for educational, scientific, or touristic purposes. At origination, cinema was seen as an instrument of education for two different publics: scientific and technical education for the higher educated echelons, and educational productions for the masses, that would allow the inhabitants of the country to have basic information for political awareness of the nation.12 Film was seen as a cultural unifier at first: “Facilitating and encouraging understanding among different populations of the country, cinema also aids to cement national unity.”13 In fact, cinema was disseminated in different departments, such as in the Division de la Jeunesse et des Sports and various ministries, because cinema was seen as a factor of social education. The CCM opened as an administrative organ at the same time as the Souissi Studios were opened for film production in Rabat, in 1944 (during the Vichy administration in Morocco), which allowed the French to produce up to twelve features per year in Morocco.14 Films were produced after 1944 in Arabic language ostensibly for distribution throughout the Arab world.15
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Chapter One
The well-equipped studios, built with assistance of the French bank BNCI,16 turned out six films in 1946 (4 Arabic), four in 1947 (two Arabic), and six in 1948 (three Arabic).17 The studios were never very financially successful, however, and went bankrupt in 1950.18 The privately run complex in Souissi had a b/w lab, a shooting stage, an auditorium, and editing areas. Souissi Studios was established to compete with Egypt, but never reached that level for a number of reasons. It constantly faced financial difficulties and did not have the draw and renown of the Egyptian industry.19 After independence the CCM did not want to revive the Souissi studios. Rather, the Moroccan government opted that some posting work be done overseas.20 A CCM decree of September 24, 1946, required that filmmakers receive a license to produce a film. In order to receive the license, the filmmaker had to pass through the CCM first—which evaluated the scenario, crew, and locations proposed—and then also had to pass through the censorship board for script review. Related legislation had also been issued in January 1946, which stipulated that wandering film exhibitors had to be licensed by the government—this legislation was passed due to the number of entrepreneurs who used cafes, parks, and souqs as exhibition spaces. Besides being “rogue” exhibitors, these individuals were defying State control by not receiving permission concerning what films were shown, so this practice had to be altered. Licensed roving exhibitors could only show licensed films, and were required to inform the government of exhibition dates and places. They were prohibited from showing films anywhere there was at least one theater.21 The Viziriel decree cited on June 19, 1946 indicates that no cinema installation, permanent or ambulatory, can be established in a place open to the public without authorization from the Government Commission, the head of the Service of Cinema, delivered upon the advice of the Chief of municipal services or the local security authority.22
Thus, every cinematic enterprise or business had to have an authorization from the government to operate, and the principal operators of the business had to hold a professional card and other documents delivered by the Commissaire du Gouvernement, Chef du Service du Cinéma. Later, with the dahir of September 12, 1949, concerning the professional identity card, the Resident General decided to organize and define who had the right to a professional identity card: exhibitors—owners, administrators and assistants; projectionists; distributors—owners, administrators, and assistants; technical—owners, administrators, department chairmen, and technicians; film production—owners, administrators, and assistants; direction—directors, assistant directors, production managers, sound engineers, and technicians. No one could receive the card without having worked professionally; no one
Laying the Industry Foundations, 1956–1970
49
might have a card who had committed a crime or gone bankrupt; cards were renewed each year (and required a fee). In the same vein as these restrictions, the “Commission d’Agrément des Scénarios” was created on January 29, 1953,23 by an arrêté résidentiel of same date, only four years later than the same type of commission established in France. This Commission had the right to approve or reject films whose production was proposed to the Protectorate government—either after reading the scenario or seeing the completed film.24 The arrêté résidentiel of January 29, 1953, stipulated that the director of the CCM was a member of the “Commission d’Agrément des Scénarios.” This Protectorate institution was carried through into the independence period in concept, although the Commission’s function was replaced by the CCM alone which was required to approve any film that proposed to be shot in Morocco, whether by foreign firms or Moroccans. A further function of the CCM, a cinémathèque, was called for by the Dahir of November 29, 1949, followed by the arrêté résidentiel of January 17, 1950.25 Directly attached to the CCM, this service has as its essential object the centralization and preservation of films of long or short length filmed in the country or internationally but having Morocco as its location. It intends to create “in the interest of art and history archives and a cinema museum.”26
The Cinémathèque served not just to archive films, but also to circulate films—for the purposes of education and propaganda—to make known Morocco, its folklore, and touristic as well as agricultural and industrial goods. After the Resident General decreed the creation of a national library of films, curated by the director of CCM, each producer of a short film had to put a copy on file at CCM; the CCM could also search for and purchase films owned by foreign companies but shot in Morocco; the law prohibited the destruction of films concerning Morocco unless authorized.27 Beginning in 1953, the CCM was also set the task of preparing filmed news for use by the Ministry of Information; at the time some of the work still had to be performed by a French company.28 The cinema convoys or caravans helped the CCM at this time to disseminate those news programs.29 “This administration whose headquarters are in Rabat, has a specialized cinema section, at the head of a group of regional inspections, of districts and of agencies covering all of Morocco. She thus controls 16 points of drop which extend their ramifications up to the most distant regions.”30 In addition to the caravan screenings of newsreels, specialists working with the Ministry of Youth and Sports organized special screenings for youths. Caravans served the perimeter zones, which really meant (a) all the areas of
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Morocco which were not larger urban centers, (b) the rural areas which did not have a permanent theater, and (c) areas whose population did not speak the national language of Arabic. At the same time Morocco was a recipient of films and monetary aid from other countries in the theatrical circuit, and from France in the cinema club circuit, particularly between September 1954 and 1956, which undermined to some extent the notion of films “promoting national society” that the newsreels were to accomplish.31 Yet running the CCM was an expensive endeavor and the CCM needed the aid and films it could receive from benefactors. The CCM budget for the period showed that 60 percent to 70 percent of receipts were destined to support the costs of training and equipment (personnel and equipment) while the rest, 30 percent to 40 percent, was consecrated to production, notably dailies, copying of films, subventions to associations such as cinema clubs, and the cost of educating personnel at IDHEC (French Higher Institute of Cinema). The budget of 1958 was 118,200,000 francs, of which 82,000,000 were given to upkeep of cinema establishments. The sum comprised about 30 million dirhams.32 However, with these funds and the experiences making newsreels and short films, eventually Moroccans were able to take up filmmaking on their own, after some training with expatriate French technicians and professionals and, for some, training abroad.
POSTINDEPENDENCE CENTRE CINÉMATOGRAPHIQUE MAROCAIN Although independence meant that Moroccans took over direction of the various institutions regulating and producing audiovisual media, there was no abrupt shift from those policies and procedures previously active during the protectorate. Nor was there an abrupt shift so that all French personnel departed and Moroccans took on all tasks. The immediate period was for learning and reevaluating tasks and policies, under the tutelage of French personnel and France. Throughout the book references the continuation of approaches, conceptions, practices, and regulations that originated in the protectorate period because one cannot overemphasize the multiple problems caused for Morocco and Moroccans by the quite wholesale adoption of that inheritance. In spite of French influence at all levels of the country upon the land, the psyches, the institutions, Morocco was not so altered by colonialism that the country could adopt French practices unproblematically, particularly in the domain of cinema. Up to 1958, the Actualités Marocaines (newsreels) were distributed by the five French newsreel houses in Morocco: Actualités Françaises, Pathé-
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Journal, Fox-Movietone, Éclair-Journal, and Gaumont Actualités. Moroccan newsreels were incorporated into imported French newsreels and were projected together.33 But starting in April 1958, the CCM took complete charge of producing the newsreels (because facilities became available), and the State utilized them in order to try to form public opinion, but also more generally to present news and information around the country to otherwise marginalized populations. Their distribution was taken over by Souissi studios in Rabat. Moroccan newsreels were no longer projected with foreign ones but were sold separately, and exhibitors were required to pay a small percent for Moroccan newsreels just as they had the foreign ones, which contributed to supporting this type of production.34 In the first years, newsreels lasted about 3 minutes and treated only national news, while in the early 1960s the “journal” would last 6 minutes and cover issues such as weekly highlights, weekly magazine, world news, and Moroccan and world sports. Finally, by the end of the decade, the news would last 15 minutes. Thus filmmakers had to start the postindependence period by making the documentaries, newsreels, and informational films for the theaters and caravans, but at the end of the 1960s were finally able to move into feature production. Particularly during this era, many filmmakers were allowed to experiment with forms and play with their subject matter in a way they would not be able to do in subsequent years. While the first Moroccan films tended to be informational, later films developed according to individual styles of directors, though of course they ultimately remained under the control and supervision of the State. The first Moroccan documentaries appeared in 1958.35 But as Daa reiterates, Moroccan filmmakers most usually relied upon the technical expertise of foreigners because few Moroccans were trained technically.36 Many of the films produced by the CCM in this first early period and even into the 1970s and 1980s were made in various language versions, such as Spanish, French, and English depending upon the market or use to which the film would be put. However, films made in darija (the local Moroccan dialect), were made only in that language and indicated that they were intended only for consumers in Morocco. One problem that began during this period and continued up to the time of writing was the relationship between filmmakers, the cinema theaters or exhibitors, and the State. The government had reorganized the taxation of distributors and exhibitors by levying a tax only on theater ticket sales.37 The CCM was funded in largest part from this source. One use of the monies collected from exhibition was a “support fund,” which in effect “supported” CCM production activities (again, on the French model) and also helped theaters to refurbish if necessary.
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Collecting and distributing such monies became one of the primary functions of the CCM. By 1959 the theater owners were complaining of the 35 percent taxation on receipts. Distributors were also complaining that the money directed to them by theater owners was totally unstable. The CCM made revisions, in 1959/1960, to taxation and the support fund, but rather than lessening the taxation it merely shifted how it was applied.38 Numerous taxes were required of the exhibitors, as Abri indicates for 1965: Taxe sur spectacles; Taxe municipale; Taxe sur les prestations et services; Droit des pauvres; Redevance cinématographique; Droit de timbre; Préception au profit de la Palestin; and Actualités marocaines.39 CCM taxes were not levied in the north, because of the relative poverty and economically precarious state of the former Spanish provinces. It is also necessary to remember that this separation of the former Spanish zone from the rest of Morocco amplified the necessity of using media to create a “whole” out of Morocco, to unify the country. Not until the 1960s was the north of Morocco integrated into the body of the country, so that at the time the new cinema regulations were written, the northern zone’s cinema infrastructure was not regulated or taxed as were the central and the south of the country. Northern theaters did not have to pay a tax for the poor because the one tax instituted by the Spanish was eliminated. The only taxes paid in the north were a 4 percent “taxe de transaction” levied on gross profits for the Ministry of Finance, and the “taxe municipale progressive.” On September 17, 1967, a ministerial decree limited the quantity of funds available to the CCM from ministries to 3 percent and from the State to 2 percent, leaving the majority of funding to come from the taxes on exhibition.40 Unfortunately, one of the catch-22s of Moroccan cinema—and any cinema funding based on percentage taxation on theater ticket sales—was that the theaters needed to be full in order for taxation to garner a lot of production money to make Moroccan films. Since there were not enough local films to fill the cinemas, there always had to be foreign film imports to keep theaters filled. The limitation on CCM funding takes on major importance when one considers that the CCM was the sole source of Moroccan film funding. It became evident in the late 1960s, with those first features, that the Moroccan film market was not sufficient to return production costs on a locally produced film; that was the initial moment when Moroccan filmmakers faced the emerging dilemma of whether to make films for local or foreign markets. Yet it soon became clear that it was near impossible for Moroccan films to find distribution in either local or foreign markets which were booked with either American or cheaper imports. The CCM then became the only real source of financing for Moroccan films, either shorts or features.
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In 1965, in an effort to counter some of these problems and to perhaps benefit from later State financing, Moroccan filmmakers created the Association of Moroccan Filmmakers (ACM), which had only an ephemeral existence. The filmmakers sent a memorandum to the king and the Minister of Information requesting: the establishment of a financing fund; obligatory exhibition of Moroccan films; promotion for international sales of Moroccan films; nationalization of distribution; and creation of a national society for production and distribution. The organization remained somewhat ineffective, because the State left little room for such organizations to maneuver. The members made recommendations and demands, and the State only ignored them. The same issues have been raised over and over for forty years with few results. We see rather grandiloquent policies enunciated in the 1968–1972 Plan Quinquennal, which was supposed to equip the CCM with a laboratory, an auditorium, a cinema hall and administrative offices.41 As a result, in 1968 new studios were built at Ain Chock in Casablanca and put into action in 1970.42 One early CCM brochure,43 advertising the benefits of filming in Morocco and heralding the putative growth of the industry, went into great detail as to the 16-mm and 35-mm capacities in terms of equipment and processing available through the two studios and labs in Morocco—the one in Ain Chock in Casablanca, and the revived one in Souissi in Rabat. The brochure further indicated that in the near future the authorities would make distribution agreements with most Arab and African countries, which would fill about 80 percent of their importation needs, and in that case Morocco could easily accommodate and produce ten to twenty films a year. Yet, despite such projections, agreements and designs over the decades, Morocco never seemed to be able to activate government plans to expand cinema operations or boost her international cinema activities. Some of the State’s policies, via the CCM, were effective at regulating the cinema sector, such as trying to improve the quality of theaters, but others suffocated rather than encouraged it. From the ACM to the cinema clubs and others, advocates argued for policies that protected but also encouraged private as well as public or State initiatives in the cinema sector. But while the CCM had made numerous efforts to try to improve the situation of national cinema, and to ensure that filmmakers themselves received high quality formal educations abroad in filmmaking, the result was a “cinema of the State, of tourist and State propaganda, of rigid regimentation, bureaucracy, tight control, censorship, and monopoly.”44 Zakya Daoud claimed that it was impossible to request the State to intervene in supporting national film; it could only work if the state nationalized film industries, which he claimed would never happen in Morocco.45 Yet the State, in response to the ACM’s request, did partially nationalize the film industry, giving itself total control
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over who made films and on film content, while leaving most distribution and exhibition open to private enterprise. However, the sectors of distribution and exhibition were finally asked to Moroccanize (meaning to be run and controlled by Moroccans, although it seems that the term “Moroccanization” was loosely interpreted and many distributors and exhibitors remained French or American). The State allowed exhibitors to choose their own films, censored the content, controlled the quality of the theaters, set the ticket prices, and then taxed the exhibitors heavily. This was a long way from a totally free economic enterprise. At the end of the 1960s, the State intervened in yet a new manner. With a new infrastructure and new plans for the future, first features could be produced, although not without some struggle and repercussions for the filmmakers and the country.46 The filmmakers worked at the CCM and were funded by it.47 Further, the first students to attend IDHEC in 1963—Mohamed Tazi, Ahmed Bouanani, and Abdallah R’mili among others—were sent by the CCM. Omar Ghannam, director of the CCM for two terms in the 1960s and 1970s, concentrated all his efforts on developing national cinema and during his tenure at the CCM sent a dozen or so filmmakers for educations abroad (some at IDHEC and others in other European countries or the former Soviet Union). It was also during his tenure that the State produced the first feature films and saw the first festivals of Mediterranean cinema in Tangiers and Rabat.48 In 1964, the CCM had twenty-eight employees and produced about thirty short films per year.49 The CCM provided, in the early years, a great school of practical application for the filmmakers trained abroad in the theoretical and introductory side of filmmaking. There were labs and film stock and cameras and personnel; filmmakers shot a lot of films and had the opportunity to learn their trade well.50 The period was an experimental period and a training period. One could say the 1960s witnessed the birth of a true school of the documentary film in Morocco.51 Films in the 1960s explored the various regions of the country, various peoples and ways of living, and focused heavily on development and industry, but also dealt with social issues. In the 1960s and 1970s Moroccan shorts were shown with imported feature films, which allowed them to have at least some public life.52 The late 1960s and early 1970s was a time of experimentation with feature length forms, including both realism and political cinema.
EXHIBITION AND DISTRIBUTION One of the most energetic cinema sectors in Morocco was the import and exhibition of films. Although the number of theaters in the country always
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hovered in the mid-two-hundreds, filmgoing was a grand event and family affair in the uptown urban areas, similar to attending the theater, and a very enjoyable group pastime for youths in other neighborhoods. Fortunately for the exhibitors, as mentioned earlier, the CCM did set up support fund devoted to the improvement of 35-mm cinema theaters, and up to 80 percent of exhibitors took advantage of the funding (see below). Primarily, while the number of European-film theaters stayed about the same in the late 1950s— around sixty—, the number of theaters showing European and Arabic films went from seventy to one hundred.53 More Arabic films were imported after independence and Moroccans were targeted as consumers as much as were European residents. Underlying the relationship between the State/CCM and the exhibitors and distributors was the nationality of the businesses and the organization of their operations. While exhibitors tended to be “residents” and independent enterprises, that is, living in Morocco permanently, and putting their profits into the country (or otherwise investing overseas), distributors were most often subsidiaries of international film distribution companies, rather than being independents, and their profits went primarily back into the overseas company rather than into the local market. In 1959 there were thirty-five distribution companies: eight American, eleven European, and nineteen Moroccan. By 1965, of the twenty-six distribution companies, only 10 were Moroccan,54 which is why the State Moroccanized the sector in 1970 to try to keep some of the profits from that trade within the country. Yet even then the Moroccan distributors were most often affiliated with a larger overseas distributor (in order to get better deals), and were thus considered to be more “middle men” than independents in their own right. One reason for the historical conflict between producers, distributors, and exhibitors had to do with the way the system was set up to make profits. Up to the 1960s, the distributors did not get a fixed sum for films but a percent of sales made by the theaters, so they were always fearful of being cheated by the exhibitors who would not report their ticket sales accurately and thereby would try to keep more money for themselves.55 The same fears were experienced by producers and the CCM—they both would get a percentage of the sales which would be hurt or diminished by underreporting on the part of exhibitors. No one sector trusted the others and thus blamed “the problem of Moroccan cinema” on the others’ lack of scruples or talent.56 Yet exhibitors were never controlled except in very few measures, because it was claimed that there was a “free market” in Morocco. In reality, the “free market” allowed taxation for the benefit of the State, and regulations on content that permitted the CCM to censor, but there was no actual impediment to making money in any way one could outside of these restrictions. Except for one: the cost of tickets set per “type” of theater.
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In July 1960, the Conseil Supérieur du Cinéma (CSP) was created in order to oversee and help determine the direction of growth of cinema in Morocco, but it was attended only by representatives of distributors and exhibitors (there being no private production), the Ministry of Information, and the director of the CCM.57 The CSP established a classification of theaters, distinguishing the: big halls which only changed their program once per week; middle-sized halls which could change their program twice per week; small-sized halls in countryside centers which presented up to three or four programs per week. This council also decreed that screenings had to end by 12:30 (midnight in winter) in order to assure that spectators got sufficient rest!58 Therefore, the CCM and CSP differentiated theaters by “class,” set restrictions on their hours of operations, and set variable ticket costs relative to the “class” of theater and audience being served. On the one hand the regulation meant that the exhibitors could not charge the public either exorbitant or ridiculously low prices, and on the other hand the CCM was more able to control the income it would receive in taxation of those receipts: “. . . the average price of a cinema ticket is kept at a level accessible to the most modest budgets, and figures among the elements entering in the calculation of the index of cost of life that is the object of special protection on the part of the public authorities, a benefit which neither the literature nor theater or other forms of education or entertainment have been granted.”59 However, in compensation: “To prohibit a merchant to himself set the price of his merchandise morally obliges that he be accorded a compensation in the case that he loses profits. Everywhere where the price of cinema seats is subject to a limitation, it is thus the duty of the public authorities to support the national cinema industry menaced by deficits.”60 The CCM’s compensation to the exhibitors was to return some of the tax monies to the theaters for renovations, but also to abstain from intervening in the businesses of exhibitors other than their taxation. The CCM supported theater renovation through a support fund, instituted under the SDC,61 from the monies received from taxation on exhibition: “The Aid Fund for cinema exhibition was instituted by the dahir of August 7, 1954.”62 It was supposed to apply to all aspects of the cinema industry, according to Article 1, but immediately, in Article 2, the aid was limited to exhibition: “in what concerns exhibition, the aid fund reserved for it is destined to support the completion of work of security, hygiene, technical improvement, embellishments and modernisation in cinema theaters equipped with
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35mm.”63 No justification was given for serving only the 35-mm theaters rather than the numerous 16-mm theaters (which dominated in rural regions). However, one result was that the exhibition circuit for 35-mm film was increased. Many theaters with good equipment were constructed.64 But the numerous theaters that were created to take advantage of the free monies then only declined over time. One reason offered for the rapid decline of new theaters was that what was given with one hand was taken by the other—the theaters were responsible for paying so much of their revenue monies into the support fund of which only a small percent was put back into the theaters. Another facet of the exhibition side of the industry is that while very small theaters and even some large theaters may have been owned by independents, most often one individual or company owned numerous theaters in different “classed” markets, in order to maximize their profits from distribution agreements. Usually films were “rented” from distributors for a period of time, not necessarily for a fixed number of screenings that could actually be verified, so unscrupulous exhibitors could make a great deal of money shuffling films around in smaller theaters that could not be well monitored.
PIVOTAL INSTITUTIONS Besides controlling the expenditure of garnered funds, and trying to shape the evolution of the nascent cinema industry or sector, the government wanted to control the content of the messages that could be disseminated to the public, which was accomplished through State regulation and censorship. Another State goal was to utilize cinema for nation building, development and unification in the country, through cinema clubs and cinema caravans.
CENSORSHIP One of the integral functions of the CCM even today is censorship. It is important to recall that issues that became important in Protectorate Morocco in the period of World War II would have been translated into laws and procedures, some of which would be repealed in postwar years, but others would continue since “postwar Morocco” was also “preindependence” Morocco and still needed to be controlled, especially in terms of information. The dahir of November 25, 1924, had given the State the monopoly over audiovisual communication, extended by a dahir in 1949 and a dahir in 1952. Furthermore, the dahir of July 6, 1949, gave the colonial authorities and
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the king monopoly over “each transmission, emission or reception of signs, signals, writings, images, sounds or information of any nature by wire, radio electricity, optics, electromagnetic systems or any/all other means”65 (thus, programming and diffusion, but not production). In terms of any State’s interest in controlling or censoring film or visual media, it is interesting to study the composition of the controlling body because it is likely to express the overriding preoccupations of the government involved. A body of control composed primarily of professions, for example, would end in a self-censorship, which accommodated the preponderance of liberal and democratic ideals; a commission which was primarily made up of political representatives of administrative bodies would imply a desire to avoid films of a political nature where the power structure feared passions would be ignited, or public order upset. Commissions on which representatives of family or religious bodies served would protect the public morality against eroticism and blasphemy. Each organization would leave its mark in the types of issues censored. At independence, the censorship code was altered to create a committee composed of: a representative of the Ministry of Information as chairman, a representative of the Royal Council, a representative of the Ministry of Interior, a representative of the Ministry of Youth and Sport, a representative of exhibitors, and a representative of distributors; no producers were included. Since professions, political and administrative representatives, and family organizations were all represented, all three above orientations had to be accommodated. These representatives would meet together or separately to review films seeking a stamp of approval, and each film to be distributed in Morocco would have to pass all the members of the committee. But even more than films were censored; the ads in public places, or the posters themselves, had to be approved. There were many forbidden areas for all media, including cinema, since censorship applied to printing and speaking as much as to films. In the case of Morocco, Article 23 of the Constitution said that “La personne du Roi est inviolable et sacrée” and further, the dahir of April 1, 1973 (modifying that of Nov. 15, 1958), forbade publication of ideas or information sullying or contradicting the king, royal family, or the idea of monarchy. The dahir also forbade any ideas or actions against the national religion of Islam. Communism was declared antithetical to Islam and outlawed; the punishment for being found guilty of practicing it was twenty years prison.66 Originally, with independence, Morocco “having juridically allowed control at the national level, and on the local level with the police powers of prefect governors and pashas and caids. But at the current time [1960] . . . the centralisation of power, that places in the hands of the government
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the totality of powers, strips in practice the local authorities of their right to add particularities to the central censorship.”67 In many ways these controls on cinema and expression were reflective of the State’s need to cement to itself the loyalty and adherence of its populace. To achieve this, given the nation’s past of decentralized power and regional struggles, the central government sought to take power out of localities and regional affiliations and anchor it more firmly in the institutions it could easily monitor, such as the CCM and the ministries. Films that at one time could have been censored by local authorities to meet the needs of local audiences and mores would now be censored only at the center. In the area of censorship, two apparently contradictory imperatives had to be reconciled. One imperative made it necessary that the State take control over the shaping of public order and public morals by controlling and censoring public projection of films. Contradictorily, it was equally considered indispensable in free and democratic countries to safeguard the freedom of expression of filmmakers and the freedom of the film spectators.68 However, freedom of expression would also possibly mean the freedom to criticize, point out problems, or in the worst case to foment unrest in the population. Obviously, if media were being used by the State to unify the people, they could not also be allowed to separate or create strife among the people. Therefore, to make censorship activities seem more like brotherly protection, the king proposed in a Royal speech given on May 1, 1963: “It is . . . the obligation of each to distinguish between the problems which could valuably be the object of discussions and differences of opinion, from those problems around which there must be national unanimity. These latter cannot be the object of disputations that would thwart efforts sincerely deployed in the general interest.”69 In terms of the caravans, as will be shown below, the whole organization of the venture, as well as the types of films shown, reflected a preoccupation with censoring what rural individuals should see and what they should learn about their country and the world in general. In terms of more urban exhibition practices and, as presented in terms of dissemination of professional cards, the censorship function focused as much on film producers as on film content. Censorship extended even further, to determine who would be allowed into the cinemas, and when. In 1960, the Ministry of Information and Ministry of Tourism decided to prohibit cinema entry to children under ten, unless the screenings were organized specifically for young spectators. The Cinema Council had imagined that specific screenings would be organized for the very young, free of charge, on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays under the auspices of the Division de la Jeunesse et des Sports. However, because youths
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soon comprised a large cinema-attending public, special theaters evolved to specifically serve their needs: low quality, low cost, and low maintenance theaters, primarily for adolescent boys. Yet such low quality and low cost theaters also showed low quality films, which many critics believed to be harmful to the development of children. Professional critics claimed the whole population was being corrupted not by dangerous ideas disseminated in films, but by the lack of intellectual stimulation or critical sensibility from the programmed films. If they could not be changed, the only alternative seemed to be to provide spectators with higher quality films through cinema clubs and special screenings.
CINEMA CLUBS One State activity to promote a cinema sector in Morocco was to support cinema clubs. This topic is important because they particularly shaped the perspectives of future bureaucrats, filmgoers, critics, and filmmakers about the types of film which should be considered suitable for Morocco, which models should be followed in filmmaking, what sources should be approached for encouragement and training, and other matters. Of further importance, the cinema clubs represented a very strong tie to French culture. The cinema clubs were also the sources from which emerged almost all Moroccan cinema critics, so that what was taught in 1968 was constantly replicated in the newspapers even decades later. In the early and mid-1950s, few cinema club activities were generated outside of the culture centers maintained by France and other European countries, although the CCM was involved and allocated subventions to associations (such as the Cinema for Youth), which educated through film.70 But in 1958, French residents in Morocco organized cinema clubs under the title Fédération Marocaine des Cinés-Clubs.71 By 1960 there were eleven clubs which were set up in principal cities, or large industrial areas, which projected films.72 This was supported by the Mission Culturelle et Universitaire Française, and during the twelve years of its existence the Federation used exclusively the stocks of the French Federation of Cinés-Clubs, making itself entirely an offspring of the French program. Although Morocco was admitted in the 1960s to the Fédération Internationale des Archives du Film, the first African country so admitted,73 there were few films to offer to cinema club activities; thus, international support from the French Federation was imperative to support club activities. The postindependence cinema clubs in Morocco were regulated by the dahir of November 15, 1958, concerning cultural associations and functioned on two
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levels. At one level, leaders were trained, or members were trained as leaders of the meetings. A second tier or level was regular membership meetings in which regular or occasional participants attended screenings and discussions. Cinema club leaders were trained: to run a cinema club; to program and project films; to deal with audiences; to deal with technical hitches and glitches; and to use various techniques and practices of presenting a film. Both members and leaders learned appropriate methods for discussing films; how to research cinema; critical approaches to cinema; and insight into Maghrebi and continental cinemas.74 Films were projected during meetings, such as October, Suspicion, Metropolis, films by Cocteau, Louis Malle, Abel Gance, and other classics, as well as films from Cuba and Latin American countries. The films chosen, according to official policy, gave the members a solid background in film development and history, which they in turn passed on to future members.75 It is noteworthy that cinema clubs began to program Moroccan films only in the mid-1960s. There was always a Moroccan chosen to preside over meetings, even though during this early period 90 percent of the membership comprised French residents. The clubs replicated the French cultural mission rather than taking a more local focus. Twenty clubs started out, but by 1968 only twelve remained, and only one was entirely Moroccan. For pretty much the first time ever the cinema clubs programmed Moroccan films in 1966, in Rabat and in Casablanca. The films were all shorts, the only products made by Moroccans until then. One main outcome was that although cinema clubs were training members to critique and view and talk about films in a certain way, they found it difficult to apply those same criteria to Moroccan films. Yet even in the mid-1960s, the cinema clubs were a site in which the members discussed the domination of the film market everywhere, but particularly in Morocco, by French, American, and Egyptian films, which rendered it almost impossible for a Moroccan film to be exhibited or distributed. In 1968 the CCM claimed vice presidency of the Federation of Cinema Clubs in order to establish a stronger-seeming commitment to Moroccanizing the national federation’s activities.76 Since the CCM in January 1969 announced its intention that distributors would Moroccanize,77 this social transformation would affect the cinema clubs too. For example, when the cinema club movement was renovated in early 1969, to give it fresh impetus, the new leadership located the administrative seat in the Ministry of Youth and Sports and asked each of the thirteen clubs, which were 99 percent European, to enroll two hundred young Moroccans.78 They also wanted to create Le Cinématographe (a review), to join the Fédération Internationale des CinésClubs,79 to participate in the congress of the federation in Helsinki, and to propose a reunion of North African cinema clubs—an effort already supported by Tunisia, which had one hundred clubs at the time. Yet other projects were
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also important—such as finding financial support since at the time they could only rely upon membership fees, the CCM, and the Ministry of Youth and Sports.80 The new federation had to pay Moroccan distributors for films (a high price, sometimes up to 200,000 francs), and to rent theaters to show their films; so they decided to try to form a cinema library of their own. Their catalog included features and short films for a total of about fiftysix films which were sorted into four categories: cinema club for ages over seventeen, cinema club for youths between fourteen and seventeen, youths of seven to fourteen years, and anyone over sixteen not specifically a cinema club member. Club organizers could get brochures and documentation that furnished analyses and critiques of films for discussion at the cinema club meetings. In comparison to the former cinema club emphasis on “high culture” films, new club activities became more diverse. The catalog of 1968 included a Nicholas Ray Western, John Wayne, Jean Cocteau, Jean Renoir, Camus’s Black Orpheus, Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis, Hitchcock, Spartacus, It’s a Wonderful Life, Virgo, and so forth.81 Moroccan short films were available to the clubs through the CCM. However, since 1968 the cinema clubs were still regularly supplied with films by the French Audiovisual Bureau’s cinema library which contained about 5,000 films. After the Ministry of Youth and Sports federation failed, the CCMsupported Fédération Nationale des Cinés-Clubs (FNCC) was created in March 1973.82 These later cinema club efforts will be elaborated in the next chapter.
CINEMA CARAVANS Cinema clubs, however, were not the only means by which to inculcate Moroccan youths or even adults. Cinema caravans were the rural alternative to cinema clubs, but also a primary agent of socialization for rural inhabitants and a means to create a sense of unity and shared common knowledge among the population. “Facilitating and encouraging comprehension among the different populations of the country, the cinema thus aids to cement national unity.”83 The cinema caravans were first created at the beginning of the 1920s by Maréchal Lyautey for the purpose of “propager jusque dans les communes lointaines, le point de vue du Protectorat sous forme de courts métrages et de journaux filmés.”84 A document from the Ministry of the Interior dated 1983 reiterates a rather similar purpose for the State-supported cinema caravans: “Projections organized by the cinema caravans have the objective to clarify the public opinion about the efforts deployed by the government in different domains. They also seek to raise the consciousness of citizens in the far removed localities not served by television and which do not have cinema theaters.”85
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In the 1960s and early 1970s, cinema was conceived to be the prime means to integrate the country in its common knowledge of itself, to make distant regions know to each other, and to create a common fund of knowledge and information—and to make money. While cinema would be disseminated by the theaters in urban centers, the majority of Morocco had no theaters, so the State set up a system of traveling exhibitions known as cinema caravans, which were of two kinds: private and public. The private sector caravans were owned by two types of businessmen. Large commercial enterprises like Coca-Cola and Cristal (cooking oil) showed free commercially oriented films in their caravans to publicize their products. Other caravans of purely commercial intent showed entertainment films and charged money. These two types existed relatively briefly.86 Otherwise, the public cinema caravans served the Ministry of Public Health, the Ministry of Agriculture, and the Ministry of Youth and Sports. These caravans showed films designed to educate the public toward a specific campaign. The Ministry of Agriculture showed films concerning agricultural practices, and the Ministry of Information showed films about official activities, and documentaries. Stateorganized caravans were funded by monies received from urban exhibition taxes. Yet these cinema caravans were primarily instituted to serve a function quite separate from that served by urban exhibitors and distributors, namely national development, as defined and shaped by the State. While urban youths were offered cinema clubs that educated them in critical approaches to cinema, rural youths were offered cinema caravans that educated them in the nation, modernity, and State-approved knowledge. At one time the caravans served a large population in rural areas until they largely diminished with the advent of television.87 Specialists organized very specific screenings for youths and adults in the perimeter zones, which had to take into consideration that different populations throughout the country spoke quite different languages or dialects. The projection is accompanied by an explanatory commentary given in the dialect language. These meetings, organized in the disinherited rural regions, unserved by entertainment houses, reach not only the youths but also adults. Long films, too long, requiring a sustained attention, are banished. On the contrary, short films, whenever possible in Arabic version, are remarkably adapted to the needs of these populations. The recreational films accompany various documentaries, on sanitary education or of economic or technical interest.88
The films were generally silent, with the commentary performed by a speaker using a microphone and speaking in the local dialect. Or, for some versions there were Arabic as well as two principal Berber dialects on sound tracks.89 Each caravan had a 16- and 35-mm projector, some speakers, a tape player, a
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record player, a portable screen, and an electricity ensemble. Two technicians accompanied each caravan: the projectionist/driver/mechanic and the speaker who spoke classical Arabic and several dialects. The films projected were mostly educational and productions of the CCM about agrarian reform, public health, recreational content, and community development films. Each program included one or several national or news programs. “These films seek to make Moroccans know the history and geography of their country, its touristic riches and economic resources. Others still teach the peasants how to improve their methods of cultivation. Adapted to populations which they address, these films are important factors of social advancement.”90 The government caravans projected films only in the most distant regions and only films of education and technical issues—never entertainment films.91 Having a minimal financial participation [my emphasis], the inhabitants are thus informed of political economic and social problems which face their country. The principal fundamentals of physical and moral hygiene are inculcated into the populations of the most distant regions; the inhabitants of the rural regions are introduced to modern agricultural techniques.92
“Having minimal financial participation” is the key term of the previous sentence. Rural folks were not going to be exposed to “entertainment” cinema because, being poor, they had little effective market power. Entertainment was only for those who could pay, whose payments could then be recirculated back into the urban entertainment system.93 Administrators believed that aid for rural cinema would lead to the building of new cinema theaters in previously unserved rural regions, while caravans would come to be employed only in regions with the most pressing needs. As well, the theaters constructed in rural regions could also serve as conference centers and places for cultural exhibitions. Few such centers were actually built in the countryside and cinema caravan activity did end when television extended its reach.
FILMS AND FILMMAKERS It is noticeable that the number of feature films during this period is quite limited compared to the number of filmmakers making shorts and documentaries. At independence, several filmmakers were training or trained abroad and otherwise entered the field to become the pioneers of early Moroccan cinema work: Larbi Bennani, Mohamed Said Afifi, Ahmed Mesnaoui, Abdelaziz Ramdani, Mohamed Tazi B.A.,94 and Mohamed Ziani. To this earliest list we can add Latif Lahlou, Mohamed Abderrahman Tazi, the Derkaoui brothers,
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Ahmed Bouanani, and Hamid Bennani. I want to call attention to those who first made their mark on Morocco with short films. I have selected some representative straightforward documentaries, and an educational film which sought to be more entertaining than the norm, and a development-oriented film.
MAIN PLAYERS AND SHORT FILMS Mohamed Osfour Mohamed Osfour is considered the “pioneer” of Moroccan cinema because he was the first to experiment with very small format moving images, such as 8 mm and 9 mm, making movies as a youth with his friends in the forests. His first short film was either Ghaba in 1941 (Forest), made with some of his friends, or L’Enfant de la Jungle in 1943, based on Tarzan movies, shot in the forest of Casablanca, Sidi Abd al-Rahman.95 The first 16-mm film was made in 1949 by Ahmed Mesnaoui, who then sold Osfour a 16-mm camera so Osfour could continue in the 1950s making films in 16 mm. No Moroccans were independent directors of feature films at the time, which made Osfour a real pioneer because he was producing independently and showing his films in cafes and neighborhoods. In 1957 he made L’Enfant Maudit, about a young boy who is mistreated by his parents and grows up to be bad, and in the end kills his fiancée. After several short films, he also made a feature in 1968, a Moroccan Western, Le Trésor Infernal, considered one of Morocco’s only fantasy films, with fights, pursuits, and technical feats to combine all the popular genres together into one film: Western, Zorro, Robin Hood, karate, Hindi, and Egyptian melodrama. Through the years Osfour also became known for his cinema inventions in camera equipment and problem solving for special techniques; he worked with numerous foreign crews filming in the country.96 Never studying abroad, he learned all his techniques from watching films, practicing making films, and working in the industry.97 Larbi Benchekroun Larbi Benchekroun was one of the first-generation filmmakers, and is considered to have made one of the first films after independence. He is reputed to have made nineteen documentaries ranging from the one listed here to various topics concerning development and industry. The film presented below has a narrative flow and is enacted, but some of Benchekroun’s works are very straightforward documents characterized by voice-over narration and factual description. Notre Amie l’Ecole (1956, b/w, 310 meters/11 mins)
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The CCM housed only the darija language version, indicating that it would have been made for release solely in Morocco; the film was produced at the Souissi studios. This is one of the earliest films produced by the CCM and can be appropriately considered a propaganda film on the importance of boys attending school; Western music underscores this film in which Mahmoud doesn’t attend school even though kids come all the way from the countryside to go. Instead Mahmoud wanders the streets, steals an apple and is caught; given the choice he discovers that it is better to go to school than prison. The film commentator speaks directly to Mahmoud, who represents all the young boys who do not want to attend the new school system. The last scene of the film is a young boy with a slingshot aiming at something; he shoots, and hits the title card which says “the end.” This film by Benchekroun posited that children, especially those in urban areas, found no outlet for their energies except trouble, crime, and unfortunate lives unless they attended school. The didactic style was characteristic of many early films which tried to reach the population with some message about development or change that was being encouraged by the new national government. The film style was more narrative, since shots were staged and enacted rather than captured as real life events that unfolded. Given the lack of sync sound in the era, the film was restricted to voice-over commentary addressing the audience through the vehicle of the youth. One of the primary objectives after independence was to educate minor and middle echelon employees, which required encouraging education and literacy in an environment in which children were needed by their families for their labor and household help. They could not be spared for schooling, ran the general consensus. Several films, both documentaries and features, presented young boys as protagonists who had to face the dilemma of attending school or not, of being well-treated by their parents or not, of learning urban life or not. Their future ability to live prosperous and successful lives and to aid their country’s development depended upon their abilities to be educated, well-treated, and urbanized. The opposite tendency, to stay working on the farm or to be working the streets at a young age only prepared youths for future lives of failure, poverty, and criminality (Le Fils Maudit (The Unfortunate Son), De l’Autre Côté du Fleuve (The Other Side of the River), al-Warta, and L’Enfance Volée (Stolen Childhood) for features, and Fittarik, Fourrage, and Chemin de la Reéducation for short films). Larbi Bennani Larbi Bennani is another early filmmaker who had an influential career, making sixteen films, but also winning renown for his efforts to interject humor
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and unique narrative style into several of his projects, even though many of his films followed the standard format of informative production. Lokmat Aiche (For a Mouthful of Bread) functions on a humorous but didactic level to encourage poor people to begin to consider sardines as a new, cheap, and delicious food source. The film stars young theater actor and director Tayeb Seddikki, who later became the most famous theater man in Morocco. Lokmat Aiche (Pour une Bouchée de Pain, For a Mouthful of Bread) (1960, b/w, 520 meters)98 Made in daraja only, this film was meant for internal development and even showed a man in the weekly market giving a “development” spiel to the crowds. There is an oriental music background to the film, which is something rare since most films of the era used Western music, jazz, or rock background scores. A voice-over explains each scene in this film ostensibly about sardines but which really treated the difficult day of an unemployed man trying to find food. The film opens on a city and workers going to work, cuts to a man choosing what tie to wear with his Western business suit, cuts to a rich and fat doctor sitting in front of an amazingly huge array of breakfast dishes of which he eats none, then cuts to a poor man huddling in front of his empty plate looking woebegone; the narration becomes very funny creating a scene of his hunger and his wife glaring at him because he has brought no food home to cook. The wife throws the shopping basket at him and points to door, “Go get food!” At the market a man with a megaphone talks about different fish. The previously funny enactment becomes more documentary style as the man explains the different fishing procedures being employed in the “new Morocco.” The educator actually goes into considerable detail about fishing and preparing processes, such as sardine processing in factories, putting them into cans, loading the cars for international transport; then he goes into some aspects of home preparation of sardines—all of which we see filmed. Then we are back into the market scene and the megaphone man ends his talk and the crowd disperses. Cut to the poor man in another market looking at flowers, ham, olives, meat and at the fish market he tries to buy one sardine! The sardine man slaps him, so he leaves to go to a parking lot to pretend to be the parking lot attendant so he can earn a little money. Soon the real attendant shows up and the poor man has to give up. He goes back to the fish market with his little change earned and buys a basket of fish for a coin and goes home. We hear a woman’s voice in the background in the house, and it turns out to be someone on the radio explaining how to prepare sardine dishes, why they are good for the health, how they have lots of vitamins and are cheap to buy: fry, smoke, grill, tajines—all are shown. The couple serves and eats the sardines and are very happy. Cut to the man going for an after-dinner smoke
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and talking about his full stomach. He then goes to watch friends play cards, and with his son takes a basket to buy dinner. This film is an early film about “development work” that takes great pains to insert a human element into the story. In an interesting aside, one of his later films, Keilaz ma Commune, 1969, color, is another narrative enactment and shows the function of cinema caravans in doing development work. Often the films made through the CCM reflected the work done through various agencies of the government, such as the Ministry of Education, or of course the Ministry of the Interior in terms of films about economic development, but also reflected are films about films, which is actually much more evident in feature films but also present in documentaries and shorts. Another of Bennani’s famous films, Nuits Andalouses, is often cited for its very unusual technique of representing a love relationship set to Andalusian music, replete with a setting in Granada, period costumes, Andalusian orchestra and dancing, sword fighting, and romancing. Mohamed Tazi B.A. Mohamed Tazi B.A., another prolific director of films for the CCM, is not to be confused with the very prolific director, cameraman, and director of photography Mohamed Abderrahman Tazi who worked at this same time period and also for the CCM—and who later became one of the most internationally wellknown Moroccan film directors. In fact, the two worked together on numerous projects. Mohamed Tazi B.A. also tried his hand at making his documents more interesting and sought to refine his aesthetic style. Tazi studied in France, at IDHEC, and worked in French television; he came back to Morocco in 1961 and began working in television in its earliest days because the RTM needed people to produce programming. He gained a great deal of experience directing live television, but soon moved to the CCM where he worked with the filmmakers Larbi Bennani, Latif Lahlou, and Abdelaziz Ramdani. Tazi continued working at the CCM for several years then went back to TV to do teleplays. Here I want to discuss Tazi’s film about Tinmel, which he had to get to by donkey and mule because there were no roads. All the equipment and the team had to reach Tinmel by animal as well. This filmmaker was very interested in breaking down any barriers or obstacles, and in the next section on feature films we will see his adventurous nature reflected again. La Mosquée de Tinmel, (The Tinmel Mosque: Birthplace of Almohades) (1964/6, b/w, 435 meters, English and French versions only) The camera pans over mountainous vistas and craggy settlements in the distance; a voice-over describes the close human ties in the region of the Souss Valley, how land is used, the interrelationships of man and land. Com-
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mentary: “Islam is the uniting force.” The roads are rough; men travel on horses. The filmmakers go with men on horses to houses, showing the difficult terrain, the tenuous life, rocks sliding down inhospitable mountainsides, peaks heavy with snow; the group drinks from a stream, and eventually, with much travail, get to an old mosque perched on the top of a mountain. The group then moves on to an old style olive mill, showing how it functions and its structure, then returns to the mosque to explore its minute details. The film is here a mixture of commentary and image, the commentary tending toward the romantic but not poetic. Yet we also are “informed” of the architectural details and other information we need to know to appreciate the historic monument. Soon the film makes a jump to the Koutoubia mosque in Marrakesh, and its history, then to Tour Hassan in Rabat and its history, and then to the Almohad gates. We have moved from south of Marrakesh to the north and Rabat in order to give some comparison to the mosque of Tinmel. But each comparative target receives only about 1 minute. Finally we see Bab Zeir, the Marrakesh gates, and fade out. Unfortunately, the film is marred by the jumpy ending comparisons and the commentary, written by Tazi, hampers the film. For example, “The idea of divine forces imposes itself on man”; “This is Almohad art in its finest form.” Latif Lahlou Lahlou is attributed approximately six films during this early period, and I have selected one that I believe to be an interesting example of making a narrative-oriented film to be used for development work, most likely for use in caravans in rural areas. The actors in the film are all farmers and peasants, set in their usual locale (i.e., their farms and homes), and speaking through the commentary. The film is nonsync, but the style of the voice-over technique tries to make the commentary in Moroccan darija seem as though it is spoken at times by the individuals on the screen, although only one commentator is used. I believe this would be one of the films also translated by accompanying personnel in caravans into Berber dialects. Fourrage (1966, b/w, 918 meters, Moroccan-Arabic dialect version only) In the film, the introductory scenes show a boy, Si Larbi, hassled each time he tries to graze his father’s cows on the road, on the roadside, or in someone’s unused field. The people who harass him tell him about the new uses of the land and the new ideal, which is to keep cows in a barn, giving them beet pulp left over after sugar extraction, giving them clover, collecting the manure for fertilizer, and selling the milk. The other farmers and the extension agent even go into detail on how to harvest clover and hay for cows. The audience learns that Si Larbi wants to go to school rather than watch
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cows anyway, so he is impressed with these ideas. The boy and the regional men convince Larbi’s father to agree. The local cooperative helps Si Larbi and his father to build a barn and Si Larbi gets to go to school. This agricultural development film was aimed to convince farmers to change their habits of cattle grazing. The traditional approach had been for farmers to let cattle graze freely, which meant they did not produce much milk, and the land was used in a more free and less regulated manner. However, the development plan was that farmers should grow clover to feed cows to produce milk, so that the farmers could then sell the milk—because much more milk was produced. Furthermore, the land was being parceled out in a more regulated and less communitarian manner, so cows under the new system could find less area to graze and unless farmers conformed to the new methods, their cows would be able to produce less and less milk. Ahmed Mesnaoui Mesnaoui, director of the film, is credited with approximately twenty-two films during this early period of filmmaking in Morocco. He was a self-taught filmmaker but one of the earliest to make a film in Morocco. He was the individual who sold a 16-mm camera to Osfour, mentioned previously, and had one of the longest records of active production in the country, producing from 1949 to 1984. His documentary style varied from pure didactic documentary to more creative construction, and he only directed one feature film, a codirection with Mohamed Tazi B.A. While the former films have been more educational or information-oriented, either focusing on educating poorer children to want to be educated, or on educating farmers in new ways of managing their work, or instructing and educating the poor about new food sources, or in instructing the neophytes about the heritage of Morocco, the next film represents one of the very different goals that short films sought to accomplish. That would be to apprise urban and more elite filmgoers of the current developments in urban and more bourgeois life. Of course, the following film might be useful for rural inhabitants to gain a glimpse of urban developments, but because the subject is Fassi (of Fez) marriage caftans and marriage planning of a well-to-do young and very bourgeois urban couple, I imagine the audience to be more modeled on the subject of the film. Of course, since this film was also made in a French version, there is the possibility that it would have a life as a “touristic” film, to encourage tourism and appreciation of cloth and clothes available in Morocco. Silhouettes aux Fils d’Or (Silhouettes of Gold Threads) (1967, 671 meters, Arabic and French versions)99
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The film opens on men and women sewing, working gold on jellabas. VO: “Amina’s fiancé lives far away and a love story is already underway.” The film takes the viewer into a museum of costumes and presents a brief history on Moroccan clothes. Amina sees a Fez style wedding outfit on a mannequin and immediately the film cuts to her in the clothes herself, and so forth, as she moves through the museum’s variety of styles. Actually, her boyfriend is a designer of material; they go together to see the looms at work and the designs available, and in this way take the spectator through some “actuality” footage. The film obviously includes some enacted events such as visiting the museum, a run in a garden, drinking tea, talking together, driving, having coffee at the beach, going to fabric stores and a fashion show, but also includes documentation about weaving and fabric making. Soon the film moves to their marriage celebration, from the beginning of being dressed in special clothes through the whole ceremony shown in stages, then the honeymoon at Restinga, playing at the beach, skiing, enjoying the sunset, and film ends. Again, I particularly included this film because it seems to be a film that opens a window onto Morocco, but to show what, and to whom? So that Moroccans can see their own looms at work, or how the bourgeoisie live? So that foreigners can be enticed by the exotic, the lure of museums and cloth and beaches and romance? Who is being targeted by a film such as this? These questions are difficult to answer for the outsider, and the filmmaker was/is not available to provide his answer, therefore I can only offer the evidence and speculate. But the ambiguity of what short films were made to accomplish, to what audience they were targeted, to what end they were produced, and what kind of Morocco they represented are all questions that can also be applied to the feature films that begin to appear during this era.
FEATURE FILMS: 1956–1970 Without seeking to deny the worth of other feature films made during this era, three particularly have left their mark upon the decades of discussion about cinema in Morocco. Vaincre pour Vivre/Life Is a Struggle is one of the team productions of the CCM, made in teams because the CCM could not quite yet decide to let individuals direct their own feature films. However, Soleil de Printemps/Spring Sun, by Latif Lahlou, was the film produced ostensibly so that Morocco would have a film made by “an individual” to show in the upcoming festival held in-country. Finally, I will discuss the film Wechma (Traces), directed by Hamid Bennani, which has until now been considered the first “truly Moroccan” film, the “best” Moroccan film, the “standard” to which subsequent films should strive.
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The ministry had decided that because Tazi had wanted to make a long film with the CCM,100 then everybody there would make a long film, but that the directors would have to work in pairs. Thus Tazi worked with Mesnaoui on the film Vaincre pour Vivre; at the same time Ramdani, Ghannam, Bennani, and Latif Lahlou joined forces for two films, Soleil du Printemps, and Quand Mûrissent les Dattes. But Tazi considers his the first because it came out first to the public.101 Vaincre pour Vivre (Life Is a Struggle) (1968, 105 mins, b/w, 35 mm)102 Famous musician Abdelwahab Doukkali plays a young musician, Karim, who flees from the daily grind of his father’s carpentry shop in a tiny Rif town to the glamour of Casablanca, in search of becoming a famous musician. In the transition he soon learns that he has not been equipped to deal with the “big league” he finds in Casablanca, and is quickly in debt, lost, and alone. His first friend is the receptionist he meets in a music agent’s office, with whom he goes out and even spends the night. Soon her ex-boyfriend, jealous because she had “dumped him,” murders the young woman. Karim, the musician, knows nothing of her murder but through a series of intrigues is blamed and eventually, near the end of the film, arrested. Karim, in the meantime, is distressed at being unable to make a living by playing music; a male friend from his hotel gets him a job in the port, while soon a rich girl—Souad (Leila Chenna)—takes him under her wing. She arranges for him to be “discovered,” and makes a place for him among her friends, the bourgeois and the successful. Discos, fast sports cars, hot 1960s outfits, and lots of alcohol set the scenes. Actually, numerous intrigues are woven into this film, particularly Souad’s rich boyfriend who hates Karim—believing Karim stole Souad from him; he manages to have Karim blamed for the murder while he simultaneously tries to avoid being caught himself for a serious hit-and-run car accident. However, finally Karim is cleared of all misunderstandings and complications; he and Souad pair, the rich boy is punished for the hit-and-run, and order is restored. According to Tazi, the film, styled upon the popular Egyptian musical melodramas of the day, received positive response from the Moroccan public but negative responses from its showing in Carthage where “gauchistes” criticized that it had a white phone and a swimming pool in it, which marred its social realism. Tazi explains that because the CCM insisted on the financial and creative contribution of distributors in making this film a commercial film, the filmmakers were constrained to make creative concessions, and to produce a musical which would have a guaranteed success.103 Further, the film was made with so little money that they had to rely on what locations
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they were afforded; in fact, he had to constantly change the film to fit the locations. For example, Laraki found someone who would let them use their villa, and it had a pool; thus the script was rewritten to accommodate a pool scene. When the team tried to shoot some scenes in the streets of Casablanca, they found the people of the streets were too interfering and it was too crowded. Someone agreed to let them shoot in the port. Tazi had to rewrite the script to figure out why this musician was in the port. Tazi would stay up all night rewriting and reorganizing the script and the next day they would shoot. Some elements wound up in the film by force of circumstance, not by original choice, yet in the end it all seemed to hold together. However, its commercial success surpassed all expectations; 96 million centimes were recuperated for a film which cost 20 million centimes to produce.104 For the first time in a long history in which this claim was made to justify the style of Moroccan films, Doukkali claimed that Vaincre pour Vivre was made to be “a film for the masses,” not to be a film of the mind for the leftists and elitists. The masses liked melodrama and action, so why should Moroccan films not have these qualities? The film did not require you to think, but just to enjoy; the speech was simple, the subject was simple; you sat and watched the film with minimal effort and enjoyed it.105 For the first time in a long history in which this claim was made to justify the quality of Moroccan films, Tazi said it was a film that was subject to the fact of “minimal/ insufficient means”; it was not his intended film, but there was the reality that he didn’t have a sufficient budget; he made the best film he could under the circumstances. I underscore here the dialectic referred to earlier, between films for the masses and films for the elites (film circle elites, not necessarily economic elites), and the role that the elites as critics would play starting at this time and dominating through the years, though finally beginning to relinquish their hold over cinema in the 1990s. For example, Vaincre pour Vivre was rejected by elites for not being on par with the latest styles of films from Europe and international festivals—they wanted a less popular film, one that would do well in festivals. They also critiqued the film for not being realistic or authentic, although it tried to be so, and for the bad actors—they weren’t professional or experienced enough to accomplish the task.106 At this time there would also be critiques from persons raised in cinema club culture, those who would look to European films or Third Cinema movements, to make comparisons with Moroccan productions. Again the issues of whether films should have an additional agenda or be made for pure consumption pleasure and entertainment would conflict. This film used Moroccan locales and stars, but would not be considered to represent the dominant reality of life
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in Morocco, would not be socially realistic, nor spur the masses to knowledge and change. Such conflicts over the goals of films will reverberate through future chapters. Some themes and questions have been more attractive to Moroccan filmmakers than others; the most dealt-with topic has been the opposition of modernity-tradition in a society in mutation such as Moroccan society.107 Here, in Spring Sun,108 the filmmaker opposes modernity and tradition, and indicates that integration is very difficult.109 Soleil de Printemps (Spring Sun, Chams Rabi’i) (1969, 90 mins, b/w, 35 mm) Lahlou presents the story of a young employee of twenty-eight, Hadi, who wants to climb the social ladder in Casablanca, but he has no means, either intellectual or financial; so he is constrained to a life of mediocrity—which he refuses.110 Hadi has left the countryside and his family’s farm to go to Casablanca to work; he has a job in a large office in which he does bookwork all day. He tries again and again to make friends and to improve his social standing and to improve his professional standing, but he is always defeated or always fails. The events of the film tell the hurdles and problems that hampered him from achieving his goal: he can never succeed in passing the requisite exams; he cannot keep his girlfriend; he cannot stand the lonely life he finds in Casablanca and finally returns to try to rediscover his place on the farm. But it is too late in a sense, because he has already been too influenced by the city to find happiness back home. He ends up in an ambiguous place, a liminal place, neither the city nor country being satisfactory. This film is considered a social film which transcended the simple problems of a “petit fonctionnaire” by including in the story the human and social difficulties of Morocco at the time. Lahlou believes the film was well-liked for the effort it made to be authentic, to show the difficulties of someone from peasant origins who wanted to adapt to life in Casablanca, but could not do so easily.111 Yet the film was not as popular with audiences as it was with critics. Lahlou describes his film as antiaction, and antispectacle, in which the drama is very subtle—a youth on the edge of maturity faced with cultural and social alienation.112 Film writer Souiba emphasizes that no one criticized the film’s sincerity, but to film boredom and dissatisfaction is always perilous, especially in this instance if the handling of the subject leads to yawns from the Moroccan audience. The main actor in the film even blamed the audience for being unable to positively receive the film due to their inculcation by Egyptian and Indian films that made it difficult for them to understand a sensitive and investiga-
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tive look into personality. Lahlou defended his work by saying that the film was heavily censored by the CCM, which marred his efforts and the overall quality of the film. Although the previous two films have maintained their reputations over decades and are still discussed today, and even critiqued today (Vaincre for being the first melodrama musical Egyptian style, and Sun for being pessimistic, social realism) no film has been so discussed and heralded over the decades as has Wechma.113 Bennani is another from this early period who studied at IDHEC, from 1965–1967, after spending some of his youth learning about cinema in Cinéclub L’Écran in Meknés. He came back to Morocco to work for television in radio television marocaine (RTM), but also remained involved in cinema. He actually worked on shooting short films for television. In 1970 he founded, with Mohamed Sekkat, Ahmed Bouanani, and A. Tazi a production society, Sigma 3, and collaborated in a review (Cinéma 3) headed by Nourredine Sail. Most important is the production society, Sigma 3, which allowed the film Wechma to emerge. The production company was actually formed as a cooperative or collaborative organization. While Tazi was responsible for camera, and Bouanani for editing, and Sekkat, Bennani, and Majid R’chich in production in general, for the film Wechma in particular Bennani was financier and director.114 These individuals wanted to work outside of the constraints placed by the CCM. Bennani and group had to form Sigma 3 because they had to be a legal body with at least a million dirhams in assets in order to be able to produce a film outside of the auspices of the CCM. However, in the end the CCM was a major contributor to the film with material, technicians (including the three other members of the production team), and in particular the editing facilities. The goal of the group was not to just hire technicians, but to work as a team, to have people in technical positions that could collaborate. While the final responsibility would fall onto Bennani for this film, he would be the collaborator on someone else’s film when they were ready to direct.115 Bennani wrote the scenario and dialogue but had help with Arabizing the dialogue, because he did not consider himself fluent in Moroccan Arabic. Bennani, as producer of the film, had a private donor who gave him 5 million dirhams to make the film.116 However, the CCM aided the film in very important and expensive ways, as noted above; further, the team members making the film all worked at the CCM, which let them off to make the film. Further, he used the editing room of the CCM, which was important. Wechma was the last feature to be shot in black and white, because everyone wanted to use color film. Even so, the film won a Bronze Tanit at the 1970 Festival of Carthage, awards at Damascus, Berlin, Tashkent and others, and was sent to numerous other festivals. At the time, in Morocco, in contrast, the film was
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shown in one cinema in Casablanca, but did not have good distribution and eventually the distributor just quit distributing it at all. However, the film was shown over and over in cinema clubs and Bennani presented it very often. Yet the decline in its distribution in the next decades did not parallel a decline in this film being used as a standard for other Moroccan films. Wechma (Traces, Tattoo) (1970, b/w, 100 mins, 35 mm) The film traces the destiny of a youth incapable of integrating into his society or family, or of finding his own identity. Many critics and scholars consider that Bennani was influenced by Buñuel in this film, both in his style and script. The film is dark and oppressive, the characters elusive rather than stereotypical, their motivations unclear. Yet, traditions, social order, and social relations emerge as the bearers of inherent decay and destruction. The film unfolds slowly, lasting over two hours, with major leaps of time in the protagonist’s life marked by no transitory explanation. Similar to the implied spectator of Buñuel’s Land without Bread, the spectator here is just an observer. The screen is closed space, we are distanced and yet not objective observers because we cannot always understand what is occurring, what is symbolism, and what is reality. The major character is Masaoud, an orphan who is negatively influenced and marred by a shocking childhood and a severe upbringing. The film opens on Masaoud adopted from an orphanage and taken home. Home life is restrictive but not oppressive, and only becomes destructive as Masaoud grows and challenges the power of the father. As Souiba indicates, the film is an investigation into the patriarchal order which dominates the relations between the son and the father in a milieu marked by its ancestral traditions.117 Neither the son nor the father can fulfill his prescribed role and only death can soothe their ongoing suffering. Masaoud’s problems become rendered as the problems of society itself, of the rural world, of unemployment, of lack of education, of youth in revolt, of a moral and intellectual void in society. Masaoud begins the story as a sensitive and inquisitive boy who is transformed—by his milieu, by the violence of other characters, by punishment metaphorically implying rape—into a wild and uncontrollable young man who does not know himself or his motivations or his desires. Beyond patriarchal relations of father and son are those of son and mother or man and woman. Masaoud’s masculinity is put in question, perhaps as a result of the implication earlier in the film that his father punished him in a manner that symbolized a rape; his femininity functions as a marker of his inability to relate to the world. He is at first sensitive and allows himself to be cuddled by his adoptive mother, but then after his punishment loses his
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ability to sympathize with women’s subordinate positions in the patriarchal order. Throughout the film, women are positioned in subordinate and oppressed roles. Bennani gives very little attention to women in this film, but when he does, they are either the weak and ineffectual mother caring for and cooking for the boy (young or old), or a crazy woman who is gang-raped by the youths Masaoud hangs out with, or a dancer/prostitute. At an early point in the film Masaoud is horrified by a gang of young boys who burn alive an owl they had captured. Later in the film he is horrified but participates in a gang of young men who rape a crazy woman (who happens to be wearing an owl mask). He can neither be out of the gangs of his age nor in the gangs. He is lost and has no “where” to belong. Social critics might say that this film’s portrayal of the boy is representative of the doom reserved for orphaned youths in Islamic societies.118 These descriptions may seem somewhat vague, and cannot reveal the story of the film, but it is impossible to really “sum up” this film due to its difficult structure and style. As Zerouali writes in his review, in spite of its numerous problems, the film is still interesting. One must watch it and rewatch it many times in order to be sure to understand it, to find out what it says as well as what it wants to say.119 Many critics who believed the film was too symbolic for a Moroccan audience, believed that the first half of the film was the most coherent, when Masaoud is a child, and would have been successful if cut then. But Hamid Bennani wanted to go further. He wanted to show a life condemned since childhood by an impossibility of integration, a failed adaptation into society. We find then, after childhood, Masaoud as an adolescent living in a fair, then with a band of delinquents into which he could not even integrate—in the end he revolts against exploitation and accidentally kills his employer. To escape he steals a motorcycle and ends up killing himself recklessly on the road. In general, the film is difficult and suitable only for specific spectators. The average audience that enjoys Hindi musicals and American action films might not accept a ponderous film with little action or dialogue or obvious plot. While one finds violence, sexual violence, adventure, and crime, the protagonist is so alienated to himself that he is doubly alienated from the audience. Excellent camera and lighting and shot techniques aside, Wechma indeed only leaves traces which the spectator must search for to combine as in a puzzle to construct meaning. Yet the film was acclaimed as the “first truly Moroccan film” and marked Morocco as a place where a new cinema aesthetic was being actively pursued. These were the responses typical of the cinema club adherents and more elite audiences who had either had exposure to film education and analysis, or who had exposure to discourse about cinema that elevated certain films and demoted others (i.e., elevated “symbolic” films and demoted “entertainment”).
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The three films presented here for short analysis reflect three approaches that battled for acceptance through the next twenty to thirty years in Morocco. What kind of film should be made for Moroccan audiences? What kind of model should be used? Who comprised the anticipated audience for a film? Certainly the anticipated audience for Wechma was not the same as for Vaincre pour Vivre. Wechma certainly won awards in international festivals, but didn’t earn any money in Morocco and encouraged filmmakers to rely upon the CCM for support, whereas Vaincre pour Vivre won money from Moroccan audiences and paid for itself.
CONCLUSION The first period of film production did not set a smooth pathway for Moroccan films to follow, but started off immediately creating an environment of conflict and confusion over cinema. As R’chich said about Moroccan cinema in general, and as it was implemented by the government’s policies in this early period, there was a lack of entrepreneurial spirit in Morocco, as filmmakers waited for the government to do something to make things better rather than doing it themselves. Sigma 3 was one early effort to cooperatively produce a film, but no other films resulted, and most of the resources still came from the CCM. Of course, the government through the CCM set itself up as the primary producer, and managed the cinema sector to hamper profit-making from entrepreneurs except in the distribution and exhibition sectors. However, the government did not set any real obstacles to opening businesses and taking initiative or doing cooperative projects either, if someone were very committed.120 But the structures set up by the State denied Moroccan filmmakers access to any income from distribution and exhibition, and effectively stymied filmmaking because few in the industry had “donors” of millions of dirhams to support film experiments. The State and CCM preserved their own authorities by preserving their incomes from exhibition taxations, and in recompense did not burden exhibitors or distributors with any requirement to further support the cinema of Morocco. Exhibitors and distributors could deal internationally and make enormous sums, but filmmakers were allowed only the options to work as crew on foreign films, work in television, work for the CCM, or work abroad until by miracle some money could be gathered to make a film. Some early filmmakers soon left Morocco to make profitable films outside, either in Europe or in Egypt. Thus, it would be important to consider the dialectic between filmmakers and the government in relation to the ongoing impasse.
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However, there was also a sense of adventure in general in production, because the CCM did not have the constraints about “the public” it would serve, the notion that a film must gain an audience and make some assumed profits. The CCM funded in-house production for the goal of disseminating film culture, for the purpose of giving filmmakers the opportunity to create a Moroccan cinema. Once notions of profitability intervened, production was much less adventuresome, and much less willing to take risks with new forms. Short film production was practically eliminated after the end of the 1970s and during the 1980s and only in the 1990s was slowly reemerging as an art form in itself, but with much more competition for funding and therefore less risk taking. Moroccan cinema’s role was defined in only one way at this point. Films were needed to inform the urban and particularly the rural public about their Moroccan-ness, about their neighbors, about development, about direction from a central government, about the new thing being shaped—the nation of Morocco. Outside of this need by the State, other sectors only raised questions about the roles and functions of cinema. Desired by the state to be educational, filmmakers wanted it to be an expression of their modernity and capabilities, but therein arose the ancillary question of what audience was to be served. Already the Moroccan audience was classified as either backward rural people who only deserved to be educated, or as urban audiences already corrupted by Egyptian, Hindi, and American films. The Moroccan audience was posited in opposition to the festival judges outside of Morocco who only could understand deep and symbolic films. Given this positioning of the audiences, how could the economic role of cinema be determined? Cinema oriented to the hinterlands was paid for and exploited by the state. Cinema for urban audiences was profit-oriented already and relied on cheaper imports or Moroccan films that emulated the imports, the popular styles. Distributors and exhibitors quickly learned that films such as Wechma would not earn box office receipts, and formed their decisions not to invest too heavily in supporting Moroccan film distribution and exhibition. Most evident in the resources consulted to write this chapter, in the dialogues expressed in journals and reviews, in discussions with filmmakers, the Moroccan public was here only nascent, a passive receiver rather than an active participant in the cinema of their nation. The State did depend upon cinema to function in its behalf, to make the people identify with the “nation” of Morocco, but the public was talked about and acted upon while being allowed but the most minor of feedback opportunities. This would change over the coming decades, but it did set the tone for the way audiences were handled in the next era, how films were oriented, and how cinema progressed in Morocco.
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Was film going to be educational or entertaining? Was film going to be a bureaucratic endeavor or a high-culture practice that revealed a person’s soul or a rollicking musical that could draw upon nascent talents within Morocco? Who were the filmmakers, and what Morocco was important to them? Was film going to decrease the distance between rural and urban, rich and poor communities, or further divide them? How much of the old order, preProtectorate as well as Protectorate Morocco, was going to be reiterated in the new Morocco? Would cinema be a means of free expression and emblematic of regional differences in its content, or just a means for the State to emphasize its growing control over various means of expression throughout the country? These questions and concepts will be elaborated upon in the pages that follow. NOTES 1. M. Abdenbi Daa, “Le Cinema Marocain de L’eclosion au Blocage” (Mémoire, Institute Superieur de Journalisme, Rabat, 1979–1980), p. 49. However, cites the author, these sentiments have not been applied either before or after their utterance. “Il n’est pas question que le cinéma soit pour nous un divertissement. Certes . . . il faut divertir, mais dans des périodes de construction ou de reconstruction il faut avant tout, éduquer, former et instruire. . . . Dans le domaine de la formation dans un pays comme le nôtre où il est nécessaire de former dans un temps très court le plus grand nombre de cadres possibles, le cinéma est un facteur important. Pour les masses, c’est un moyen de vulgarisation. En effet . . . grâce au cinéma, les masses peuvent prendre conscience de l’époque modèrne dans laquelle elles vivent et vivre ainsi à l’échelle de leur époque.” 2. “une règlementation très étroite de l’activité cinématographique touchant à l’exercice même de la profession, comportant notamment des dispositions impératives auxquelles distributeurs et exploitants sont contraints de se conformer dans leurs rapports contractuels” (Maillot, p. 24). 3. Maillot, p. 29. 4. Maillot, p. 25. 5. Il est placé sous l’autorité d’un commissaire du Gouvernement nommé par décision résidentielle sur proposition du directeur du Service Général de l’Information et chargé “de prendre toutes mesures ou d’assurer l’exécution de celles qui seront édictées par arrêtés résidentiels touchant la profession cinématographique au Maroc, notamment celles concernant les autorisations d’exercice de la profession, l’organisation des entreprises cinématographiques, le régime des spectacles cinématographiques.” Il comprend un service central à Rabat et une inspection administrative à Casablanca, capitale économique du Maroc et principal centre d’activité de l’industrie cinématographique (Akharbach, p. 17). 6. Ce service a pour mission l’étude des questions générales intéressant l’ensemble de l’industrie cinématographique et la solution des problèmes posés par cette indust-
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rie. A cet égard, le chef du Service du Cinéma dispose du pouvoir d’édicter, dans le cadre des textes organiques, une réglementation de l’exercice de la profession. Ses décisions concernent la programmation des séances, contiennent des dispositions relatives à l’aménagement des salles, rappelant en de multiples occasions aux membres de la profession leurs obligations. Aux termes de l’arrêté résidentiel du 3 février 1944, elles doivent être contresignées par le directeur de l’Information. Le chef du Service du Cinéma formule également des avis et des recommandations sous forme de circulaires adressées aux membres de la profession. Très proche de la profession qu’il contrôle, ce service est à même de conseiller l’Etat sur la politique à suivre et la règlementation à élaborer en matière cinématographique (Maillot). 7. Il est créé un Centre Cinématographique Marocain qui est placé sous l’autorité du directeur des affaires politiques et qui a pour objet la production, la distribution et la projection de films cinématographiques “ainsi que la constitution d’une cinémathèque. Cet organisme est un établissement public doté de la personnalité civile et de l’autonomie financière” (Maillot, p. 11). 8. Maillot. 9. La création du Centre Cinématographique marque un tournant essentiel dans l’histoire de l’administration du cinéma au Maroc. Désormais, l’État ne se borne plus à exercer un contrôle politique et professional sur l’industrie cinématographique, il devient producteur. Non content de règlementer et d’administrer, il exploite (Maillot, p. 32). 10. Akharbach, p. 17. 11. Created under the tutelage of the Ministry of Information, only in the mid1990s did the CCM move to reside under the auspices of the Ministry of Communication, which had itself been newly created. 12. This argument would be somewhat modified at the present time because of the dissemination of television and satellite; since there was no TV at that time, thus cinema had to play a significant role in Moroccan information policy until the late 1960s, when TV had a little more chance to proliferate. 13. “Facilitant et encourageant la compréhension entre les différentes populations du pays le cinéma aide ainsi à cimenter l’unité nationale” (Maillot). 14. Fouad Souiba and Fatima Zahra el Alaoui, Un Siècle de Cinéma au Maroc 1907–1995 (Rabat: World Design Communication, 1995), p. 15. 15. MAROC 70, brochure published by Centre Cinématographique Marocain. 16. Abdelkader Taleb, “Cinéma Maghrebin, Crise & Identite” (Memoire de Fin d’Etudes, Institute Superieur de Journalisme, Rabat 1989–1990), p. 18. 17. Pierre Haffner, “Le Sens de Khouribga: Les cinémas africains et le rôle du Maroc,” Dirassat Cinimaiya, Etudes Cinématographiques, Revue de la Fédération National des Ciné-Clubs du Maroc, 10 (Mars/Avril 1990, Kenitra, Morocco), pp. 48–55. 18. Haffner. 19. Interview with Majid R’chich. 20. Much later, a new complex was created by the CCM in Casablanca, in Ain Chok, in 1968, and the Souissi studios remained unused. However, eventually the Ain Chok facilities could not survive their financial difficulties either, and also closed.
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21. Mostafa Ejmahri, “The Legal System of the Cinema in Morocco,” Dirassat Cinimaiya, Etudes Cinématographiques, Revue de la Fédération National des CinéClubs du Maroc, 12 (Sept./Oct. 1990), pp. 29–39. 22. L’arrêté viziriel précité du 19 juin 1946 dispose qu’aucune installation cinématographique fixe ou foraine ne pourra être effectuée dans un lieu overt au public sans autorisation du Commissaire du Gouvernement, chef du Service du Cinéma, délivrée après avis du Chef des Services municipaux ou de l’autorité locale de contrôle (Maillot, p. 31). 23. Maillot, p. 50; or on 14 November 1952, depending on source. 24. Daa, p. 17. 25. Daa. 26. Directement rattaché au Centre Cinématographique, ce service a pour objet essentiel la centralisation et la conservation des films de long ou court métrage tournés dans le pays ou à l’étranger et ayant le Maroc pour cadre. Il s’agit de constituer “dans l’intérêt de l’art et de l’histoire des archives et un musée de la Cinématographie” (Maillot, p. 51). 27. A 1977 decree restipulated the organization of such a library by the CCM because the endeavor had not been pursued. 28. Maillot, p. 54; because the government-controlled cinema sector was not a functional until 1958 when the Service du Cinéma was fully annexed to the CCM (January 7, 1958). 29. Ejmahri, pp. 29–39. 30. Cette administration, dont le siège est à Rabat, comporte une section “cinema” spécialisée, à la tête d’un réseau d’inspections régionales, de circonscriptions et d’agences couvrant tout le Maroc. Elle dispose ainsi de 16 points de chute qui étendent leurs ramifications jusque dans les régions les plus reculées (Maillot, p. 13). 31. Ejmahri, pp. 29–39. 32. Maillot, pp. 59–60. 33. Maillot, p. 109. 34. Centre Cinématographique Marocain in-house literature. 35. MAROC 70. 36. Daa, p. 37. 37. Latif Lahlou, “Le cinéma au Maroc, hier et demain.” 38. Fund management, 2 percent; Moroccan daily news, 12 percent; equipment and labs, 4 percent; CCM official production and aid to private production, 40 percent; exhibition, 25 percent; advertising and distribution, 5 percent; education of production personnel, 2 percent; rural cinema, 10 percent. 39. M. Mehdi Abri, “La Consommation Cinématographique au Maroc” (Mémoire, Institut Superieur de Journalisme, Rabat, 1980–1981). 40. Taleb. 41. Hamdane, p. 30. 42. Taleb, p. 24. Later, a complex with a laboratory in color as well as black/white, an auditorium, and a production unit were built in Rabat in June 1981. The Rabat
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facilities seem mostly a fabrication for prestige purposes, since production quantity remains quite limited. 43. Must be around 1967 since it includes films produced as of 1966. 44. Abdallah Zerouali, “Quand Murissent les cineastes,” Lamalif 44, Dec. 1970, pp. 44–45. 45. Zakya Daoud, “Le cinéma marocain à la recherche du temps perdu,” Lamalif 31, July-August 1969, pp. 12–18. 46. Souiba, “L’Ecriture Cinématographique au Maroc.” 47. Lahlou, “Le cinéma au Maroc, hier et demain.” 48. Ahmed Araib, “Cinéastes Marocains, Que sont-ils devenus?” AlMaghrib (30–31 December 1990), p. 13. 49. Compared to 1992’s more than 200 employees and fewer films produced. 50. Ahmed Araib, “Le Métier de tous les défis,” Al Maghrib, March 8–9, 1992, p. 11. 51. Mohamed Dahane, “The Trends of the Moroccan Cinema (1959–1986),” trans. into Arabic Mohamed Sijilmassi, Dirassat Cinimaiya, Etudes Cinématographiques, Revue de la Fédération National des Ciné-Clubs du Maroc, 12 (Sept./Oct., 1990), pp. 17–28. 52. Rabat Festival, Roundtable on Moroccan short films, June 1996. In the 1980s and 1990s there was no market for shorts and thus production became less important or notable. 53. Maillot, p. 95. 54. Daoud, “Le cinéma marocain à la recherche du temps perdu,” p. 15. 55. Maillot, p. 86. 56. Maillot, p. 92. 57. Maillot, p. 15. 58. Maillot, p. 87. 59. . . . le prix moyen du billet du cinéma est maintenu à un niveau accessible aux bourses les plus modestes et figure parmi les éléments entrant dans le calcul de l’indice du coût de la vie qui fait l’objet d’une protection spéciale de la part des pouvoirs publics, faveur que ne connaissent ni la littérature ni le théâtre, ni les autres formes d’éducation ou de distraction (Maillot, p. 98). 60. Empêcher un commerçant de fixer lui-même le prix de sa marchandise oblige moralement à lui accorder une compensation en cas de manque à gagner. Partout où le prix des places de cinéma est soumis à une limitation, il est donc du devoir des pouvoirs publics de soutenir l’industrie cinématographique nationale menacée de résultats déficitaires (Maillot, p. 98). 61. This was the predecessor to the other production funds to be discussed in later chapters. 62. Le Fonds d’Aide à l’exploitation cinématographique a été institué par le dahir du 7 août 1954 (Maillot, pp. 101–102). 63. “en ce qui concerne l’exploitation, les fonds d’aide qui lui seront réservés sont destinés à concourir à la réalisation de travaux de sécurité, hygiène, amélioration technique,
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embellissements et modernisation dans les salles de spectacles cinématographiques publiques équipées en format de 35 mm” (Maillot, p. 110). 64. Maillot, p. 110. 65. Ahmed Hidass, “Liberté et communication au Maroc,” L’Information au Maghreb, Ouvrage collectif sous la direction de Wolfgang S. Freund (Tunis: Cérès Productions, 1992), pp. 231–277. 66. Hidass. 67. “[avait] laissé subsister juridiquement ce contrôle à l’échelon national et les pouvoirs de police des gouverneurs de préfecture et des pachas et qaids, à l’échelon local. Mais, à l’heure actuelle [1960] . . . le centralisation du pouvoir, qui placé entre les mains du Gouvernement la totalité des pouvoirs, dépouille pratiquement les autorités locales du droit de renchérir à la censure centrale” (Maillot, p. 44). 68. Maillot. 69. Il est ( . . . ) du devoir de chacun de faire la distinction entre les problèmes qui peuvent valablement fair l’objet de discussions et de divergences d’opinion et entre les problèmes autour lesquels doit se réaliser une unanimité nationale. Ces derniers ne sauraient faire l’objet de surenchères de nature à contrecarrer les efforts sincères déployées en vue de l’intérêt général. (S. R. Le Roi Hassan II, Le Maroc en Marche (Rabat: Ministry of Information, 1965), pp. 266–267.) 70. Maillot, p. 98. 71. Akharbach, pp. 77–78. 72. Maillot, p. 108. 73. Maillot, p. 13. 74. In the earlier 1960s, there were Pre-cine-clubs, created to educate youths for eventual participation in cine-clubs. Films would be followed by debates and discussion similar to that encouraged in cine clubs. 75. “Les Projets de la Fédération Marocaine des Ciné-Clubs,” Lamalif 30, MayJune 1969, p. 46. 76. “La Fédération est contestée,” Lamalif 24, November 1968, p. 59. 77. Mehdi Haimeur, “Le cinéma doit tenir compte des problèmes économiques et sociaux,” Lamalif 24, November 1968, p. 58. 78. When the early incarnation of the cinema clubs failed by 1970, the Ministry of Youth and Sports tried to regroup the cine-clubs under L’Union Marocaine des Cinés-clubs, but it also did not last. 79. As of 1968, the Fédération Marocaine des Cinés-Clubs was not a member of the Fédération Internationale, and had the weakest participation of all the North African countries. 80. “Les Projets de la Fédération Marocaine des Ciné-Clubs,” p. 46. 81. Catalog des Films de la Cinémathèque 1968, Ministère de Jeunesse et Sports, Rabat. 82. Akharbach, pp. 77–78. 83. “ Facilitant et encourageant la compréhension entre les différentes populations du pays le cinéma aide ainsi à cimenter l’unité nationale” (Akharbach, p. 79). 84. Akharbach, p. 79.
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85. Les projections organisées par les caravanes cinématographiques ont pour objectif d’éclairer l’opinion publique sur les efforts déployés par le gouvernement dans les différents domaines. Elles veillent aussi à la prise de conscience des citoyens dans les localités éloignées non déservies par la télévision et qui ne disposent pas de salles de cinéma. (Akharbach, p. 79.) 86. Himit, p. 35. 87. Maillot, pp. 108 and 109. The CCM continued to use caravans into the 1980s. 88. La projection est accompagnée d’un commentaire explicatif donné dans la langue dialectale. Ces séances, organisées dans des regions rurales déshéritées, dépourvues de salles de spectacles, atteignent non seulement les jeunes mais aussi les adultes. Les grands films, trop longs, exigeant une attention soutenue, sont bannis. Au contraire, les courts métrages, autant que possible en version arabe, sont remarquablement adaptés aux besoins de ces populations. Les films récréatifs voisinent avec les documentaires variés, d’éducation sanitaire ou d’intérêt économique et technique (Maillot, p. 13). 89. Maillot, p. 113. 90. Ces films visent à faire connaître aux Marocains l’histoire et la géographie de leur pays, ses richesses touristiques et ses ressources économiques. D’autres encore apprennent aux paysans à améliorer leurs méthodes de culture. Adaptés aux populations auxquelles ils s’adressent, ces films sont d’importants facteurs de promotion sociale (Maillot, p. 13). 91. This point is very important, even in the 1990s. 92. Moyennant une participation financière minime [my emphasis], les habitants sont ainsi informés des problèmes politiques, économiques et sociaux qui se posent à leur pays. Les principes fondamentaux de l’hygiène physique et morale sont inculqués aux populations des régions les plus reculées; les habitants des régions rurales sont initiés aux techniques agricoles modernes (Maillot, p. 109). 93. I will comment upon several short films in the last section of this chapter that indicate that Moroccan filmmakers did try to, at least occasionally, make their “informative and educative” films of an entertaining nature, to reprieve the rural peoples from being considered so alien and marginal that they would not be deserving of entertainment! 94. There are two filmmakers with very similar names who began working and still work in Morocco: Mohamed Tazi B.A. and Mohamed Abderrahman Tazi. I have separated them in the Appendices, except for films which don’t specify which Tazi directed them. 95. Rabat Festival, Roundtable. 96. Souiba and el Alaoui, pp. 15 and 55. 97. I am not discussing his films in more detail herein, having not had the opportunity to view them. 98. Stars Tayeb Seddikki and Fatima Regragi. 99. Starring Leila Chenna and Abdelkader Ben Slimane, Mohamed Lazrek, Fatima Lamoir.
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100. Interview with Mohamed Tazi, B.A. He made a first feature film coproduction, la Route du Kif, in 1966—also known as Alerte a la Drogue, retitled by the distributor in Casablanca who did not want to pay Tazi any royalties! Tazi was supposed to get 10 percent. That film was coproduced with Italians because the CCM had told Tazi that he could not make a feature under CCM auspices but had to find a producer. So he found someone in Casablanca, who found some Italians who wanted to make a film, and la Route du Kif, an action espionage film was birthed, and apparently popular in the theaters. After that, Tazi went back to the CCM, which then decided to do Moroccan-only features, without requiring a foreign investor. 101. 1968, Life Is a Struggle/al-Hyat Kifah, Mohamad Tazi B.A. and Ahmed Mesnaoui. 102. Starring the well-known musician Abdelwahab Doukkali (who later starred in many features and became very famous), Leila Chenna (a professional actress), and Mustapha Mounir, was produced by M. Laraki of Afrassia-Film Society, and the CCM, for a very low budget. Tazi wrote the song lyrics himself. Tazi and Mesnaoui were never to get much in revenues from the film because they were budgeted only 10 percent of the 50 percent due to the CCM after the producer, exhibitor and miscellaneous expenses were met. 103. Souiba, “L’Ecriture Cinématographique au Maroc,” p. 28. 104. Mohamed Tazi, “Le cinéma marocain entre l’aspiration et le bilan,” ANWAL, 18 Novembre 1982. 105. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, with Doukkali and film Hyat al Kifah/Life Is a Struggle. 106. “Débat autour de ‘Vaincre pour Vivre,’” Lamalif 26, January 1969, p. 27. 107. For example, Ramdani/Bennani’s Quand Murissent les Dattes, 1968, feature, 90 mins, color, 35 mm: A. Ramdani and L. Bennani cowrote and directed; actors Larbi Doghmi and Habiba Medkouri, Bella Bellamine, Saad Thamy, Abderrazak Hakam . . . CCM production, coproduced by Cinécité Marocaine, which also financed the Festival de Tanger. Unfolds in the palm groves of southern Morocco, in the pre-Sahara region, concerning two tribes on each side of the palm divide, who try to remedy their antagonistic relationships. The film tells also of conflict between tradition and modernity, and influences of the colonial era. As the second Moroccan feature, it is notable for its departure from the dominant Egyptian style. The CCM literature says: “L’histoire du film qui se déroule dans les palmeraies du Sud du Maroc, à la porte du fascinant monde pré-Saharien, est une succession de divertissants contrastes divisant deux tribus qui seront aplanis par la génération naissante, animée d’un esprit constructif, qui saura naturellement rétablir les rapports entre les antagonistes. Les éléments classiques qui composent cette divertisante comédie de costumes sont rehaussés par l’éclat d’une ambiance absolument nouvelle pour le monde du cinéma et de la culture en général.” 108. Soleil de Printemps (Chams Rabi’i), 1969, 90 mins, b/w, 35 mm written, directed and edited by Latif Lahlou, script and dialogue Latif Lahlou and Abdelkrim Ghallab from Ghallab’s novel. Image Mohamed Sekkat. CCM Production. Principle role played by Hamidou (Hamidou Ben Masaoud) with Fatima Cheikh, Idriss Bennani, Khadija Tazi, Amar Bennacer, Fatima Regragui. . . . 109. Akharbach, p. 112.
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110. Daoud, “Le cinéma marocain à la recherche du temps perdu.” 111. Lahlou, “Le cinéma au Maroc, hier et demain.” 112. Daoud, “Le cinéma marocain à la recherche du temps perdu.” 113. Wechma, Traces, Tattoo, 1970. Hamid Bennani, b/w, 100 mins, 35 mm. With AbdelQader Mataa’, Mohamed Kaghat, Toufiq Daada. Script and direction Bennani. DP Abderrahman Tazi. Editing Bouanani. Music Kamal Dominique Hellebois. 114. Interview with Hamid Bennani, June 17, 1996. 115. Ignacio Ramonet, “A Propos de ‘Traces,’” Lamalif 45, Jan./Feb. 1971, pp. 45–48, 45. 116. To me this seems a lot for the time; but could mean also 50,000 depending on whether he is using “million” in the French or Moroccan Arabic sense. In French it means million, but in Moroccan colloquial it can mean 10,000. Confusing, yes. 117. Souiba, “L’Ecriture Cinématographique au Maroc,” p. 54. 118. Jamila Bargach, “Between Prescription and Proscription: Kafala, Adoption and Abandoned Children in Morocco” (Ph.D. Dissertation, Rice University, Houston, June 1998). 119. Abdallah Zerouali, “Quand Murissent les Cineastes,” Lamalif 44, Dec. 1970, pp. 44–45, 45. 120. Interview with Majid R’chich.
Chapter Two
Looking to Define a Moroccan Aesthetic, 1971–1985
Our filmmakers should for the most part add a notice to their film or a notice of deployment so that the spectator can defuse the semiotic mines which often pepper the film. And if it is not understood, too bad for him, he has only to reread Metz, Mittry, and Barthes! It is, one says—auteur cinema. In fact, it is a cinema where each one makes his film, and goodbye to emotion! Goodbye good stories! The joys and pleasures of cinema!1 Orphan of space, prohibited to reach those who wait for it and for whom it is destined: it is a cinema menaced by silence and exile. It should at least, if not fully exist, uncover and bring into the daylight the scandalous system of the politics of blockade and of suffocation of this new expression in Arabic cinema. For this system, only a black screen is available.2
After fourteen years of independence, Moroccan film production practices and institutions matured, and filmmakers focused on more original expression, especially in feature filmmaking. However, primary concern about film’s function in society or for social development shifted to primary concern about problems, deficiencies, and alienation in cinema. In the perspective of the new era, questions about the social function of cinema still resonated, but at a lower frequency. The issues of whether cinema should be educational, entertaining, or nation-building, became issues of social versus auteur films. Less so in the new era was “nation-building” brought into question; rather, “nation-defining” emerged in terms of the State’s handling of internal divisions and contrary perspectives concerning cinema as a private versus a public endeavor. The question shifted to become: should films be made to be seen by the Moroccan public, or for the fulfillment of the filmmaker? The question about whether film could play a role in building the nation became: what is the role 89
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of the nation-State in the promotion and protection of films made by Moroccans? Two emerging issues in the previous era were to be major obstacles to the growth and dissemination of Moroccan films in the 1970s and 1980s: the cooperation of the “private” distribution and exhibition sectors in the advancement of Moroccan filmmaking, and the manner in which the State supported and regulated film production. One main reason for the changes was the progress to production of feature films. The distinction between making films and making a cinema began to emerge. One persistent theme in this era is the conflicted perception about the “function” of film. While previously the State had assumed control of the cinema domain in many respects, between 1971 and 1985 there arose a tripartite division between the State, private sector distributors and exhibitors, and filmmakers as being loci of responsibility for the development of cinema. Each of the three maintained completely different perspectives over how Moroccan cinema should develop, what goals should be pursued, and what role the industry should play overall in the growth of the nation. The years 1971–1985 were an era of contradictions, with very few overlapping or complementary zones, a theme which will emerge quite often in this chapter.
THE CONTEXT AND THE INSTITUTIONS One immediate change between 1971 and 1985 is that the few forays made into feature production were quickly followed by additional feature films and a large increase in the numbers of new filmmakers, although throughout the period short films diminished in number. If the previous period would be considered the “Golden Age of Documentary and Short Films,” this period could be considered the “Looking to Define a Moroccan Aesthetic” period. Perhaps it should be called “The Problem with Moroccan Cinema” period, since it was primarily defined by the efforts of Moroccan filmmakers, through feature films, to find a distinctive cinema style on the one hand, and on the other hand a period in which negative criticisms of those films prevailed. It was the effort to create a distinctive style that further enhanced the already nascent conflict between those Moroccans who believed film should be made for the masses and for entertainment, and those who believed film should be an art, a personal expression, or a product that could be appreciated only by an elite or minority sector of society. One argument claimed the cinema sector should be considered part of the national patrimony and therefore supported, versus an argument that pointed out that the sector was part of the liberal economy and should be encouraged to function on a competitive basis. There were intermediary stances, too, but few.
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The period 1971–1985 marked a turning point in which the various sectors began to define their own needs and wants in competition with the limited resources of the country. At this time the “nation” became less relevant as a target of filmmaking and development; instead, the endeavor was elevated to become an end in itself rather than a means toward national development and national individuality. Rather than films representing the nation and the State, the State became the site of struggle over resources and laws. The State was expected to develop the cinema infrastructure and to enable production of films, yet was criticized for its inconsistent control over the domain (i.e., the State censored and taxed, but refused to require theaters to exhibit Moroccan films). Yet most importantly, the role of the State institutions were highly emphasized. As discussed below, the State’s regulations and stances continually changed as it sought to define its own position concerning national cinema, which interacted with the ongoing debates that continually occurred in cinema clubs, with filmmakers, with critics, and with the public. Such struggles emphasize a growing tension between filmmakers and their publics, even the distanciation of filmmakers from their publics, and the distanciation of Moroccan filmmaking in general from the Moroccan people or nation. Competing models for how cinema should function created competing demands for the types of films, the types of State control, and the overall orientation to building a cinema structure. All sectors criticized the others and all criticized the films; the filmmakers defended their films by criticizing the other sectors and the absence of support. This will be discussed in detail below. The aesthetic for most new filmmakers was not a technical one, but a philosophical and theoretical one. Therefore, films lauded for representing Morocco’s search for a new aesthetic might not have been films that actually evidenced much technical mastery of filmmaking. Since most of the issues pertaining to exhibition and distribution, and regulation by the CCM will be discussed in other sections of this chapter, this section will focus on (1) the changing role of the filmmaker, (2) the issue of technical mastery, and (3) the issue of film style and function. Interwoven into all three is why Moroccan films were considered unappealing.
THE CHANGING ROLE OF THE FILMMAKER The filmmaker began to move from being strictly an employee of the CCM to function somewhat independently as scriptwriter, director, producer, and other roles. The filmmaker was usually required to perform several functions during the life of the film, from writing, directing, and producing to include
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even acting, set designing, location scouting, and other administrative tasks, then often also editing, distributing, and promoting the film. Filmmakers became known literally as “jacks of all trades,” because they had to perform so many roles and functions. Some did so by necessity, because there were no qualified personnel to hire, or no one willing to volunteer when there was no money to hire. Some did so by choice, because they were committed to a particular notion of auteur cinema. Thus, the filmmaker and the film product tended to become synonymous during this period. As well, critiques of films functioned simultaneously as critiques of the filmmaker and team who made the film because the two were so intertwined. Two primary criticisms were a lack of technical quality or mastery, and that the subject matters were too intellectual, symbolic, and abstract for the majority of Moroccan audiences. THE ISSUE OF TECHNICAL MASTERY Many Moroccan films had problems with their technical quality. Many filmmakers were so much more interested in the topic, their philosophy, and their theories of cinema, that stories got lost, or the details of telling the story through the medium of the visual was shunted aside or forgotten. However, Moroccan audiences decoded cinema from having learned visual not philosophical codes, and found themselves in new territory when dealing with philosophy and the mental rather than emotionality and the image. On the other hand, some filmmakers did pay attention to visual elements and the story, but were hampered by lack of technical personnel and infrastructure in the country, and by lack of money for certain work, and perhaps even by lack of training in the medium. Whatever the underlying causes, the pertinent issue was that many films were considered technically deficient in comparison to films from other countries, even other developing countries. And Moroccans considered this to be a big problem. Ali Hassan’s television interview with actor Mohamed Miftah and director Nabyl Lahlou nicely summarizes the typical bones of contention: Miftah: Theater depends on the text, the dialogue. Somebody who is blind can go into the theater and understand. Cinema differs from theater because it depends on the image; even if there is no dialogue, you can understand from the image. The Moroccan audience is accustomed to watching, because they watch the cinema of the world . . . Russian cinema, Hindi cinema, American and European cinema. . . . I even know some people who learned Hindi just from watching films; . . . the Moroccan audience sympathizes and follows these films. But Moroccan films are not accepted by the Moroccan audience. Why? Because there is something wrong. What is wrong is that we are doing cinema without doing the alphabetics of cinema. We don’t do the ABCs of cinema.
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Lahlou: In L’Âme qui Brait, I made beautiful images, to the extent that the film was about to go into the official competition in Cannes, but then it was not accepted. Hassan: Why wasn’t it selected? Lahlou: Because, I was told, of its technical deficiencies. The film was made in Morocco 100%. There is what is called “etalonage” (calibration, standardization)—the colors were not clear, and the sound was not good. It was the first film that was made in our Moroccan color laboratory. There is a great difference between our films that we can call traditionally crafted films (artisanal) and films which one could say would be made by an industrial process. The Governor General was made with 2 million centimes [200,000 dirhams]. Miftah saw how we were working in Marrakesh. Everybody helped us. This is the only thing about which we can be proud in Morocco, because Moroccans help and give us hotels for free and many other things for free. This is because they want a Moroccan cinema and because they also know that we work [with no money].3
Miftah complained that the films made in Morocco were not easy for Moroccans to decipher, understand, or follow, and that explained why the public did not appreciate Moroccan films. Yet Lahlou immediately changed the subject to say that the reason the films were not well made was because the State infrastructure was deficient and there was a lack of money. He represents the stance taken by many filmmakers who shifted criticism from their style and film topics to technical deficiencies caused by the system and their lack of funds. Somehow Lahlou wants us to believe that given the Hollywood system and millions of dollars at his disposal, his film would no longer be abstract, intellectual and full of theatrical and philosophical references completely indecipherable by the average Moroccan.4 However, there was equally acerbic criticism by elitists of those Moroccan films, which sought to emulate popular films from the United States, Egypt, or India and thereby sought to gain a popular Moroccan audience.
FILM STYLE Three tendencies characterized this period: (a) popular entertainment, (b) auteur cinema, and (c) “third” cinema. (a) One tendency demanded that films be made for audiences who wished to be entertained; that films could and should be modeled after popular genres from America, India, and Egypt because these were pleasing to audiences in Morocco. From the period 1971–1985, approximately twenty-nine films of the group of approximately fifty-five could be considered to be oriented to popular tastes or imagination. Some of these twenty-nine may be more identifiable with Egyptian song-and-dance melodrama, but others would be
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of the simple melodrama style whose subjects were very rooted in Moroccan history, tradition, or culture. Most drew upon easily identifiable Moroccan locales, protagonists, and problems, some even delving into the nationalist movement and others drawing upon Moroccan mythology. It is very revealing indeed that films of this genre were not archived or were allowed to disappear, and comprised the majority of the films unavailable to see in Morocco. Of the available for research, examples were Bamou, Lalla Chafia, Amina, Beyond the River, and The Comrades of Today. Though popular with audiences, these films were the most marginalized, underdiscussed, and undervalued of the Moroccan filmography by Moroccan film historians and critics. While such films actually comprised the majority of films produced and were the only films even minutely able to recuperate some of their production costs through exhibition, they were not sent to festivals or used to garner recognition for Moroccan filmmakers. They were effectively defined as extraneous to Moroccan cinema. The notion of making “popular” films resonated with an argument proffered by exhibitors and distributors as well—that audiences knew what they liked and all sectors of cinema should provide what audiences wanted. In contrast, however, members of cinema clubs claimed that audiences had been corrupted by their constant diet of imported films and this practice explained their preferences. They had been in a sense brainwashed, and filmmakers should not cater to their perverted tastes but encourage them in different directions by making challenging and difficult films. Elitists argued that the untutored audience needed to change rather than the filmmakers or the films. These arguments will be further elaborated upon in discussion of cinema clubs and criticism as well as exhibition/distribution. (b) Yet, as Abdellaoui indicated, there were also audiences that demanded films of a more intellectual nature, modeled after French trends: I see that there are two movements necessary to create an ambiance of cinema in Morocco. There have to be films that attract a large public and there also have to be more demanding and experimental efforts. As for the public, there is not one public, there are many. One public likes easy films, like Egyptian and karate. And another public likes films of very intense cinematographic quality, like foreign films as well as intellectual Moroccan films.5
The second tendency often meant that films were made for the auteur, and for the limited audience that wished to be challenged by the film; the film product was rendered an art piece that “should be” supported by the State as would other forms of art that were needed to contribute to the national patrimony. Sadok Ben Aicha declared: “I do not believe that the fact of being a filmmaker in the third world obliges one to make primary cinema . . . as a
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conscientious filmmaker of the third world I claim the right to be an aesthete, an artist also.”6 The question then follows, why is the State responsible for supporting the “artist”? Shouldn’t the artist be supported by a consuming public? Many artists believed they should indeed be supported by the State, but without being constrained or required to meet any qualifications or accountability—they should be free agents. Filmmaker Ben Barka (later CCM director) claimed that Moroccan filmmakers all wanted to be auteurs, and did not want anybody else sticking their nose into their business. Since the auteur film usually meant a hermetic film that did not try to reach out to the grander public, the result was often an inaccessible film.7 . . . A tradition has been well installed in Moroccan cinema: excessive intellectualism and sometimes frankly a doubly daunting foolhardy pretension to avoid making an accessible, agreeable or visual cinema, but works of hypercomplicated art that regroup literary, philosophical and other references that the most soured cinephile, the most sharp intellectual have difficulty to comprehend much less support.8
If the most educated filmmaker was unsure of how to understand a film, then what about the Moroccan public that was at the time only newly introduced to media such as films and television and thus not greatly media literate? What about Moroccans wishing for a cinema that produced films resonating with storytelling and codes from traditional performance? Taleb proposed that auteur filmmakers utilized modes and references outside the framework of most Moroccans, and thus rendered themselves alien and, of course, alienating. The Maghrebian public, habituated to the artifices of traditional tales, is thirsty to see a Moroccan film that tells a story with a beginning and an end. And it is normal that he would find himself confused in front of a cinema production that he finds difficult “to access” because it presents a code of signs and cultural symbols which he would understand only with difficulty. In Wechma (Hamid Bennani, 1970), the religious symbols are mentioned ironically. Bennani explains himself thus “My film rests on some principles which I took from a course with Roland Barthes. For example, the ‘antiphrasis,’ the ‘palimpsest’ and ‘mannequin.’ These concepts allowed me to develop the ambiguity of language that I searched for.” Moumen Smihi made, for example, in Caftan d’Amour, reference to more than four filmmakers: Lang, Hitchcock, Mizoguchi and Buñuel, and to two philosophers: Lacan and Roland Barthes.9
Given the predominance of training in France and other concept-heavy environments such as the Soviet Union and Poland, it is not surprising that some filmmakers were more concerned with the theory than the process of
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storytelling. And it is not surprising that the notion of “auteur” meant only “abstract intellectual style” rather than meaning “a marked personal style.” A frequent criticism of Moroccan films was that there really was no story; although the film might have begun with the intimation of a story, soon the narrative devolved into just reflection, intellectual rambling, introspection, and metaphysics. Approximately seventeen films could be put into this category, compared to approximately twenty-nine more popularly oriented films. (c) The third tendency, that related to the Third Cinema10 movement gaining ground at the time, called for a cinema that educated and mobilized the masses, for more social realism in cinema, and for more proactive filmmakers. While Third Cinema comprised the primary focus of articles in the Federation of Cinema Clubs magazines and in other cinema club affiliations, few Moroccan films actually adhered to it. Noureddine Sail, one of the founders of the cinema club movement in Morocco, was a firm believer in the Third Cinema movement and even founded the journal Cinéma 3 to promote the ideology. Furthermore, other critics such as Ferid Boughedir singled out films such as Ben Barka’s Mille et Une Mains as an example of the spirit of Third Cinema and elevated that film above the others of the era for said reason.11 Yet overall, the theses of Third Cinema were “deeper and more radical than is Moroccan cinema. Ours is more referential and emotional than revolutionary.”12 Most Moroccan filmmakers rejected wholeheartedly the notion of revolutionary cinema, the camera as a gun, and guerrilla filmmaking. Though not the only one holding this idea, Derkaoui said: “We do not want to make subversive cinema, that does not interest us. It is more a factor of making cinema an adequate means of denunciation, and not a force in the quest for a foolish and insupportable subversion.”13 Of course, revolutionary cinema was difficult to produce in the censored environment that was a primary characteristic of Morocco in the period. Achaari indicates that before the 1970s (whereas one could say even the 1960s), the intellectuals had a right to exist as they wished. In the 1960s and 1970s, the central national question became the rapport of the intellectual and the political, which led to “the great purge,” the prohibition of UNEM (writers union), and numerous arrests—and all this created a terrible disillusion and disappointment after the independence movement (see Censorship). With the preexisting government controls on cinema caravans, exhibition taxation, film importation and censorship of individual films, the entire cinema sector was constrained by the government’s fears at the time. The laws and organization of the film industry still remained a holdover from protectorate days.14 Several consequences resulted. Officials allowed much less experimentation and innovation in the films made,15 and any tendency toward third cinema productions was squashed im-
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mediately. Most filmmakers were not keen to prompt reprisal by attempting revolutionary films when even seemingly innocent topics were perceived as attacks against the government. For example, Derkaoui’s first feature film Events without Meaning (1974/1975) was never given a permit for exhibition supposedly because Derkaoui had told one official, in passing, that it dealt with unemployment.16 The official replied that unemployment was not a problem in Morocco, and for an unspecified reason the film was denied the film exhibition license for more than fifteen years. Instead, aesthetically dense and symbolically loaded auteur cinema became the alternate style chosen by a number of filmmakers who wished to critique social and political developments in Morocco without being censored. Nabyl Lahlou, one prolific director who came from a theater background, made very critical films but so loaded with symbolism and so difficult for the viewer to unpack that he was never censored. Many filmmakers eschewed entrepreneurial activities in favor of relying upon the government to fix all problems and obstacles for filmmaking, because even something as simple or seemingly innocent as entrepreneurship could be read as threatening to the State, and invite reprisal. Later in this chapter it will become more evident how much the film and cinema sectors depended upon State initiative, and how all problems and solutions were directed toward the State or international bodies.
THE CENTRE CINÉMATOGRAPHIQUE MAROCAIN (CCM) While chapter 1 focused upon the seminal role played by the State, through the agency of the CCM, in regulating and promoting Moroccan filmmakers and Moroccan films, this chapter reveals the complexity of the State’s position and goals in this domain. Further, discrepancies emerged between the desires of filmmakers as individuals and the goals of the State in how the sector of cinema should be regulated and encouraged. As a reminder, the difficulty of the situation is demonstrated by the numerous tasks and responsibilities levied by other government authorities upon the single CCM administration. Recall that the CCM was required to regulate the sector in every conceivable way, including taxation on theater ticket sales. Beginning in the late 1960s, the CCM set some new goals and made several revisions in order to render itself more effective, but also more in control. Brief Summary of Dates, Dahirs, Laws, and Notable Changes to Cinema Sector 1968–1972 Plan Quinquennal: equipped the CCM with laboratory, auditorium, cinema hall, and administrative offices July 1970: a new tax devoted to protecting author rights
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1973–1977 Plan: called for creation of support fund for film production (see 1980) 1973 Plan: called for encouragement of short films March 2, 1973, Dahir No. 1-73-210: Moroccanized cinema businesses (modified May 7, 1973, Dahir 1-73-339) 1973–1977, 4th Plan Quadriennal: instituted means to develop cinema, such as creation of production support fund, establishment of complete technical infrastructure, training of personnel, encouragement of short film production, and instigation of quota for exhibition of Moroccan films September 19, 1977, Dahir No. 1-77-230: major overhaul of operations and goals of CCM intended in renovation plan; Dahir reiterated nation’s need for an archive or library 1979–1981 Plan: reiterated 1977 legislation for new cinema infrastructure; led to building of color laboratory in Rabat Financial Law of 1980, Chapter 9: replaced five separate taxes with one tax (plus remaining panorama of taxes) 1980: support fund especially for production took effect 1980: support fund for film production and improvement of theaters, endowed with 7 million dirhams 1980–1985: Moroccan feature film production jumped to five films a year 1981: CCM advertised they could blow up 16 mm negative to 35 mm 1982: no facilities yet operated to develop in 16 mm or enlarge to 35 mm October 1982: CCM created First National Festival of Moroccan Cinema 1982: renewal of Convention sur le Cinéma between Tunisia and Morocco originally made in 1964 1984: different international accords signed between the CCM and Senegal, Tunisia, and Libya for promotion of intraregional exchanges; Accords d’Oujda signed between Morocco and Libya 1984: CCM reduced funding for theater renovation and new theater building 1985: support fund reduced to only 1,800,000 dirhams The 1968–1972 Plan Quinquennal was supposed to equip the CCM with a laboratory, an auditorium, a cinema hall, and administrative offices, while the Fourth Plan Quadrennal, 1973–1977, was to institute means to develop cinema, such as the creation of a support fund for production, establishment of a complete technical infrastructure, training of personnel, encouragement of production of short films, and the instigation of a quota for exhibition of Moroccan films.17 There had been a support fund for theatrical sustainment and renovation off and on since the 1950s, but no fund for film production because all previous activities had been undertaken by CCM salaried staff. Only when individuals wanted to make films outside of the CCM employ did it become necessary to envision a support fund for production.
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Production of short films had to be encouraged because during the 1970s filmmakers were beginning to place more emphasis on feature films and there were fewer short films available to the theaters to run as filler before the feature; yet short films were also seen as the best opportunities for training in filmmaking. Even at this early period, it was necessary that a requirement for training be included in the plan, since there was less training of technical and artistic personnel overall. Finally, although the plan called for a quota to be established for screening Moroccan films, the practice was never implemented and remained an issue which caused conflict in the cinema domain into the new millenium. Further, the Dahir No. 1-73-210 of March 2, 1973,18 Moroccanized cinema businesses by stipulating that “cinema activity can no longer be exercised except by companies of Moroccan nationality”19 (1/2 or more of capital had to be Moroccan).20 Thus, activities, which had begun in the late 1960s, such as the Moroccanization of the exhibition and distribution sectors, were followed with an overall move to Moroccanize. These numerous changes, however, did not resolve the perception that the CCM was operating ineffectively, especially since many of the requirements were never implemented. Thus, a major overhaul of the operations and goals of the CCM was intended in a 1977 renovation plan. Many of the items enumerated in the Dahir No. 1-77-230 of September 19, 1977—which reorganized the CCM more extensively—were duplicates of responsibilities already in practice since 1956 or mentioned in the intervening years and never implemented or updated. Of most importance was Article 2, which enumerated the plethora of tasks the CCM was supposed to accomplish or supervise; the quantity and scope of the tasks necessitates inclusion of the Article here: Article 2: The CCM is in charge of: regulating the cinema profession, authorizations to exercise the profession, organization of enterprises, and exhibition practices; regulating import/export/production of films; producing, distributing and exhibiting films, particularly filmed news; producing films for public enterprises; controlling with the Ministry of Finances the distribution of tickets to exhibitors; creating studios and other infrastructure and industry structures; creating measures to promote cinema; organizing with ministerial departments the training of cinema professionals; helping set ticket prices and rental prices; organizing national and international meetings to encourage Moroccan film and to send Moroccan films abroad to festivals and screenings; arbitrating conflicts among different branches of industry; promoting, with the Ministry of Culture, the diffusion of culture through cinema, particularly through a national cinema library; the diffusion of artistic films; to encourage by all means the creation and dissemination of cinema clubs; proposing to the government the legislative measures useful to encourage the cinema industry.21
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The revised articles governing the CCM were intended to spur activity in the cinema sector and enhance the ability of the CCM to aggressively apply laws pertaining to the sector.22 For example, although the Resident General had decreed in 1950 that a national library of films should be created and curated by the director of the CCM, no such activity had been pursued. The reorganization dahir reiterated the nation’s need for such an archive or library to conserve documentary films dealing with the history of Morocco and its norms, geography, and economics, as well as short and feature films of all types. Further, the dahir prohibited the destruction of any films concerning Morocco unless authorized.23 One element of the dahirs and legislations from the 1950s and beyond that must be noted is the lack of follow-through between “making” a law and “acting on” that law. Therefore, laws were made, never enforced or enacted, and new laws had to be made restating the same objectives. Or, often, after laws were made new contradictory laws were made, then laws were revised again. The result was a very confused and confusing cinema sector that apparently had more objectives than could ever be implemented adequately, and a confusion that supported complaints and disappointments in all sectors.
ADMINISTRATIVE OR CULTURAL AGENCY? With the changes introduced in 1977 the CCM was expected to exercise power over all rather than just a few aspects of the cinema industry—including production and exhibition.24 The reorganization then raised the question of whether the CCM was a public agency, in charge of regulations, and so forth, or whether it was an industrial and commercial agency (i.e., private), since it was in charge of producing films and exhibiting them too.25 It seemed to be both.26 What really prompted a conflict was that the CCM no longer just maintained equipment and filmmakers on staff, it also was supposed to run a laboratory, an auditorium and theater, and provide screenings too—in urban locales. No longer limited to the hinterland exhibition in cinema caravans, no longer maintaining an emphasis on education, the CCM seemed to be both forced and lured into the realm of features and entertainment. Moroccan film researcher, Jaidi, offers: “For the state institution, the cinema has a triple function: it is simultaneously a support of cultural dissemination, a means of information and above all an economic activity, of double nature, because, on one hand the cinematographic exhibition realizes each year a ledger of finance more than ten billion centimes (the most of which is taken by the state under the form of fiscal receipts) and on the other hand, the cinema is considered as an agent of development.”27 It seems the CCM was being pushed to take its
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first steps toward fully participating in the sector of exhibition and distribution as well as production and regulation so that the State could more directly access the profits from the sector. However, little progress was ever made. It is not useful here to delve into all the particulars of personnel, equipment or services offered by the CCM, but several CCM functions were particularly influential on the industry as a whole, not just on individual films, and thus merit special mention. That the CCM maintain a laboratory was very important to the national goals, but also to all the filmmakers, and related specifically to the problem of lack of professional training of technical personnel in the industry overall. Furthermore, the subject of taxation was influential on the sector of exhibition, but also production. These topics will be addressed as elaborations of the problems associated with the huge burden of activities upon the CCM alone.
LABORATORY The legislation of 1977 called for a new cinema infrastructure, reiterated in the plan of 1979–1981, which actually led to the building of a color laboratory in Rabat in 1981.28 In addition to the existing black and white laboratory, the color laboratory was outfitted to develop and print 3 million meters, but the facility itself was designed to be expanded to handle more than three times as much work. The system was considered sufficient to permit the production of twenty features and thirty or fewer shorts per year.29 (Some expansion of the laboratory capacity occurred by 1994–1995, as the plan of 1988–1992 had reserved 15 million dirhams to improve the CCM infrastructure, including buying new equipment, and improving the laboratory.30) Although great emphasis was placed upon building the cinema complex and laboratory, little attention was paid to the quality of the technicians who would work in it.31 Even though technicians requested supplemental training, the CCM never arranged for it. This caused many errors, ruined footage, and lowered quality of celluloid images. Therefore, the color laboratory work was as much criticized as was the black and white laboratory before it, although most Moroccan filmmakers were essentially forced to use the facility because of its lower cost (1/3 the cost of the work done in France), and because usually the aid given by the State or in the production support fund was in the form of laboratory credit. For example, Mustapha Derkaoui said that he could never have made a film without the CCM’s laboratory credit program because the filmmakers could only get money from the funding system and the lab. His team started Le Cendre du Clos (1977) with 86,000 dirhams, and the laboratory bill said that the processing and lab work had cost 63,600 dirhams alone. Without the
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laboratory credit, the film could not have been made.32 In reference to his own film work, Nabyl Lahlou had complained to the CCM, and made his complaints public in newspaper editorials, that the laboratory had ruined his footage and refused to award him money to reshoot lost scenes (they would give him replacement film only). By 1986 at least, official documents of the CCM laboratory, such as the laboratory work contract, stipulated immediately that the CCM/lab was not responsible for damages of film/documents that might occur in the laboratory work or processing. Especially noteworthy is that while the filmmakers were criticizing the CCM lab for ruining their films both in developing and printing, the lab personnel were criticizing the CCM administration for buying equipment not useful for the time, and for not providing adequate training and education in the equipment.33 The complaints about lack of training seemed to cascade from the higher managerial levels of the CCM to the bottom ranks of film work, but the source of the problems rested in the CCM management and perhaps ministerial directives. However, because the State had instituted itself as the overseer of cinema production activities, it was impossible for any private efforts to emerge in competition.
TRAINING Again, although the state invested great sums of money to get the infrastructure for a color laboratory, it totally neglected to train the workers who would operate the facility.34 Such a move was indicative of the CCM’s reluctance to send individuals abroad for training, even its own laboratory and technical staff. Yet how many technicians could fund themselves to leave the country and seek education?35 Even filmmakers were expected to learn their crafts from working on the foreign features shot in Morocco that were required to use a certain percentage of Moroccan crew—even if they were relatively untrained. As a result, fewer and fewer individuals attended a school or facility in which they could see the immediate results of the application of their knowledge, or lack thereof—which led to amateurism.36 Therefore, the CCM was awarding professional identity cards to amateurs, persons trained only in the field who had relatively little opportunity to see the outcome of their work, or to judge the quality of their knowledge and skills. Furthermore, foreign films did not actually provide “training” in the real sense of the word, because there was never enough time on a film shoot for such education; if Moroccan crew did not already know how to accomplish a task, they were assigned to a different task; much of the “learning” was reduced to “observation from afar.” Thus Moroccan films became the site of the real training or education, because
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they became the only opportunity for the Moroccan crew to do the work themselves, and to see the immediate results of their capabilities (or lack thereof). When the Moroccan films that resulted were critiqued for their lack of technical quality, Moroccan filmmakers were understandably enraged because they were caught in the double bind created by the CCM: the CCM would not train, but would criticize the work produced by untrained workers. It is difficult to understand the entire rationale shaping CCM policies. The CCM was investing in the technology, but not the capacity to use the technology to its utmost. The CCM was catering to the foreign films coming to Morocco, because they spent a lot of money in the country (in 1984, foreign currency brought into Morocco by foreign film productions equaled 46,378,000 dirhams37). Yet the CCM was also spending a great deal of money funding Moroccan films whose quality suffered from lack of training by filmmakers and crews. All in all it seems as though the CCM was frittering away funds and hurting its own industry while supporting to all extents the foreign film industries. Yet this also seems contradictory to the purpose of having an institution such as the CCM. No less contradictory were the relationships between the taxation of cinema exhibitors, the CCM’s goals to expand the number of theaters and improve the quality of cinema exhibition, and the CCM’s increasing demands upon exhibitors for more monies from taxation. Each time the CCM would raise taxes, theaters would close. In order to increase the number of theaters, the CCM would lower taxation, and less money would be available to fund Moroccan films. If taxation rose and more films were made, more theaters would again close. There was no system in place to allow both sectors, exhibition and production, to expand and improve throughout the country.
TAXATION The CCM budget came from the State and through taxes raised from theater ticket sales. Therefore, the CCM was compelled to try to keep the exhibition sector lively and theaters full in order to sustain the source of its own financing. The CCM limited the extent of its nonregulatory involvement in the domain of exhibition and distribution so as to keep those activities private enterprises and a competitive source of State revenues. Between 1957 and 1962, thirty-five new theaters were created because the CCM had lowered taxation to not more than 20 percent. But after 1963, when new taxes were added in order to increase funding of State needs—such as a municipal tax (14% of gross receipts) and a “droit des pauvres” (7% des gross receipts)—then the building of new theaters stopped and instead a large
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number closed. When theaters were paying taxes that they received back in the form of renovations monies and funds to build new profitable enterprises, the theater owners were happy to expand; but when the funds had to go to State needs rather than back to theaters, then those entrepreneurs declined to suffer the loss in profits. This relation between the taxation on ticket sales and the support of theaters was quite complex and while it continually changed, the State—through the CCM—kept trying essentially the same unsuccessful strategy over and over again from the 1970s up to the 1990s. In July 1970, a new tax was added devoted to protecting author rights, and the Financial Law of 1980, chapter 9, replaced five separate taxes38 with one tax39—in addition to the remaining panorama of taxes.40 The tax redistribution allotted only 5 percent to the CCM and 5 percent to the support funds while the rest went to the various ministries, services or governmental aid programs.41 Thus, in 1980 the State again encouraged the building of new theaters by creating a new support fund for renovation along with the new fund for film production; the numbers of theaters again rose. The CCM particularly sought to increase the number of theaters in cities with more than 50,000 people in which there was no theater—about 100 cities.42 The new Support Fund created in 1980 for both film production and the improvement of theaters was initially endowed with 7 million dirhams. Production jumped—to five films a year in 1980–1985.43 CCM efforts resulted in twelve new theaters having been built in three years, and in three years approximately 450 theater renovations were funded, which is a particularly interesting statistic since there were only about 250 theaters in the country. Apparently, theaters were renovated multiple times in only a few years.44 However, by 1985, the support fund was reduced to only 1,800,000 dirhams due to detaxation of new and renovated theaters.45 The State had introduced a new glitch into its vicious circle by legislating that newly built theaters and renovated theaters would be spared any taxation from five to ten years. Funds available for film production and other services, thus, and not surprisingly, quickly dried up. Yet film exhibitors had long complained of being the sole institution responsible for generating so much money from taxation. Their profits, they claimed persistently, were being so eroded by taxation that they could not keep their theaters in good repair, and certainly could not build additional theaters in new areas. One would be tempted to say: because there is an unsatisfied potential demand, it is enough to construct new cinemas to enlarge the market and ameliorate the profitability of exhibition. But there is a major obstacle which leans with all its weight on the destiny of film exhibition in Morocco, and that is the taxation on
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cinema exhibition. This taxation attained an average record of 51.5% of gross receipts. That does nothing at all to encourage investment in this sector.46
The CCM complained of itself that its heavy taxation was responsible for driving exhibitors out of the business rather than the fact that the exhibitors were not satisfied with a moderate versus a huge profit margin. Yet from where else would the CCM gain money to support production of films, the new film laboratory, and other expanded services and functions demanded by the State, and from where would the State get money to pay for social services, if not from luxury spending such as attending the cinema? A situation seems to have been created in Morocco in which everyone was perceived to be a victim. Exhibitors were victims of the State and the CCM, filmmakers were victims of the CCM, filmmakers were victims of exhibitors and distributors, distributors were victims of exhibitors, the CCM was the victim of exhibitors, the public was the victim of exhibitors and filmmakers and distributors. . . .
MORE PROBLEMS The 1973–1977 plan called for the creation of a support fund for film production, which took effect in 1980.47 However, the CCM’s seemingly innocuous and even beneficial activities turned out to be major obstacles and frustrations for Moroccan filmmakers (further information on support funds below). A case in point is that of Mohamed Reggab.48 The story’s complexity matches the confusion of the filmmaking system in Morocco. In 1981 the CCM had advertised to filmmakers that they could film in 16 mm or 35 mm; and having shot in 16mm, they could blow up to 35 mm for the print. However, by 1982 no facilities operated in Morocco to develop in 16 mm or enlarge to 35 mm. Therefore, Reggab was forced by the CCM to shoot his film in 35 mm rather than 16 mm, which cost much more than he had anticipated or budgeted. Furthermore, he was severely harmed by the CCM’s process for financing the film. At the time, the CCM gave monetary awards after the film was complete, not before production, and the CCM offered two types of aid in their “Advance on Award”: one was client credit on material and work at the CCM itself, and the other was a bank credit/advance obtained through CCM intervention. The CCM had awarded Reggab 300,000 dirhams support in January 1983, which, again, would not be available for his use until after his film was finished. Thus Reggab had to borrow 130,000 dirhams from a Casablanca bank; later the bank demanded so much in interest that Reggab’s total loan repayment would be 182,000 dirhams. The reason
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for such hefty interest accumulation was that Reggab had taken quite long to finish his film—but only because he was constrained by the CCM. Unfortunately, the CCM only had one 35 mm editing room, which was used during the day for CCM affairs and was only available to filmmakers one night out of three, at night only. Therefore, Reggab faced a lengthy editing period because he could only work two nights a week to edit his film. Reggab pursued the CCM to intervene on his behalf with the bank, since they were supposed to be helping filmmakers obtain the loans and, further, the CCM was itself responsible for the length of the time required to finalize the film. The CCM refused to help him with the bank and further exacerbated Reggab’s problem by only paying the bank 100,000 dirhams of his 300,000 dirham award, rather than the full amount of the bank loan. The CCM kept 40,000 dirhams for itself for making posters and publicity, and an additional 160,000 dirhams for itself to cover costs at the CCM, which were never formally announced to the filmmaker. Therefore, Reggab was held liable by the bank for the additional 82,000 dirhams owed. The CCM managed to even further exacerbate Reggab’s problem by reserving for itself the right to keep all profits from the film until all costs had been recuperated, and kept the film negative. Incredibly, given what had already befallen this ill-starred work, copies of the film had terrible sound tracks caused by duplicating problems at the CCM lab, which made dialogue impossible to hear, but the CCM refused to withdraw the bad copies and pay for good ones. Then the CCM proceeded to make it nigh impossible for Reggab to present his film in festivals abroad, although they had made very little effort to distribute it even in Morocco. Thus hampered from gaining any funds from screenings or awards, Reggab was unable to repay the bank, which then confiscated his home furnishings. Reggab never earned any money from writing, producing and directing his film, while the CCM used its own monies to pay for its own services.49 While Reggab’s story reveals how difficult it was for Moroccan filmmakers to actually get the funds necessary to make a film, his story also reveals the difficulty faced in finding a way to reap any benefits from the film through festivals or exhibition. Without the assistance of a range of statesupported theaters to exhibit through, and unable to independently exhibit their films in cafes or other public spaces, the Moroccan filmmaker was allowed no alternative exhibition. Thus, the aforementioned clash between filmmakers, distributors, and exhibitors. Distributors and exhibitors were reluctant to accommodate Moroccan films, and the Moroccan public was left the option to see a Moroccan film only in a festival, a cinema club, or a rare and infrequent theatrical release. In an ineffective move to provide an exhibition venue for newly produced Moroccan films, the CCM created the First National Festival of Moroccan
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Cinema, in October 1982 in Rabat,50 and such national festivals continue. While the festivals allowed a portion of local audiences to see Moroccan films, the majority of the population was disregarded. The CCM also made a relatively minuscule move to accommodate Moroccan films by constructing a theater in Rabat, the Septième Art, to specifically show art films and Moroccan films;51 while the CCM had planned to build additional theaters around the country, to support Moroccan films specifically, only the Rabat theater was realized.52 Further, the CCM encouraged the cinema clubs to program Moroccan features in lieu of taking on the task itself, or ensuring that commercial theaters would support Moroccan films, or building additional State-run theaters.53 The problems of exhibition and distribution will be fully detailed in a specific section below.
CINEMATIC SUPPORT FUNDS A variety of approaches have been tried to fund the Moroccan cinema sector since independence. This section will detail the procedures of the support funds up to 1985, while also providing information about arguments for and against the processes. Cinematic sustainment initially applied only to the CCM and its support of theater building or renovations. Recall that the first fund to aid cinema was conceived in 1954 and from 1954 to 1959 served only to provide funds for theater renovation and maintenance. The State felt a responsibility to encourage the dissemination of theaters throughout the country as a means to foster national identification and development, and to ensure that existing theaters were well maintained in order to encourage attendance at screenings. Of course no support had been necessary for film production outside of the CCM until the 1960s with the advent of independent features. Only with the final implementation in 1980 of the new law of 1973–1977 did the direction of funds to feature film production become a significant issue.54 As everything else about the cinema sector in Morocco, the sustainment issues are no less complex and detail is necessary to fully understand the entire sector’s operations. Three concepts are very significant: the burden of and dependence upon taxation; that production funds were most often awarded as reimbursements to the CCM rather than actual cash grants;55 and that a particular type of filmmaker arose, labeled as “chasers after the award” (to be referred to as award-chasers). Numerous testimonies accused the CCM for primarily using the award funds only to reimburse itself for its own services. The award-chasers were individuals who suddenly entered the field of film production only because money was made available to each and every project proposed to the CCM.
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PRIVATE FINANCE Prior to the 1980 production fund, most filmmakers were either employees of the CCM and received funding through the CCM, found private donors, or they formed collectives. However, it had become clear that the CCM would not fund feature films, and that the State would not create incentives to promote private financing of films. Independent financiers were offered no tax breaks or other perks, and really could not expect to recuperate their investment through regular avenues of exhibition. With no return on investment, much less profits, almost none were willing to put money into an enterprise solely for the purpose of supporting a national cultural product. One example of the situation makes the point quite clearly. Cendre du Clos, which cost 620,000 dirhams, received the most numerous ticket sales of any Moroccan film by 1981. Between October 1980 and May 1981 it had been projected in most towns and sold 150,000 tickets, earning gross receipts of 375,000 dirhams. The amount was taxed 42 percent (157,500 dirhams); theater owners received 33 percent (123,760 dirhams). The rest was divided between the producer (12.5%) and the distributor (12.5%); in this case, each earned about 46,875 dirhams each. The producer then, in this situation, would still have been more than 500,000 dirhams shy of recuperating only costs. Under this system, the filmmakers/producers could have recuperated the cost of the film, not profits mind you, only if they had sold 2 million tickets. At the time, the most popular American film, The Exorcist, had sold only 640,000 tickets.56 In lieu of finding private financing, the other avenue pursued was to form film collectives.
FILM COLLECTIVES Filmmakers who recognized that they could neither depend upon the state to finance their films nor upon the private sector, formed collectives in order to spread the burden amongst several filmmakers for each individual film. However, few collectives were actually formed and none lasted any significant period.57 Sigma 3 in 1970 was a collective of Bouanani, Bennani, Sekkat, and R’chich; their first film was Wechma. In 1973 the group Basma (Société de Production et de Recherche Cinématographiques) produced Quelques Evénements sans Signification by Derkaoui. Bennani and Smihi collaborated to make Chergui, and in 1976 Reggab-Films and Basma collaborated to make Les Cendres du Clos.58 However, the collectives also faced the same problem of recuperating investments, so that first films often tended to be the only films produced. Therefore, State policies really left only the State to finance Moroccan film.
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SUPPORT FUNDS AND AWARD COMMITTEES The Plan Quinquennal of 1973–1977 first mentioned a “fonds de soutien” to permit the support of theaters and financing of Moroccan films.59 No fund was actually implemented for production until 1980, and this first form of funding was known as the Fonds de Soutien. In effect from 1980 to 1987, approximately 12,224,500 dirhams were expended. The Fonds de Soutien was replaced by the Fonds d’Aide in 1988.60 The fund created in 1980 was financed with a special (additional) tax on screenings of which 40 percent went to the State, 25 percent to the CCM, and 35 percent to a special account in the CCM set up for the support fund. Of the 35 percent allotted to the support fund, 5 percent went toward management expenses, and the other 95 percent was divided equally between aid for exhibition and aid for production (see table below).61 The creation of the funds necessitated the creation, of course, of two committees to oversee the funds—one committee to make recommendations and awards for film production and another committee concentrating on theaters. The Decree No. 279-744 of December 31, 1979, Article 5, stipulated that the production funds were to be meted out by a commission presided by the director of the CCM and including representatives of: the Ministry of Information, the Ministry of Cultural Affairs, the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Labor, producers, distributors, film professionals, and an artistic or literary figure designated by the Ministry of Culture.62 Since the new provisions required that there be a representative on the committee from the filmmakers, the filmmakers were suddenly required to organize. In fact, this became the first time that filmmakers thought to organize to present their aims to the government, since they had never been formally permitted to participate in CCM deliberations or committees until this time.63 This committee was also one of the first to include almost as many representatives working in the sector as representatives of the government. Article 8 of the Decree stipulated that cinema theaters were to be awarded funds based upon recommendation by a committee headed by the director of CCM as well as a representative of: the Ministry of Information, the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Interior, the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, and a representative of the exhibitors.64 The second committee contained no representatives of film professionals who could thereby influence the development of the sector. As a result, the constitution of the committee allowed the maintenance of the status quo relating to the operations of theaters and their orientation to Moroccan film exhibition. Yet, the exhibitors and distributors had positions on the
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committee awarding film production funds, and thus the ability to influence the production sector. The exhibition committee wanted to free new cinema theaters from taxation for five to seven years; suspend taxes on goods for producers of Moroccan films; and suspend taxes on services connected with the distribution of national films. While this committee did recognize the importance of reducing taxation upon all sectors of the film community, there was no indication that exhibitors were any more willing to accommodate Moroccan films. While the theater committee did succeed in having taxation removed from new and renovated theaters, no other detaxation was permitted by the State, which put even more burden upon the production sector.
EXHIBITION FUNDS Funds for theatrical refurbishment or rebuilding were, as indicated, awarded after the completion of the work and presentation of affidavits to the CCM.65 The awards for exhibition were divided into 12 percent for the creation of new theaters and 88 percent for renovations. Award amounts depended upon the annual income of the theater, ranging from 5,000 dirhams for a theater with a 100,000 dirhams annual income to 40,000 dirhams for a theater with more than a million-and-a-half dirhams income. Between 1980 and 1984, theater owners took awards totaling 11,500,000 dirhams.66 In 1980, 194 theaters were given renovation funds (a total of 2,690,000 dirhams; around 13,600 dirhams each), while new theater building was awarded 371,300 dirhams to build Anfa Cinema in Casablanca, Masira in Ouled Nem, Zahra in Settat, and Tarfaya in Tarfaya. The sums for building seem quite low in comparison to those for refurbishment. The total amount of money spent on renovation and building in 1980 was 3,061,300 dirhams.67 Sums were quite similar for subsequent years: 1981—2,294,000 dirhams in taxes went to renovation of 147 theaters and 399,998 dirhams for building 4 new theaters; 1982—25 theaters were renovated at a cost of 2,138,000 dirhams, and 765,000 dirhams were spent for building for 4 new theaters. Another anomaly in the overall system is as follows. Although in 1980 four theaters were built from the 371,000 dirham fund, which could be calculated as less than 93,000 dirhams per theater, it is noteworthy that during this same period each film presented for an award would automatically receive no less than 180,000 dirhams. At the same time, the film produced would most likely return no income to the sector, while even a theater with an annual income of 100,000 dirhams would pay approximately 42,000 dirhams in taxes.
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PRODUCTION FUNDS According to the new system enacted in 1980, the proportion of the fund awarded to production was itself divided into two parts: advances on receipts (70% of the amount), and national film festival prizes (30%). Advances on receipts started out at the fixed sum of 180,000 dirhams (soon upgraded to 200,000 dirhams) awarded to each film submitted (prime de base), which could be supplemented by an “award after completion” of work, not to exceed 300,000 dirhams if the film was of distinguished artistic quality (prime de qualité).68 Short films would receive a 30,000 dirham base sum and a complementary award possibly up to 30,000 dirhams for exceptional work.69 The funding procedures limited a filmmaker to 20–50 percent of the estimated costs of the film,70 and funds could only be granted to Moroccan producers and companies in Morocco; the director had to be Moroccan, the capital of the company had to be held by Moroccans, Moroccan technicians had to have been used, and the film had to have been shot primarily in Morocco.71 Awards were automatic, but in a delicious bureaucratic twist were not “guaranteed.” Given only after the production was completed, filmmakers had to seek elsewhere for financing to actually get a film made. Most turned toward bank loans.72 The Société de Banques et de Crédit (SBC) would extend credit to filmmakers who would repay the bank from their final award. The filmmaker got an attestation from the CCM that the film was accepted for production, but no guarantee of award. The bank could then lend only up to one-third of the film’s budget, and only the producer was responsible for the loan since the CCM had already attested that no award was “guaranteed.”73 If for some reason a film did not receive its postproduction award, the producer was still required to pay the bank.74 Even though the system seems confusing and problematic, more than forty scripts were rapidly deposited at the CCM;75 the fund allowed an annual average of seven feature films and seven short films to be produced between 1979 and 1983. In eight years, thirty features and 20 shorts were made—nineteen filmmakers were able to make their first fiction films.76 However, over time the annual average decreased as the problems associated with the administration and dispensation of the fund were brought to light. In addition, a fiscal reform in 1985 diminished the resources of the fund by 75 percent. In fact, 1986 saw only one feature film produced—by Latif Lahlou, who received his funds from the French Agency of Cultural and Technical Cooperation rather than the CCM.77 Because the award was given to anyone who applied, a new category of filmmaker was labeled “award-chasers” for appearing only when money was being given away to anyone who applied for it. However, it seems evident from other
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citations that the production support fund was not liberally handing out large sums of money to filmmakers to fritter away on personal expenditures. If the support fund did not even cover laboratory and CCM costs, why was it significant that the newly emerging filmmakers had only entered the domain in order to “take advantage of” the production fund? One reason was that while the fund might have been considered liberating, allowing previously silenced voices to emerge into the cinema domain, it was also evident that many individuals proposed inflated budgets to the award committee and then trimmed their actual productions (cost and quality) to fit only the amounts covered by CCM grants (rather than going and getting additional money to make a good film). The primary result was a slew of mediocre or low quality films.78 There were differing viewpoints about the efficacy of the production fund: some believed that it encouraged filmmaking just to get money from the CCM, others believed it was indispensable to filmmakers, others believed it was not enough. Critics complained that the fund fostered mediocrity because it awarded everyone who applied. Supporters said that it would encourage production and thereby improve the capacities of everyone to make films better.79 Although most of the grants were not even enough to pay the laboratory and other CCM expenses, much less provide a living for the filmmaker or pay any other expenses,80 the filmmakers were expected to make high-quality films. While criticism was made that the award process encouraged amateur filmmaking, the filmmakers themselves critiqued the process which took expenditures of funds out of their hands and put it into the hands of bureaucrats interested only in making sure the State structure and services were paid for. Specifically, filmmakers were required to use the CCM laboratory and equipment in spite of personal preferences or the inadequacy of the services. Nabyl Lahlou, a prolific filmmaker and persistent and vocal critic of CCM policies and foibles, emphasized some of the complaints previously heard from Reggab about funding policies. In 1980 his film The Governor General of the Island of Shakerbakerben was awarded 280,000 dirhams; the CCM paid only 134,091 dirhams. In 1981, Brahim Yach was awarded 230,000 dirhams, but Lahlou never saw it—the CCM used the award to pay their laboratory costs, which was expected, but they never provided Lahlou with any accounting of expenditures. Furthermore, in 1984 Lahlou’s L’âme Qui Brait was awarded 240,000 dirhams; again the CCM bypassed Lahlou and paid their laboratory costs—and sent the rest of the money to the bank (Société de Banque et de Crédit) to pay off Lahlou’s 1981 loans for Brahim Yach.81 Recall that funds were designated specifically as prizes for the national festival of cinema. Lahlou won 5,000 dirhams for his acting in Brahim Yach in 1981, but never saw a penny of it; no one at the CCM could give him any information about this money.82
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As a result of the many such complaints about the products and procedures, the support fund would be revised extensively.83 One proposition was that perhaps a system of grants during production would be more suitable and economical.84 Thus, the system was changed in 1988 so that the process of funding films became “selective.”85 Although the fund was entirely problematic in many ways, it did allow film production to flourish. The films of this period would be categorized as emphasizing socioethnographic subjects, such as the problems of farmers and the rural arena, the position of women in tradition, the development of the family, holiness, and magic. Many of the filmmakers evinced a desire to reveal the contradictions in society.86 The types of films and issues raised will be discussed further in the section on Filmmakers. However, one unresolved constraint remained the lack of distribution of Moroccan films once made.87 While the State thought the fund would be the ultimate resolution of the problem of national cinema, in fact the overall situation for Moroccan filmmakers was worse because there was no system whereby produced films could be seen by the public. As the strife between production and exhibition remained unresolved, many producers simply decided to bypass the Moroccan audience altogether and seek international distribution or focused on festival exhibition. This response, logical in terms of the difficulties that Moroccan filmmakers faced, was harmful for the Moroccan audience which found itself paying for films it was persistently deprived of consuming.88 One can summarize the entire situation as contradictory: contradictory that filmmakers and exhibitors hated the CCM’s interference in terms of censorship and taxation, but yet demanded that the CCM interfere by making more money available for national production or by making regulations on exhibitors and distributors; contradictory to create a production fund which encouraged national production of films without concomitantly creating measures which constrained exhibitors and distributors to support national films.89
EXHIBITION AND DISTRIBUTION In 1956, at independence, there were 350 theaters for 10 million inhabitants.90 (In comparison, Morocco was home to 157 production companies.91) Most theaters in Morocco were located in urban areas with insufficient numbers of theaters in rural areas.92 Cinema theaters concentrated in larger cities, in 1979, totaled 211: Casablanca 46, Rabat 14, Fez 13, and other cities only 1 if any.93 In 1980 there were 242 theaters in cities: 47 in Casablanca and more than 10 each in Rabat, Fez, Meknes, and Kenitra. Ministry of Information figures for
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1980 reflected that more than 480 communities of more than 10,000 inhabitants did not have access to a cinema, even though the number of the population could support one. For example, the province of Azilal had 1 seat for 2,178 people whereas in the city of Tangier there was 1 seat for every 36 residents.94 Of the theaters in Morocco in 1980–1981, 228 were affiliated with the Chamber of Exhibitors, twenty-two were independents, and eleven were seasonal, meaning that they were only open dependent upon the season such as summer at the beach or in the mountains, or winter in the desert.95 Not all cinema theaters were created equal. There were “classes” of theaters in cities, from the elite urban downtown theaters to middle-range theaters and then very low-cost theaters catering only to men and young boys in the poorer neighborhoods or rural areas. The distinction had also been described as “European” theaters (reserved for upper-class Europeans and Moroccans), “mixed” theaters (for lower-class Europeans and Moroccan functionaries), and “Arabic” theaters (for the majority of Moroccans).96 There was also a difference between city centers and “popular” areas, or the suburbs. In the United States at the time, the city center was poorer and the suburbs were richer, but in Morocco the city center was richer and most poor people lived in the medinas and poor suburbs. Poor areas were only served with low quality theaters with low entry prices and thus low quality films.97 As an example of cost variations, exclusive theaters may have charged 10 dirhams for a ticket while the cheaper theaters may have charged only 1.2 dirhams.98 Ben Barka complained that movie ticket prices had not increased between 1970 and 1980, which hampered everyone from making money; of course, who could afford higher ticket prices in Morocco during that time?99 The cost of living was hurting the Moroccan public, the dirham was worth less, but foods, clothes, transport, and so forth cost more. This was an era of major rioting simply spurred by rising costs of living. But, true, the films also cost more to import. Even when the prices for tickets increased after 1980, it was not enough, supposedly, to offset the cost of the films.100 One example of a theater complex elaborates the influence of ticket costs, which of course would relate to the agonies of exhibitors over taxation. Ben Barka owned the Dawliz cinema complex in Casablanca; the complex had three theaters, holding about 300 seats each, a snack bar, a restaurant, an openair theater, and a cafeteria. (Most cinemas in Morocco at the time were single structures with single screens and no additional services attached.) Ben Barka had been planning the 20 million dirham project since 1972, and was only able to complete it because banks financed 50 percent. His tickets cost the unusually high price of 20 dirhams because the outfitting of the theaters was expensive. At 20 dirhams he projected he could pay off his debts largely in twenty to twenty-five years; at 10 dirhams it would take fifty years or more.101
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Ben Barka’s strategy, however, was to build a higher-class establishment that would entice back those professionals, mature audiences, women, and families who had begun to abandon other theaters, not entirely because of the films programmed, but because of the quality of the theater and the preponderate clientele. Many reviews were written that only decried the deplorable state of the Moroccan cinema theaters, whether European or Arabic, urban or rural, claiming that the preponderance of youth audiences102 had caused the theaters to suffer terrible physical abuse.103 (The majority of spectators in Morocco were under the age of thirty, and women’s attendance at cinemas was much less than men’s in any age category.104) Theaters were also blamed for having antiquated projection equipment, untrained projectionists, bad seats, bad screens, dirt, and the problem of actually being surrounded by screaming and hooting young men while trying to watch a show. Theaters were not cooled in summer nor heated in winter, which often made attendance a physical as well as emotional challenge. Again, the terrible conditions of the theaters had actually driven many previous theater-goers to video and satellite use, although surveys revealed that individuals did prefer to go to the theater itself105 (except for women who were generally more confined to the home anyway).106 In terms of the types and quality of films programmed, most distributors excused much of their importation practice to the power of the Motion Picture Export Association of America (MPEAA) which, distributors claimed, had such power over what got shown on Moroccan screens that it was like being held hostage to their interests. Distributors cited as evidence that when Upper Volta and Guinea tried to restrict access to their screens, to set limitations/quotas, the MPEAA blacklisted them and refused to send/sell them any films.107 Moroccan distributors and exhibitors had definitely chosen not to antagonize any aspect of the cinema sector except the Moroccan filmmakers. Distributors used the power of the MPEAA to justify the high numbers of foreign films they imported; the CCM believed it could decrease the quantity of funds being paid to foreign distributors (and thus leaving the country) by Moroccanizing the distribution sector. As mentioned, the CCM had begun to Moroccanize the cinema sector in the 1970s; as of 1971 the CCM had decided that the percentage of film exhibition profits that could go to distributors would be based on theater gross receipts. As this level of remuneration was instituted and the foreign companies realized that their earnings were being quite limited, they easily decided to sell their shares to Moroccans. Then in 1973 two Dahirs (March 2 and April 7, 1973) further encouraged Moroccanization of the distribution sector, defining the characteristics of a commercial company and delimiting the necessary participation of Moroccans and Morocco in the composition of the company. Afterwards the numbers of
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imported films declined because the international distribution firms did not control the theaters and distribution houses, and were not reaping the same profits. However, still 258 foreign films were authorized for imported in 1984; payment for the films was 7,307,970 dirhams.108 But distributors were also importers who usually contracted to distribute a film in Morocco during five to seven years, either paying a percentage of sales or a minimum guarantee for each film.109 Distributors had to get authorization from the CCM for each film, including censorship clearance. Because most distributors owned their own theaters, and most distribution was in the hands of large companies who had several theaters of their own, small distributors were unable to gain a foothold or make inroads into the market.110 Given the aforementioned problematics related to theaters and constant complaints of low profits by the sector, it is surprising that Morocco regularly screened a large number of films and sold a large number of theater tickets. In 1980 more than 42,474,000 theater tickets were sold, equal to two per Moroccan citizen, which is quite a figure given that most consumption would have been only in Casablanca due to the number of theaters and population there, that most attendees would have been males and youths.111 The CCM claimed that exhibition generated about 115 million dirhams annually; taxes were about 45 million, costs were about 40 million, leaving about 30 million to partition between the exhibitors and the distributors.112 These figures allowed distributors to import 300–350 films a year,113 and costs included publicity materials and advertisements.114 Thus, it seems obvious that exhibitors and distributors were not actually making no profits, but were indeed profiting quite handsomely. The figures heartily belie claims made by this sector that it could not afford to support the film industry through taxation or afford to promote Moroccan films.
RELATIONS BETWEEN MOROCCAN FILMMAKERS, EXHIBITORS, AND DISTRIBUTORS Since 1971 Moroccan filmmakers had demanded that a quota be established for Moroccan film exhibition, that their first films should be exempt from taxation and that a system of “advance on sales” should be created.115 One solution suggested in 1970 was that the government require each distributor to handle at least one Moroccan film for every fifteen foreign films, and that each theater should consecrate a week each trimester for a Moroccan film.116 (In 1999 the same recommendations were being made, without result, after 29 years.) Moroccan filmmakers neither wanted to penalize distributors and exhibitors, nor be penalized themselves. Since the films had received support
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to be made, why should they not also receive government support in distribution and exhibition? One primary difference between the sectors concerned whether Moroccan films should be considered cultural goods or capital goods. Filmmakers believed the films should be supported as part of the cultural patrimony and therefore protected by State intervention rather than being left subject to exhibitor desires for profits.117 Exhibitors and distributors, conversely, conceived of films only as commercial products that either did or did not reap good profits, or could or could not compete with other products available in the international marketplace. Furthermore, they claimed that the technical quality of Moroccan films rendered them unsuitable for the market, and that overall public taste justified either their occultation or very low prices paid for their purchase.118 Exhibitors considered any film substandard if it did not mimic the form and content of “commercial cinema” which they felt was required for their theaters. Furthermore, distributors and exhibitors blamed heavy taxation for the types of films they imported/screened. They claimed to be unable to afford “good” films and had to get what they could; they needed films which would attract a large following to make money.119 The president of the Moroccan Chamber of Distributors spoke for the whole sector when he said that distributors “only followed the public’s taste in films” (i.e., distribution/exhibition policies had no influence “on” the public’s taste in films), and that the distributor was above all a businessman; the box office was the client and the measure of the popularity of certain types of films.120 Filmmakers, however, as seen, often voiced a contrary perspective— that the massive distribution of foreign film fare had corrupted the tastes of the Moroccan audience and made them unable to understand Moroccan films. Distributors and exhibitors pointed to their hefty receipts and profits (thereby contradicting their previous arguments concerning their need for government support) to prove that audiences liked the films provided; filmmakers conversely asserted that audiences needed to be exposed to alternate types of cinema to diversify their knowledge and appreciation. With little option available in Morocco, however, audiences had no means to convey that they disliked the dominant fare in theaters—there were no other cinemas to frequent and no other entertainment venues. If the choice was kungfu movie versus no movie, many chose the kung-fu movie. Rather than being a matter of preference, the issue was a matter of availability, and the inability to choose any changes in the system of film distribution and exhibition. Neither filmmakers, distributors, nor exhibitors wanted responsibility for paying the real costs of a Moroccan film, nor to pay for publicity. Distributors and exhibitors were accustomed to international films which were (1)
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sold very cheaply because they had already earned much of their costs from previous distribution, and (2) came replete with a range of publicity materials. Moroccan filmmakers could rarely bear the costs of producing advertising and publicity materials for their films, particularly when distributors were unwilling to pay commensurably for the film. Ben Barka provided some figures for how expensive advertising a film could be. A poster of 5 ⫻ 2 meters cost 500 dirhams in Casablanca per week, a newspaper advertisement cost 1,400 dirhams per day, and a 30-second TV spot cost 5,000 dirhams.121 Yet if it was too expensive for the distributors to pay for advertisements, how could the filmmakers do so when their funds were already so minimal? The CCM and the State believed that it was impossible to force a private business owner to accommodate Moroccan cinema or private theaters to show Moroccan films.122 The businessmen, after all, had to make a profit, in order to pay their high taxes. Another contention raised by filmmakers at this juncture was that since theaters were given State aid for renovation and new building, why was it then inadmissible for them to be required to show Moroccan films? The rebuttal: theaters needed to be full to generate a lot of money—to make local films.123 Moroccan films, the rumor went, did not keep the theaters full. Of course, when exhibitors did not advertise Moroccan films, audiences did not know to attend. Yet plenty of evidence attested that Moroccan audiences, when informed, did attend Moroccan films—if the ticket price was not doubled or quadrupled. But exhibitors claimed that in order to pay more for a Moroccan film, the ticket price had to be raised, which thus prevented many Moroccans from attending.124 The distributors and exhibitors wanted to place Moroccan films in the same category as international films, either demanding their quality be commensurate with films from countries with extensive film industries and history, or demanding the films be sold cheaply. For their part, Moroccan filmmakers claimed to just want the public to see their films, to have their films considered valuable cultural productions; yet, they also wanted to profit from their efforts. Filmmakers never agreed that they should make films without earning any salary or profit, that they should incur heavy burdens of debt and obligation, and then be critiqued because their films did not measure up to those produced in systems wherein everyone was paid a career wage. As well, filmmakers did not comprehend why they should be required to consider filmmaking a sideline activity while distributors and exhibitors were considered professionals who deserved to profit from their work. In the long run, the filmmakers did not see why the burden of national cultural production should fall solely upon their shoulders without any commensurate burden on other sectors of the industry. CCM employees were paid a living wage, distributors and exhibitors made handsome livings from cinema, why not filmmakers?
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Distributors and exhibitors believed the State was responsible for promoting Moroccan film in the nation.125 Because the State levied such high taxation on theater sales, the State thereby rendered itself responsible for resolving the affairs of the cinema industry. The end result of the disputes between Moroccan filmmakers, exhibitors and distributors between 1970 and 1985 was that Moroccan films were seen only by select audiences either in the few theaters in which individual filmmakers were able to make deals (as in “four walling”), in cinema clubs, or in festivals. The ultimate constraint could also be considered the structural one: the overall number of theaters available, their ownership, their location, and their quality. The distribution and exhibition sectors were more complex than possible to explore here, yet the overall intense interrelationship between sectors is quite clear. The CCM could not really have functioned without funds from the exhibition sector, which itself depended upon the distribution sector; filmmakers could not have made films but for the funds from the CCM. The circle only failed to close when the link between the films going into the theaters was severed. What severed the overall interlinking was that final imposition of “making profits.” Yet between 1971 and 1985, more Moroccans entered film production; television and other new technologies emerged very strongly; and a youth boom coupled with migration spurred interest in and consumption of media. So what were the influences from other media and institutions? PIVOTAL INSTITUTIONS Censorship Censorship took multiple forms, both overt and covert, which made it one of the powerful influences on the cinema domain. Outside of cinema, censorship was a constant reminder to the populace of the locus of power in the country. The government clamped down on any revolutionary ideas such as Marxism and Third Cinema, or any antimonarchical movements, and indeed on any potentially powerful movements at all. Poets, writers, artists, intellectuals, and political militants were arrested, tortured, and marked in State records for the remainder of their lives. Marxist and Islamic movements were especially targeted. For example, “When Abdel Salam Yacine (the founder of the Islamic group Al Adl wal Ihsan) first attracted attention with a challenging open letter to the king in an Islamic newspaper in 1974, the affront earned him three years in a psychiatric hospital and a further three years in prison. Over the years members of other Islamic opposition movements have met with arrest,
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exile or execution.”126 No one could do anything to stop or mediate the State’s practices to protect itself.127 Although inside of the world of cinema, various forms of censorship specifically targeted films and filmmakers, of course the repercussions were not commensurate—unless the filmmaker also happened to be an activist. There was the standard censorship committee that evaluated films that distributors and exhibitors wanted to import into Morocco. The censorship commission was supposed to be an independent body outside of the CCM. The members were named by the State and included a representative of: the CCM, the Ministry of Education, National Security, the Royal Gendarmie, and a representative of exhibitors.128 Decisions were taken either on the basis of scripts or posters, or after watching the film. For films in languages other than French, the distributor had to provide and pay for a reputable translator. The committee could cut the film or reject it outright, and rejected films were indicated to the police. The director of the CCM, Ben Barka, said he had personally censored several films from any exhibition in Morocco because he considered them too pornographic.129 However, Ben Barka also claimed that only two things could render a film censurable: it insulted Islam, or it defamed Morocco.130 While there were no published censorship codes, the committee also primarily ruled out films with political objectives, or films which could have caused social upheaval. Up to 400 films were reviewed each year in the mid-1970s and 1980s, and about 350 of them were licensed for 230 theaters. In 1983, 22 films were rejected and 345 were licensed. This figure is interesting to compare to the 1960 figure of 1,971 films imported of which 137 were censored.131 The committee also determined the age range of viewers, and classified the film. But there were other censorship mechanisms. There was the committee that evaluated whether Moroccan films would be suitable for the production fund, which was another form of censorship in two ways: authors self-censored in hopes of qualifying for the fund, and the committee censored by eliminating any films they felt unworthy. In an interview with M. Reggab, Boutarkha noted that the CCM had a kind of censorship over national production because the CCM was the only national source of equipment and material available for filmmaking (by the 1970s), so that if the CCM did not approve of a production and allow the filmmaker to rent their materials, the film could not be made unless the filmmaker could go outside of Morocco—prohibitively expensive!132 There was also censorship in terms of the limitation on funds available, which meant that few films could be produced; another censorship form was the taxation on necessary materials which rendered the cost of making a film in Morocco prohibitive for local producers. And again the standard film censorship committee, which awarded the exhibition visa, this time scrutinized Moroccan
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films. Finally, another severe form of censorship was the lack of aid to a film once it had been produced and was ready for release. Distribution was difficult if not impossible, exhibition the same.133 Another form of subtle censorship along these lines was that the CCM did not fulfill its role to enable filmmakers to travel abroad to present their films, refusing to help them financially or to obtain a visa to travel, or also hampering distribution of Moroccan films abroad, both by design and by bureaucratic inefficacy. For Moroccan films, the censorship process functioned from start to finish: curtailed the film before production when the filmmaker was seeking funds,134 during production when funds were lacking, after production when the visa was necessary, and when the film needed to be sent abroad by the CCM. Censorship was also more rigorous for national than foreign films. For national films, the censors considered morality and mores as well as political questions and other questions.135 Noureddine Sail, in Maghreb Information of March 6, 1973, complained that the censors considered the Moroccan public a mass of ignorants and mental retards burdened by congenital underdevelopment.136 In addition to the censorship of Derkaoui’s film mentioned, Quelques Evénements Sans Signification never received censor approval; La Guerre du Petrole n’Aura Pas Lieu, by Ben Barka, received a permit which was immediately rescinded. A documentary film entitled Les Enfants du Haouz was stopped in editing because the filmmaker described a poor desolate village, when in fact “there were no such villages in Morocco,” according to State officials. Sometimes censorship was just a matter of cutting scenes or images; for example, in Soleil de Printemps a scene had to be cut in which the hero passed through his native village and heard of the miseries suffered by the peasants there. A reference to prostitution had to be cut from Alyam Alyam. But Moroccan filmmakers also censored their own films when they tried to make films that delivered a message without letting the censors in on the secret: . . . one should remark through some feature and short films which have been produced, a certain recourse to tricks, camouflage and symbols at the levels of the text and the image. This practice permits the filmmaker to sometimes escape censure, but unfortunately exposes the product in the same time to incomprehension by the average public.137
If the censors could not understand a subversive movement, then assuredly the consuming public would not either? Last but not least, censorship included censoring “discussions of” cinema, not just the films themselves. The Sunday, January 30, 1977, issue of L’Opinion was seized for publishing the proceedings of a roundtable on the “problems” of Moroccan cinema.138 The roundtable was no doubt sponsored by a Moroccan cinema club, which was one of the institutions in Morocco
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which both most supported national film production, and critiqued it most relentlessly. Cinema Clubs This section will be a chronological history of the clubs’ development during 1971–1985. Early objectives of the cinema clubs were to publish and spread awareness about cinema as an art and as an industry; to raise the level of artistic taste among members by discussing exhibited films; to show international cinematic works known for their artistic, intellectual, and aesthetic innovations; to create opportunities for individuals to learn production and writing techniques through workshops; and to support Moroccan film production. Cinema clubs in Morocco are and were quite complex in terms of their influence upon the cinema domain at all levels. While the club movement since the mid-1970s had taken up Moroccan film as a cause célèbre, there had always been a concomitant intense emphasis upon other cinemas somewhat on the margins of dominant filmmaking, particularly avant garde, new wave, third cinema, and auteur cinema. But cinema clubs were also the site where dominant or classical cinemas were studied, the goal of the clubs being that individuals understand films and their institutions. Therefore, while cinema clubs did have a strong influence upon Moroccan cinema, they also had effects on the domain of cinema in other ways. Cinema clubs produced writers and critics who went on to disseminate their views on cinema to the Moroccan populace, and the clubs continued to support the oppositional relationship between filmmakers and distributors/exhibitors in Morocco. The chronological history, emphasizing the numerous changes through which cinema clubs have progressed, highlights the inherent difficulties faced by any organization that sought to have nation-wide influence in such a controlled environment as Morocco in the 1970s. All organizations would only operate under the supervision or with permission of the government, because all sources of stress, threat, or variant viewpoint had to be monitored as potential sources of damage to the stability of the State. State bodies (and thus the goals of the State at the moment) would determine what organizations would be allowed or encouraged to form, what activities could be undertaken, and who could participate. Organizations themselves would be challenged over time by the changing goals and beliefs of newer members; thus as organizations evolved, and the State changed with time, the dialectic between them had to constantly be reestablished with new rules, new roles, and new parameters. Furthermore, this era also witnessed the expansion of radio and television into domains previously unserved, which created a heightened sense of
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“nation-hood” rather than regionalism or localism. The cinema clubs contributed to this linking together of previously separated localities, because leaders grouped together from various regions, the similarity in programs linked one club to another and created a cultural capital shared by all club members, cinema club conferences brought together members from diverse regions and backgrounds, and eventually their widely distributed publication contributed to creating a base foundation of knowledge and orientation toward thinking about cinema. However, much detail has been relegated to footnotes. Dahane, one of the earliest members of the cinema club movement in Morocco, currently a critic and university professor, emphasized that the cinema club movement only existed because of the personal initiative of individuals who would take on obligations and perform tasks unpaid.139 For the organizers of the movement in the early days and later, the cinema clubs were a synthesis between manual and intellectual work; organizers had to organize the clubs, find members, find locations, get permits, teach about cinema, find films, mail films, do paperwork, and organize events. Therefore, the overall organization depended a great deal upon those who occupied the center, whether of the organization or of the individual club. Sometimes the individual club leadership and members could produce dramatic events, such as the cinema festival organized by the club in Tetouan. As mentioned, the National Federation of Cinema Clubs in Morocco, created in 1958, underwent numerous evolutions before it became the Fédération Nationale des Ciné-Clubs Marocains (FNCCM) in 1973.140 The FNCCM still exists although in reduced form at the time of this writing; the organization has been constantly impeded by political pressure, internal division, government hegemony, and economic and financial pressures.141 The Federation was amended several times—December 1981 and September 1984; the 1984 date was most significant because the State made cinema club activities much more difficult and expensive.142 By 1974 the organization was no longer under the Ministry of Youth and Sports; the movement had 13,000 members and 60 clubs. By May 1976 there were thirty-four Moroccan cinema clubs143 with about 30,000 members; the FNCCM was the first cultural organization gathering such a large number of members in Morocco:144 “La création de la F.N.C.C.M suscita un véritable mouvement culturel à l’échelle nationale. En quelques mois le réseau fédéral couvrit la plupart des grandes villes et s’étendit aux petites localités et aux bourgs reculés”145 (trans.146). The huge extent of the clubs throughout Morocco made them noteworthy, but also able to spread their ideology-ofthe-moment quite broadly. The Federation soon developed a cultural platform influenced by their recent attendance at the meeting of the Third World Film-Makers in Algiers,
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Algeria, in 1973.147 The new platform denounced the invasion of the screens of the country by the commercial by-products of the dominant and alienating film industries. The Federation wanted to present alternative views of cinema to the Moroccan public. The films that circulated in the cinema clubs for several years reflected the Federation’s wish to emphasize works, such as those by Eisenstein, which exhibitors would never have screened, including Moroccan and Maghrebi films. At the same time, in 1974, the Moroccan Federation helped found the Union Maghrébine de Fédérations de Ciné-Clubs (UMFCC) during the Carthage Film Fest. Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia created the UMFCC which remained the only communal cinema organization among North African nations.148 Algeria encouraged Moroccans in a more radical approach: The third-world avocation of the federation established itself parallel with its exchanges with the Maghreb. Latin America was presented on our screens by the exhibition of films by Glauber Rocha, Jorge Sanjines, Octravio Gomez and many others. This was a strong period for the cinema clubs that saw the number of their adherents double and triple in so many weeks.149
The more radical approach toward cinema persisted through the 1970s, while in 1981 the Federation issued a proclamation that the CCM was not doing enough to protect Moroccan cinema, nor to ensure its distribution throughout the third world, nor to balance the import of foreign films with production funds for local production.150 Throughout the 1980s Federation members were active; each year the Federation organized about 200 screenings. However, the Federation was revised in 1984, as mentioned above. The government mandated that the directors of clubs should procure a special license each week for their exhibition; besides the added inconvenience and time this process caused, the regional authorities responsible for issuing the licenses were often difficult to deal with, and issued such licenses depending upon their mood at the moment. Besides procuring the license, the leader of each club had to find a place to hold club meetings and screen films. Some groups were encouraged, and tried, to utilize the Dar al Shababs151 to show films; but the places were not equipped with 16-mm projectors, or they were badly maintained, and/or there was insufficient seating, inadequate projection facilities (bad image and sound) for this purpose. But private theaters presented a problem of expense; because theater rentals rates were not regulated by the state, the FNCCM leaders often found that the rental rates of theaters kept increasing.152 Sometimes theater owners or personnel would show up late to open the theater for the club, or would force the cinema club members to leave early; as a result, discussions were curtailed, and sometimes had to be canceled.
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However, the cinema club movement was not limited to film exhibition, and this actually is one of the more unsatisfactory results of the cinema club objectives as they changed through the 1980s. A statement by the New Cinema Club in Ain Sbaa, Casablanca, elaborated the perceived goals of the Federation in Morocco: “The basic gift that the [FNCCM] shall offer is the forming of scholars that will be concerned with the domain of cinema and the diverse problems of Moroccan cinema, so that they could participate effectively in the creation of a Moroccan cinematic movement and in cinema with aesthetic, educational, and civilizational aims. . . .”153 This sounds very benign, but as the latter section on criticism reveals, the result was less so. The organization’s goal was to critically train spectators/members, but also to technically train members in the procedures of cinema production, and to publish concerning cinema. The Federation succeeded in producing Dirassat Sinimaiya, but the lack of financial support from members made other projects impossible. One suggestion made, rather less benign, was that the clubs should limit their memberships to “people with financial capabilities”; rather than reaching out toward the many youths who could not contribute financially to the organization, more established, serious members should be sought.154 But the Federation’s goals actually became its dilemma. The dilemma was a polarity between leaders who preferred to remain oriented toward international issues and models, and leaders who wished to emphasize local issues. The polarity in the Federation’s ideology was mirrored by a split or polarity in the membership; one faction/ideology was oriented toward cinema as an abstraction, a universal, a knowledge field; the other faction was more oriented to cinema as a real, present, local practice with effects, which required discussing cinema as a significant element in the problem of national culture.155 The FNCCM was a very suitable vehicle to raise the issue of national culture and to generate debate on this topic throughout the country. Yet a debate over national culture and over cinema culture in specific would be very contradictory given the dominant ideologies of the Moroccan cinema clubs at this time. Such a debate would be based on a dialectic which pitted the public (the Moroccan people) against the intellectual (the cinema club member), and both the public and intellectual against the State and capitalism. Such terrain was very dangerous and did garner the cinema club organization some problems with both the public and the government. In particular, third cinema, revolutionary cinema, and alternative cinema were not looked upon favorably by the State, or as suitable topics around which to gather thousands of proselytes. And the Moroccan people were not fond of being characterized as mindless dupes. Some club members saw the clubs as cultural and ideological groups, which only required that they see movies and discourse in an opinionated fashion—rather than seriously learn about cinema.156 The orientation toward
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opinion-giving versus scholarship would plague the cinema clubs for decades, as members moved into writing for newspapers and journals on the subject of cinema. Furthermore, cinema club members often posited themselves as an elite group who could criticize the public for its tastes for popular cinema, because while the cinema club member was considered an educated viewer, the public was considered ignorant. Cinema clubs encouraged Moroccan filmmakers who experimented with the medium and sought to produce highly eclectic and intellectual films, and these same groups were responsible for discouraging filmmakers who tried to make popular films, such as melodramas or musicals, because they were just that, popular rather than intellectual.157 Although other members tried to reorient the FNCCM toward a more rigorous critical approach, the Federation could not easily, in the 1980s, quickly undo the ingrained orientation toward opinion-giving, particularly because club leaders had had inadequate critical training in film viewing, and lacked formal training in film criticism and film analysis.158 While the cinema clubs did expose many Moroccans to issues and films they would never have seen otherwise, the cinema clubs were not always the equivalent of real education and training in film analysis and criticism. Some individuals were exposed in-depth to theorists and critical literature, but many of the individuals in clubs, who began to write about films in newspapers and other venues, and to talk about cinema on television or radio, had very limited education in the field, very limited exposure to literature on the subject, and yet continued to emphasize “opinion-giving.” Thus, in a way, the cinema clubs were highly problematic in their objectives, as further developed in the following section on Criticism and Publication. Criticism and Publication As intimated previously, a new issue became significant in this era as a result of cinema club activity. Moroccan filmmakers became the subjects of intense criticism due to the quality of their films, and yet this criticism came not from a consuming general Moroccan public but from specialized receivers in cinema clubs, who might also be journalists or other filmmakers. These criticisms were offered through the press, in cinema clubs, over radio and television, and eventually filtered into the general populace who then knew their national cinema only by reputation rather than by personal consumption and evaluation. Noticeably, individuals asked about Moroccan cinema during this era could critique a film and filmmakers, and then confess to having never actually seen a Moroccan film. Rather than emphasizing the physical distribution of films themselves, the distribution of discourse “about” the films became predominant.
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Prior to the 1970s and 1980s, film criticism and discourse was limited to cinema clubs and professional circles. There had been no Moroccan films exhibited to discuss, and thus not much need for local criticism and writing until they began to emerge in the 1980s. As mentioned previously, the first cinema-specific journal was Cinéma 3 edited by Noureddine Sail. There were only four issues of Cinéma 3 but it had an important influence in Morocco because previously all cinematic criticism had appeared only in international publications. Subsequently cinematic pages appeared in national newspapers, such as the page of l’Opinion directed by Abdou Ashouba, and a page in Maghreb Information supervised by Noureddine Sail. This latter endeavor lasted two years. After 1975 almost all Moroccan newspapers began to devote a page to cinema,159 and national magazines (such as Lamalif and Kalima) began to carry articles on Moroccan cinema as well. The only long-term effort to publish exclusively about cinema was Dirassat Sinimaiya (Cinema Studies), as already mentioned. Again, cinema writing and the orientation toward writing about and evaluating cinema were influenced by the third cinema movement but also by the international trends evident in the international publications. The issue of cinema criticism and writing seems, very paradoxically, to have been easier for Moroccans at the time to create a discourse about Moroccan cinema through writing, television programs, and meetings than through actual distribution and consumption of the films themselves. The dominant discourse would lead one to believe that the third cinema movement had been a predominant impetus for feature filmmakers of the era, when in fact very few films were so oriented or filmmakers so inspired. On the other hand, many filmmakers were strongly influenced by independent and auteur filmmakers. The real importance of the issue of criticism is that an opposition becomes evident between the critics/opinion shapers and the filmmakers themselves, further marked by the absence of the films to speak for themselves through any exhibition outlet besides the cinema clubs—themselves the sources of the critics and opinion formers. The opposition is further marked because critics held Moroccan filmmakers accountable to a consuming public which did not actually exist, because critics themselves occupied oppositional stances about what types of films should be made in a developing national cinema, what types of films were worthy of serious evaluation, and what types of subjects were appropriate in this early period. For example, films that emulated the dominant Egyptian model were heavily criticized, although most of the Moroccan population appreciated and supported Egyptian films. The critics expected Moroccan films to take “the high road” rather than attempt to appeal to popular tastes, especially when the writings shaping their conception of “worthy” cinema all elevated either third cinema or
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auteur cinema works. Yet films were equally criticized for attempting to take “too” high a road thus leaving the critic in confusion and alienated. Consider this typical criticism published in the magazine Lamalif in 1981: To what happiness is allusion made? The sad happiness of seeing the film? The false happiness to see it come out on our screens, or the simple happiness to count one more film on the list of Moroccan films produced since . . . since forever. A wide shot which pretends to interiorize a dramatic expression on the faces of amateur or professional actors, adding neither action nor talent—when they have any—nor an act often weak, nor even a presence, simply a reproduction of their image on celluloid in color. Of a wide shot then to another, without transition, a fixed shot, often without centering to another fixed shot, moving the camera, looking apparently for the unfindable, or like a television report, the sensational, and there is nothing upon which to rest the eyes, nor to permit an appreciation of a certain image quality. . . .160 (trans.161)
In the short article the critic finds numerous ways to emphasize how much he despises the film, which could in fact be “any” film—the one segment reproduced above indicates the overall approach and tone of the entire article. Yet this film was one of the few actually distributed and indeed made money (compared to other films), so someone must have liked it. While impossible to reproduce the entire article, this author as do others makes an acerbic critique based solely upon his personal conception of the aesthetics of “good” cinema, without considering whether the tactics he so despises are not actually chosen for a reason, for an alternate aesthetic. Some critics/writers subscribed to the third cinema aesthetic and some to the auteur cinema aesthetic, leading to a combative position between the two styles, particularly because the “auteur” aesthetic was considered linked not to realism in filmmaking but to the avant-garde, the experimental, the metaphorical and heavily referential. An added twist, already noted, to the complex arabesque woven between critics, publics, and filmmakers, many of these first filmmakers were the products of educations in Institut des Hautes Études C´inematographiques (IDHEC), Poland, Russia, Italy and other European sites, which would predispose them toward experimenting in the dominant modality of their school and education. IDHEC et al. emphasized the auteur, the metaphoric, the heavily intellectual approach while the cinema clubs were training critics split between adherence to third cinema or realist cinema. Additionally, almost no writers for cinema clubs, newspapers, magazines, or journals came from a university education in cinema theory or production, and learned only from within the cinema clubs, a somewhat insular process. Interestingly, over time some of the new filmmakers discussed later emerged from the cinema clubs in the absence of CCM funding to send
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filmmakers abroad for training, thus the discourse about cinema matured and deepened in later years. Cinema Caravans Even by the 1970s and 1980s, many regions in Morocco still had no theaters, discussed previously, and no cinema clubs. Therefore, cinema caravans were still necessary at this time to serve those populations. But the issues pertinent in cinema clubs and criticism would not be the same issues dealt with by caravans, because entertainment film and profit-making were not the dominant themes. A document from the Ministry of the Interior dated 1983 reiterates the same purposes of the cinema caravans for the 1980s as applied in the 1920s under the French: “Les projections organizées par les caravanes cinématographiques ont pour objectif d’éclairer l’opinion publique sur les efforts déployés par le gouvernement dans les différents domaines. Elles veillent aussi à la prise de consciencce des citoyens dans les localités éloignées non déservies par la télévision et qui ne disposent pas de salles de cinéma.”162 Most of the caravan activity had been disrupted by government agencies by 1982 and thus left primarily to the CCM, and the circuits no longer reached into the remotest parts of the country.163 In 1983 the number of caravans in operation was reduced to 9 caravans serving 15 circuits; 9 million persons (of an approximately 22 million population, of which almost 60% was rural164) attended 230 seances of projections of a range of 37 short films concerning royal activities, and events such as the twelfth Arab Conference Summit.165 In comparison, for the same year, almost 39 million tickets were sold in all of Morocco’s theaters.166 Again, the films were mostly educational, development oriented, and newsreel genre, excluding any feature or entertainment programming which was deemed unnecessary for such rural populations. While the cities and larger towns could rally around Moroccan filmmaking and national culture through discussions in cinema clubs, cultural centers, and even some festivals, those residing in rural areas were subjected to film only as a means to create an awareness of their being a member of the national body known as Morocco, without being able to share in the same cultural activities or cultural capital as those Moroccans of the urban areas. This is a form of censorship by default of locality, of rurality, meaning that one is marginalized both spatially as well as intellectually and culturally—that is from the national culture that is being debated in the capital and larger cities, the national culture that is taking shape from funding oriented only to the urban and urbanites. Although cinema caravans reached over 9 million Moroccans in one year’s work, caravans diminished as other forms of media increased their own reach, such as radio, television, and satellite in particular. While rural folk may have
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had their moussems, souqs, and other reasons to gather together, for urban and select audiences a new motivation for gathering became the cinema festival, which of course had absolutely no outreach to rural audiences. CINEMA FESTIVALS IN MOROCCO In keeping with the perspective of some club members that cinema appreciation and different types of cinema should be made available to all, not just cinema club members, some very interesting and diverse national and international festivals and similar events emerged in Morocco. There were: a biannual festival in Tetouan, a biannual festival in Khouribga, and a festival in Ben Guerir, along with a host of smaller one-off festivals such as the Tetuouan Cinema Encounter, the Festival of Azemour, the International Festival of Youth-Cinema in Rabat, and the Days of the Moroccan Film organized by Moroccan cinema clubs.167 In addition, there were the festival “Cinéma et du Roman” sponsored by the Club d’Action in Casablanca, the “Cinema and Human Rights” festival organized by the Association Marocaine des Droits de l’Homme, and many other such initiatives. Each festival had very specific characteristics and target audience. It is only possible to skim the surface of these festivals, which are themselves rich sources of information about the operation of cinema in Morocco and for Moroccans, but it is important for the reader to have a basic idea of the types of cinematic activities which would have shaped notions about cinema for audiences and filmmakers. One primary role of festivals for the purpose of this book is that Moroccan films were often screened in such festivals and club activities, while sometimes these may have been the only outlets available to Moroccan filmmakers. Furthermore, the festivals were sites through which Moroccan filmmakers and film professionals met with filmmakers from all over the world, an opportunity which would otherwise be extremely limited for them. The next section highlights two festival domains because they either have international reknown or are nationally significant to the cinema realm. RENCONTRES CINÉMATOGRAPHIQUES DE KHOURIBGA At its height in the 1970s, under the leadership of Noureddine Sail,168 the FNCCM organized the Mediterranean Festival in Tangier in 1968 and in Rabat in 1969, and then in 1977 the Rencontres Cinématographiques de Khouribga. The very active cinema club members from Khouribga, a phosphate mining town, organized and maintained the festival, although with heavy linkages and ties to the FNCCM. The cinema club proposed the idea of a festival in Khou-
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ribga to the Office of Phosphates which supported it and budgeted it; over time the festival acquired an international and African characteristic and reach.169 At its creation, this festival nourished the desire to constitute a positive reaction to the call by Argentinian filmmakers for a third cinema. The Khourigba encounter is justified in its opening to new African cinema that does not hide its communion of ideas with that which has come to be called third cinema. . . . deprived of means, their producers cannot, up to our days, offer itself the luxury of making high budget films, reducing their budgets to very low figures and insignificant production costs. This is in keeping with the third cinema philosophy, in which artificial luxury of decors and waste known in other cinemas have been banished by the opposite omnipresence of social realism.170
In keeping with the Federation’s engagement with third cinema at the time, the Khouribga festivals specifically sought to bring trends from other third world countries into contact and into Morocco. Latin American, African, Middle Eastern and Moroccan, and other revolutionary as well as struggling filmmakers and their films were hosted, programmed, and intensely discussed. Over time the dialogue about the focus of the festival changed to become less revolutionary while remaining committed to bringing Latin America, Africa, and the Middle East together to share their many and similar constraints and practices. Because Moroccan filmmakers never took up third cinema, the festival began considering films made more for commercial or artistic purposes in a move toward cinema that “appeals to” the public rather than a cinema which “reveals” the public.171 Because the Khouribga festivals were so successful, this site became famous for presenting African cinema before the Ouagadougou festivals began. However, conflicts erupted, this time between local authorities, the FNCCM and the local cinema club. As a result, the festivals were eventually interrupted (in 1994) though reinstituted and continuing in importance today.172 Privately organized festivals increased in number over the years, but this era of burgeoning festivals and cinema activities also spurred the State to organize a festival specifically limited to Moroccan film. While national festivals of Moroccan cinema were limited to screening only Moroccan films, they were also limited to including Moroccan audiences, professionals, and filmmakers, and for this reason they have been much less successful and useful for the cinema sector compared to other festivals.
NATIONAL FESTIVALS OF MOROCCAN CINEMA The dahir of 1977 made clear that one of the CCM’s primary objectives was to animate the cinema sector, that is, create festivals. Perhaps the CCM
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only coproduced the two films Vaincre pour Vivre and Quand Mûrissent les Dattes, and totally funded Soleil de Printemps because they had organized and agreed to sponsor the Festival Mediteranéen in Morocco and could not do so without having any Moroccan films to participate.173 On top of such an ignominious beginning, none of the National Festivals of Moroccan Cinema redeemed the CCM which persistently expended effort and a great deal of money to organize national festivals to which it invited no significant foreign participants such as producers, distributors, or television buyers. No international outreach was ever solicited and organizers focused on the national not international press, so no one ever heard about Moroccan cinema. The various cinema-related chambers called for the CCM to more vigorously promote Moroccan cinema abroad as well as at home, to conceive of the industry as more professional than artisanal, and for the CCM then to act more professionally in advertising the cinema. In defense of itself, the CCM did publish the statement that because: The Moroccan film being mostly a stranger in its own home, the CCM opted to organize a national festival of films. First to evaluate the national production through the body of work relevant to the sector, then to habituate the Moroccan spectator to see his image on the screen, and then to incite distributors and exhibitors to rethink their politics and to include, in the best case, a quota of Moroccan films in their program of activities. This is how the CCM continues to unite all the participants in the sector to reflect upon the Moroccan cinema and unleash their best tools to permit its evolution.174
Kouider Bennani, director of the CCM in 1980, said that the main reason to have the festival was to get Moroccan professionals together to get to know each other, to talk and discuss, because they had long struggled against one another and had never really understood each other. However, the festivals did not in fact reunite all the sectors of cinema; some sectors did not attend the festivals, while some expended a great deal of energy incriminating the other sectors rather than cooperating. In fact, evident from the numerous newspaper clippings after the festivals, the primary activity and outcome of the festivals seemed to be bickering and arguing over what kind of cinema was best, what orientation to cinema was appropriate, what was wrong with every film, with no emphasis on promoting the cinema or the industry overall.175 Further, everyone agreed that the only merit of the national festivals of cinema was simply that they existed—although in very conflicted circumstances. They served as a review or diagnostic of existent production, and a place for discussion and debates on the problematic future of Moroccan cinema. But Moroccan festivals had no significant results outside of their awards and highly critical newspaper articles. Even the coverage of the events and
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personages by television were cursory at best (although radio programmers seemed to have been active in recording interviews with many individuals for their midnight and beyond time slots). The national festivals marked different phases of cinema. The first festival came after the institution of the Fonds de Soutien, so that the films and the industry could be evaluated based on the new input into production. By the second festival, films were being more closely analyzed for their individual value, because the support fund had already been in place a while.176 In the first two festivals the CCM was held responsible for solving the problems of cinema in Morocco, no matter what other complaints were lodged. During the first festival all complaints were levied against the State, the distributors and the exhibitors as being the sources of all problems facing national cinema. At the second festival, complaints targeted the filmmakers themselves for making very mediocre films and for “trying to use the same old alibi—lack of means—forever.”177 First National Festival of Moroccan Cinema: October 1982 The idea to have the first festival came because the laboratory and support fund allowed many new films to emerge. However, the first festival was specifically limited to only those films made between 1980 and the festival in 1982. This restriction made some filmmakers angry because their films were not accepted, and led to the predominant notion that the festival was just held to compare the films that were made after the initiation of the support fund.178 The first festival, held October 9–16, 1982, was the first occasion for filmmakers, exhibitors, distributors, and administrators of the CCM and the radio television marocaine (RTM) to meet together formally to discuss some of the problems of the sector of cinema, some potential solutions, and to try to understand the points of view and motivations of the other parties in the sector. The meeting and discussions were quickly named the “dialogue of the deaf” because while the discussions were free and expressive, they led nowhere because each group remained mired in its own perspective, as has been reflected in such arguments noted previously. From the very first the festival was reproached for being badly organized; filmmakers and professionals weren’t enough involved in the organization and in the presentation, and there were foreigners invited to be on the jury and on the organization committee rather than local filmmakers. The festival started off badly because it was not advertised to the public except for a few late appearing posters and some very late and tiny announcements in a few papers. It appeared that the festival was not designed to focus upon the people
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of the towns in which it was being held. The organizers, either by refusal or by indifference, wanted this festival to be oriented toward a very limited group of specialists rather than being an open and public event.179 Such a conception was unusual because festivals were very popular in Morocco, where Moussems were officially sacred, and festivals were held for every conceivable event or occasion. Yet, the first festival did reflect the reality of cinema in Morocco. One would have wanted the festival to be a factor to move and to improve, be a critique of the past and a turning point. But it was not, in truth, but the truthful image of a morose reality. For this itself the festival was good, because it permitted, for the first time and for a whole week, filmmakers and film enthusiasts, the public and at times the authorities to gather together; it permitted the diverse protagonists (those who bothered to attend) to confront each other in the same place.180 In any case, the festival was nothing but the reflection of what had become of cinema, its degree of maturity, vivacity, strength, and promise—or lack thereof. No selection of films was made; every film made since 1980 could have been accepted—thus thirteen features and twelve shorts were programmed.181 Some prizes were not awarded, such as the grand prize, the prize for editing, and the prize for music.182 Certain themes emerged in discussions, such as the need for television to support cinema activities with more money, more advertising, and some promotion; the need for distribution of films and the need for distribution to be a legal requirement; and that theaters and national films should be detaxed. Second National Festival of Moroccan Cinema: December 1984 The second festival was held in December 1984 in Casablanca (originally scheduled for March, it had to be canceled due to too few films being ready183). The third festival was not held until November 1991 in Meknes, after a seven-year gap. The second festival was limited to films produced since the first festival, so between 1982 and 1984. The brochure was mimeographed or photocopied as was the one for the first festival, but this time the paper was different colors of construction-type paper. While the former brochure was all in Arabic, this brochure was printed entirely in French with no Arabic. The cover design on the booklet was also the theme of the festival poster. One of the main topics raised by critics at the second festival was that Moroccan filmmakers were unable to communicate with the Moroccan public. In other respects the second festival was much the same as the first. One of the most interesting areas to look at in terms of festivals is also what films won prizes. Of particular interest is the distinction between the “public prize”
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and the other prizes awarded by the juries of these two festivals, in relation to the dichotomy between what were considered Morocco’s “best” films versus “most popular” films. In the first festival, Al Hal was selected as the film most appreciated by the audience (public prize). The film, a docu-fiction about a popular singing/performance group Nass al Ghiwane, encapsulates performance, interview, historical footage, and some enacted scenes. An excellent film, informative yet entertaining, emphasizing cultural icons of Moroccan popular culture—yet the film won no prizes in any of the juried categories though it was adored by audiences. In the second festival, the public prize went to Yachfine’s Cauchemar, a film flashback of a man in the current era of women’s rights and notions of urban equality going back via a strange dreamstate to a previous generation in which women and men’s relationships were not egalitarian. The male lead had several jealous wives already and decided he must marry the girl who happened to also be the young sweetheart of his son. The jealous women tried magic and herbs on the husband to keep him from taking another wife, while the traumatized son fled only to be picked up by the colonial forces and forced to join their army. Yet again the film was very popular with audiences because of its subject and historical re-creation, but the jury awarded its most prestigious prizes (but also numerous prizes) and acclaim to Hadda. While Hadda was a beautiful film, the plot and story were highly metaphysical, intellectual, and abstract, and difficult for even the cultivated viewer to grasp, much less the audience which wanted a film to be engaging rather than a scholastic exercise. The difference here noted between the values of the jury and the regular audience do lend credence to the antagonisms between Moroccan filmmakers and Moroccan exhibitors/critics as to what constitutes appropriate films for the Moroccan audience.
FILMS AND FILMMAKERS From four features produced between 1956 and 1970, Morocco/Moroccans produced fifty-three features between 1971 and 1985, most of them first films and many of surprising quality given the negative reviews they received. Of the fiftythree films, approximately thirty-five were generated between 1980 and 1985, compared to eighteen generated between 1971 and 1979.184 In contrast to the 112 shorts/documentaries produced prior to 1970, only 55 were made between 1971 and 1985, and at least half of those were made subsequent to the creation of the production fund, that is between 1981 and 1985. Obviously, the production fund did a great deal to stimulate quantitative production of films in Morocco, even given its highly problematic structure and management.
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With the shift from a primary focus on documentary and short films to an emphasis on feature filmmaking, there was also a shift of duties in the CCM such that filmmakers previously employed full-time found they were no longer needed, which induced a change in the cadre of filmmakers working during this era. CCM funding for in-house projects was curtailed, which then curtailed some of the great experimentation that State job security allowed the early short and documentary filmmakers. Several prolific (and some of the best) makers of short films and documentaries no longer produced after 1970–1971: Mohamed Afifi, Larbi Benchekroun, Larbi Bennani, Abdelaziz Ramdani and Mohamed Ziani.185 Only Ahmed Mesnaoui continued to produce numerous films after 1970, maintaining the tradition of shorts and documentaries for government ministries, and national development, with a focus on diverse subjects throughout Morocco. Mohamed Laalioui, who had just started his career at the end of the 1960s, continued making documentaries oriented to national information and development into the 1990s. These figures and those that follow emphasize that the community of filmmakers, was relatively small overall, yet the number of films was, while relatively small, by no means negligible. Therefore, it is striking that nearly half of the filmmaking community only made a film once the production fund had been instituted. But the figures also attest that all the “problems” mentioned about the CCM, the sustainment fund and other limitations throughout the field had very real effects on the industry, because many of the most creative individuals fled. At least twenty-five new filmmakers entered the scene for the first time: Mohamed Abbassi, Abdou Achouba, Hamid Bensaid, Said (Ben) Saouda, Bouriki Benghaleb, Hamid Bensherif, Farida Bourquia, Saad Chraibi, Abdellah Drissi, Noureddine Gounejjar, Ahmed Kacem Aqdi, Driss Kettani, Mostafa Khayat, Abdelkader Lagtaâ, Nabyl Lahlou, Ahmed Maanouni, Abdellah Mesbahi, Hassan Moufti, Driss Mrini, Hakim Noury, Majid R’chich, Mohamed Reggab, Tayeb Seddikki, Najib Sefrioui, and Ahmed Yachfine. Some of the above listed individuals continued to produce until the 2000s, while a few made their first feature film during this era and not again until the 1990s (Abbassi, Yachfine . . .), either due to the way the system was organized, how difficult it was to raise funds, because they worked in cinema only part-time, or because the individual worked primarily abroad. Particularly noticeable was Farida Bourquia, the first woman director in Morocco—although women had been fulfilling a variety of roles in administration and in certain aspects of production, such as Farida Benlyazid who worked as a scriptwriter, an assistant director, and a production manager. Some individuals were active “only” during the period from 1971 to 1985, after which the system changed again. These individuals were considered
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“award-chasers” because they came on the scene just when “everyone” could get production funds, and then dropped out,186 or moved to/focused on other media. Farida Bourquia, Tayeb Seddikki, and Mohamed Reggab deserve special mention because Bourquia continued to produce prolifically in television, Seddikki had a continuing full career in theater, and Mohamed Reggab would have produced much longer but for his untimely death. Of twenty-five new filmmakers entering the field, approximately twelve continued to make films after 1985, and some of those made only one additional film. However, numerous filmmakers left filmmaking but continued to work in media—either in administration, television, or publicity.187 Because filmmakers had to perform numerous pre- and production roles, along with being distributor, press agent, and publicist, send the film to festivals, and perhaps even act and edit, one of the main issues that filmmakers complained made filmmaking difficult was the lack of trained professionals either for preproduction, production, or postproduction phases. Filmmakers had lobbied the CCM for two main issues: increased funding to make films, so that films of better quality could be made and so that all sectors could make a minimum salary at least; and the desperate need for the State to train professionals and technicians in diverse arenas. Filmmakers demanded that the CCM begin to work toward a “professional cinema” in Morocco, not amateurism, whether film subjects were elite or commercial.188 As mentioned previously, no real efforts had been extended to train nor to create training facilities since 1970 until 2000. The filmmakers claimed that the multiple roles they had to assume automatically led to the lower quality of their films. One person just could not do so many tasks and be entirely responsible for so many arenas and do them all well.189 Furthermore, the filmmakers were not able to earn an income to offset the intensive commitment required to make their films. Actor Larbi Doghmi recalled that when he worked with Lahlou on an early film, Lahlou had no financing so Doghmi actually bought/brought lunch for the crew, and used his own savings to buy the motorcycle needed in the film.190 Eventually Lahlou was able to give him some money back, but the example is indicative. As a professional actor, however, Doghmi complained that filmmakers could not even pay actors a moderate salary; how were they to survive as actors with no pay? Simultaneously, actors were criticized for being too “theatrical” or for not having enough experience to act well in films. Somehow the actors as well as other crew were expected to produce professional product while pursuing their craft as a hobby rather than a paying profession. Yet film producers and directors had their hands tied; they could not pay for services when the money was not available. Either they worked within the extant system, they waited for years and years to put together financing deals outside
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of the system, or they gave up filmmaking altogether. To work within the system meant that pay for everyone was low or deferred, and still filmmakers often had to sell their property to finance a film, or others, such as Reggab, had their belongings repossessed by the bank when they were unable to pay back loans. In spite of the complaints poured forth by filmmakers from the beginning of this era—that they were set impossible obstacles and had too many roles to perform and yet were criticized for producing films which were not competitive with those of France and the United States—one of the complaints lodged by the critics of Moroccan films was that the films were bad because Moroccan filmmakers tried to do too many jobs themselves. While the filmmakers blamed the system in place, the critics blamed the individuals. Eventually the critics did challenge the CCM’s irresponsible management of technical infrastructure and their lack of trained personnel or training programs. Yet filmmakers continued to bear the brunt of criticisms for the quality of their films. Critics disparaged the low technical quality, but also the subject matter. The criticism of subject matter seemed to further divide filmmakers into camps dependent upon the types of films they made. This was the beginning of the end of the era in which nation-building, development, and exploration of national territory dominated the subjects of films. Since caravans reduced their reach and other technologies took more of the burden of trying to cohere the populace into a “nation,” films and filmmakers shifted to become more equally divided between information and fiction/shorts and features. With the move to feature filmmaking and the later introduction of a production fund, filmmakers begin to approach the medium much more like their counterparts in developed countries which they used as models. Films delved much more into explorations of the psyche and soul along with geography and culture, but were also characterized as being hermetic, too devoted to the interior realm, too metaphysical in their treatment of even common subjects. While the struggle for independence was a dominant theme in early Algerian and Tunisian cinema, Moroccans generated only a few films on the topic.191 Films were divided into two main tendencies irrespective of the actual subject: popular orientation or intellectual orientation. The tendency or overall approach received disproportionate attention compared to the genre or subject of films, although perhaps a claim could be made that the intellectualist approach could constitute a genre. “Commercial” or “popular” films were seen to have some traits in common, such as recourse to a type of reductivist folklore, a potpourri of people treated in the melodramatic vein, including theatrical tirades which pretended to be laden with hidden significance, but including farce; the worst stereotypes persisting from the televised theater tradition, particularly of the bled
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(Moroccan countryside) and the country people, seen through a prism of the petit bourgeois who had no sensibility of the rural world.192 One can believe that, consciously or unconsciously, Arab intellectuals who have begun to live the difficult but fecund mutation of their civilization have not, almost never, perceived the role/part of the peasant or even more the role/part of the non-sedentary tribes in their national cultural patrimony except through the notion of folklore, or worse, of exoticism. This reaction is, without a doubt, nourished by a distrust towards themselves, because often, the truth of the provinces, its daily realities, remain foreign to the intellectuals. They themselves don’t live/experience this reality.193 Added to this, there is a distrust of folklore which is known only by decontextualized signs—whether music, chant, dance or handicrafts—by the socialistic oriented who risk condemning the past, considering the past an obstacle, a source of stagnation. Parts of one’s own country are disappeared, rendered null, a void, interesting only to anthropologists.194
While some filmmakers were considered alienated from their national public they further alienated themselves by turning instead to specialized international audiences of festivals which demanded from them films not suitable to their local public.195 Thus the filmmakers were also considered alienating to their publics, because they could not make films that spoke to the majority of the people. This is the crux of the distinction between “commercial/popular” and “intellectual” filmmaking. Both types of filmmakers might have been alienated from their public because they belonged to an elite class with a specific upbringing that rendered them quite different and separated from the customs and thoughts of the “masses.” But one filmmaker type tried to replicate the films which had appealed to this undefinable Moroccan public in the past, while the other type believed either that the public was an insignificant factor (film as personal art) or that the public had to be educated and saved from the corruption of popular films to learn to see in a more challenging way. Moumen Smihi, for example, belonged to the second category. He was not concerned that his films had low to no distribution in Morocco, because he made films as a personal not public endeavor.196 His films were his art, which would necessarily appeal only to a few consumers, and would not be expected to generate much income. He was not concerned about making films for the Moroccan public, and stated that he was actually much more in tune and had much more in common with the urban elites of France and Egypt than with the majority of Moroccans. Since Smihi studied at IDHEC and with Roland Barthes, his films reflected both his training and his very personal use of filmmaking.
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The term “auteur” was used to designate such films for the stylistics mentioned, but also because individual directors did create signature styles within the overall “intellectualist” orientation. Films by Smihi fall into this category, as do those by Derkaoui, Nabyl Lahlou, Mohamed Reggab, and several others. Such films were the most readily available for television screenings, festivals, and cinema club showings. And while critics complained that the films were too difficult on one hand, they also elevated them above “commercial” films because they could be construed as more “authentic,” more a product of the individual Moroccan director. Ben Barka fit into an in-between category. His films were neither difficult for the audience to understand nor modeled after the most popular imported films; rather, he explored various terrains: he used a Third Cinema approach for his first film, Mille et Un Mains, used international stars Laurent Terzeiff and Irene Pappas in adapting Garcia Lorca’s Blood Wedding placed in a very Moroccan setting, and ventured into South Africa to remake Paton’s Cry the Beloved Country in his film Amok which in no way referenced Morocco. However, despite their “orientation,” most remarkable of this period was that of all the films available, admittedly only about thirty-one of fifty-two films listed, one trend tended to dominate in all but perhaps two to three films. Each film was suffused with a goal or character who desired change intensely, desired something, searched for something—but the change never occurred, the quest was never fulfilled, progress was always blocked, and failure was always the outcome.197 Often the protagonists were psychologically deranged or went through a period of derangement and estrangement; the world was full of violence; no one could be trusted and nothing was sacred nor safe. Women and the innocent were victimized, the trusting were cheated, leaders and the government were dishonest and selfish, and above all the individual was helpless in the face of overwhelming odds and forces against him/her. The next section deviates by detailing the only three films available which did not follow the previously mentioned trend: Al Hal by Maanouni; Abbassi’s De l’Autre Côté du Fleuve; and Yachfine’s Cauchemar. Al Hal evinces the power of the music and the group Nass al Ghiwane quite positively while not rendering the individual members heroic or mythic. It was the first Moroccan film to break box office records in Morocco because it was so popular with audiences. The film also won the Prix ESEC at Cannes in 1981 as well as the Prize of the Public at the first national cinema festival in Rabat in 1982. De l’Autre Côté du Fleuve features a young boy who faces many cruel and distressing adventures along with some tender moments as he learns about the nature of the world’s inhabitants. The film is quite touching because the young boy is so innocent, not vanquished by his encounters, which makes the film more powerful. Cauchemar won the audience reception prize in
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the second national festival of Moroccan film in 1984 and the prize for best decor. These were the three examples that did not end either negatively or in failure, and one of them is a semidocumentary. Al Hal (Trances) (1981, 87 mins, 16 mm, color)198 As mentioned previously, this feature-length semidocumentary concerns the musical group Nass al Ghiwane in daily life, playing in concerts and informally, in the studios, and in personal moments. Souiba: “The music of the group became a sort of cultural identity harking back in time just to the beginning of the century to embrace the music of the Gnaoua, and it is this musical depth open all through the century of the Protectorate that had been substituted by an imported music.”199 Nass al Ghiwane were known for resuscitating a music that had long been neglected in favor of oriental style and romanticism; through songs they touched upon themes and preoccupations of the daily, but also significant memories of a country attached to its culture and its national identity. The film included archival footage of the colonial era in a flashback sequence—which seemed a bit awkward coming in such a modern film, but had its place in explaining the origins of Nass al Ghiwane and the necessity of a return to Moroccan music and away from Western influences and styles. In an especially interesting instance, Larbi Batma recounted a dream/story about Aisha Kandisha as a mythical figure who arose in resistance to colonialism (Aisha Kandisha is a well-known mythical figure/djinnia in Morocco). Thus the film about Nass al Ghiwane is less simple than it sounds because it is full of symbols and images which are interwoven with significance within the film, within the culture, and within the texts of the songs. As well, Al Hal expresses the sacred, and the ritual of the Gnaouas of Essaouira, and transforms them into the lay and the modern. De L’Autre Côté du Fleuve/Au-dela du Fleuve (The Other Side of the River) (1982, color, 85 mins, 35 mm)200 Said, an eight-year-old boy from Salé, has been sent to fetch a caftan his mother was having made, but it is stolen by some very crafty thieves, and Said, afraid to return home, instead runs away to look for his aunt in Rabat to seek her help. Along the way he manages to encounter unusual characters and situations as he traverses the river separating Rabat and Salé. Practically nothing really happens to Said. He is only captured in a successive turbulence of events and situations which he only passes through/crosses; he submits. The director used Said as the eyepiece through which to reveal life in Morocco, with all the social and cultural disparities existing at the time.201 For example,
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Said sees a garden party where young Moroccans dance to American music and French people discuss politics; he passes a cinema showing kung-fu pictures, then is attacked by five boys acting out the kung-fu (he is saved by a man passing by who makes the kids run off and curses them for their stupid emulations); one youth is hitchhiking to Amsterdam and is picked up by a Volkswagen bug. Said encounters an old Berber couple who share their food, a young girl just emerging from prison, youths working in different trades such as car repair and in coffee shops, a debilitated boxer, young urban rebellious women, and indigent youths on a crime spree who steal a man’s wallet. When he chases them, he is joined temporarily into their “gang” until they steal his clothes and abandon him at the end of a long train hop. Undaunted, and in fact a bit wizened and strengthened by his escapades, he returns home willing to endure his punishments. The film is considered to be fresh and comforting because it is far from being moralistic or heavy in the way of many realist or social films. Still the film is considered a social commentary film; the filmmaker focused on social details to bring into relief the unshown elements of society. Abbassi’s film is about an innocent who, trusting, is taken advantage of at every possible moment. Yet rather than being defeated and depressed as he would have become in other films, he simply accepts and adapts to the reality of human interrelations. Finally, Cauchemar is a film that opens in the modern era and flashes back to yesteryear, during the French occupation around 1940s. The story during the flashback fits into the overall negativity pattern of other films, yet the flashback section is framed by scenes of the modern era, which save the film from having an overall despondent or negative tone. Thus there is hope in this time even though the past might have been dismal. Cauchemar Kabous (Nightmare, Kabous) (1984, 100 min, color, 35 mm)202 Said is a successful playwright who suffers from sleepwalking. He leads a normal life with his wife Meriem who heads the women’s union in Casablanca. In the beginning of the film Said drops his wife at her speaking engagement at an international women’s day conference; the framing device presages that the role of women would be a dominant issue. While traveling to another town, Said’s car breaks down and he has to spend the night in a deserted house. He dreams he turns into Haj Said, a man married to two wives who wants to take a third who just happens to be the sweetheart of his only son. At this time period, Haj Said is respected by his covillagers as well as the colonial authorities—he supervises rationing and assists the French military justice.203 He becomes the vehicle through
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which we see the life of this village during the difficult era of colonialism. The French colonial forces in the film distribute/ration food since there is drought in the region exacerbated by conscription of crops for the French army; further, the French are forcibly rounding up recruits for their war with Germany. In fact, after Haj Said’s marriage, his angered son runs away but is captured by the French military and hauled away with numerous other youths. Interestingly, when the French regional authority holds court, all the crimes seem to be atrocities against women. For example, one man beat his wife nearly to death because she served food to his guests that was too salty. He is sentenced to a week in the stockade but released because his cow needs attention. Said’s previous wives did not want him to take a third wife, and thus resort to witchcraft to win their husband’s affection and love. They make him eat something which quickly causes him to die; then his soul returns to the body of the man in the modern era, who wakes up and returns to the modern city and his egalitarian relationship with his wife. According to Yachfine, this film had a lot to do with the colonial period, since it had to do with the “amm al-boon,” a year of social and economic crises, the intrusion of the foreigner, and the suffering of the Moroccan population. “Boon” is “receipt according to one’s share” which also references the subject of the film, the relationships between the genders. Because food was meant to go to the army—especially grains, sugar, and oils—these things were given to Moroccans only in limited amounts (rations).204 The story of the film was taken from events in a specific region, Moulay Bouazza, and specific people who lived during the period. While the film was heavily criticized for not showing “resistance” to the French, Yachfine countered that the film was not a survey of the time period, but events which happened to a particular group of people in a specific region. These particular people thought positively about the colonizer until the war period, rationing and oppression, so Yachfine’s film did not deal with resistance or independence, the national movement, or politics.205 Yachfine purposefully maintained a very easy style for spectators to follow, using no symbolism, abstractions, elusive language or ambiguous individuals. He wanted a simple story, even banal, but available to the viewer and to as honestly as possible convey the situation of the colonial period in the region. Other films dealing with colonialism, such as Bouanani’s Mirage, 44. . . . by Smihi, and L’âme Qui Brait by Lahlou, all obscured the period by their difficult style and ambiguous messages.206 Of course, in response to Yachfine’s efforts, critics said the film reflected an honest endeavor to treat important subjects, but too often reeked of amateurism, of made-for-TV sentimentality, of televised theater.207
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MAIN PLAYERS AND SHORT FILMS The 1970s and early 1980s were an era of more standard documentation, blanketing background music, voice-over description and commentary in various language versions, and linear explicative documentary mode using either recycled footage from earlier films or footage shot explicitly of the subject treated. In general, although not every film fits this pattern, the films could be summed up as didactic and rather pedantic in orientation and style. Mohamed Laalioui Mohamed Laalioui directed approximately five documentaries during this period, and numerous ones during the late 1980s and early 1990s. His style was a very straightforward documentary with explicative voice-over, treating subjects such as the air force, the vacation camps that various ministries and agencies ran for the families of their employees, and tourism-type promotional films. Forces Royales Air (1971, b/w, 1,035 meters, French only) A carriage arrives at an air force school in Marrakech unloading a new recruit. A captain speaks to a group of new recruits then the film moves into reflecting the soldier’s life at camp, marching, discipline, honor, drills, training, studying, in class, in barracks, men in planes, flying formation, men in helicopters, loading bomber planes, engaging in fighter practice, and parachuting; there is even a funny scene in the cafeteria which is edited using very quick cuts to make people flick around and appear and disappear quickly. Voice-over uses the style: “Men have achieved their dreams, have their families, and serve their country.” Colonies de Vacances (1972, b/w, 682 meters, Arabic version) This film is a bit more fun, as it concerns young boys at camps run by the organizations their parents work for. From a tent in the woods, a boy writes a letter home describing his camp, allowing the film to expand to include all the boys in camp, as the writer’s voice-over talks about his experiences in the camp, at the doctor’s, at play. We are taken from the woods to the beach and back following the youths in their activities, raising the flag, going hiking and for walks, family visits, singing, praying, eating food, doing crafts, and playing sports. The fun kids at camp are contrasted with kids who do not go to camp and are thus left to no future but becoming street ruffians, criminals, and rude to authorities. Our writer finishes his letter and drops it in the mail. Then a girl’s voice tells about girls’ camps in the same vein (although shorter), until camp is over, and a crew does end of camp cleanup. At the end the tide rises and washes away the sand castles built by camp kids on the beach, and the camp is over.
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Ahmed Mesnaoui Ahmed Mesnaoui was more prolific during this era with eleven documentaries. Much of his work replicated the styles of the films noted above, but he also maintained the effort to add more narrative creativity to his message films. The film below was designed as a “development” film to encourage families to send their children to school, to treat their children more as Western children were treated rather than requiring that they work at an early age to support the family. The film emphasizes that fathers should be more considerate of their children rather than brutal and authoritarian. Fittarik (1982, b/w, about 25 mins, / 680 meters, Arabic)208 This story is incredibly similar to Abbassi’s De L’Autre Côté du Fleuve and both films were released in the same year. In this story, a young boy is constantly abused by his father who torments him for having a weak arm and a stutter; the father takes the boy to work with him in his shop rather than sending him to school. On the way to the shop the boy sees a man beating a donkey and the camera discloses his face and his fear that he is just a donkey to his father. Soon he has to run an errand for the father: to go to a house to take a little boy to school. He is unfriendly to the boy, and at the school stays outside and peeks in at the students. When the teacher asks a question they can not answer, the boy yells out the correct response from outside then runs away. In fact, he just runs away from home, and his adventures take him through various streets and scenarios exactly reminiscent of Said’s adventures in Abbassi’s film: kids stealing from a store, him freeing a bird from a cage, seeing movie posters outside a theater and then being beat up by kids pretending to be Bruce Lee, and sleeping outside at night while his parents look for him. The boy stays away for several days because when he thinks of home he only thinks of being yelled at. But when he runs across a street he is hit by a car. Next we see his parents come to visit him in the hospital; they are suddenly more loving to him. A male voiceover to this film emphasizes that this is a film about children who are treated badly by society and their parents, badly educated, and exploited, and the dangers that accompany such treatment. Even though enacted, the film has a very didactic tone and educational orientation. Kouider Bennani This last short film represents a dominant style in Moroccan documentary. Kouider Bennani made only a couple of films, but both replicated the same style as this. There is a bit more detail on this film because it is so propagandistic and is such an obvious effort to use cinema to sway public opinion to favor the King’s plans and practices. Particularly important is that this film was made just
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after several years of drought throughout Morocco which caused huge bread riots in Casablanca and other locales, coupled with a lot of public unrest, in which many Moroccans were killed, along with reciprocal repression by police and government authorities. Yet the king used his available resources to turn the tide of public opinion and this film was one of his endeavors to do so. Le Sahara Marocain a Traverse les Siècles (The Moroccan Sahara through the Centuries) (1985, 1,015 meters, color, French, Arabic, and English versions) The film opens on an aerial view of a port; immediately a male voice-over commences very quickly paced, breathless, racing over the images underneath (all recognizable as being culled from other documentaries) which show cars being unloaded from a ferry, roads, buildings, and city overview as the narrator tells us our location and the importance of postcolonial modern Morocco. After one breath the voice launches into a tirade about how Morocco has conquered many obstacles to renovate society while keeping traditions alive. “Morocco recuperated its sovereignty and fixed a program of independence as the country developed in serenity and the mobilization of national energies in continuity. . . .” The commentary is dense, breathless, trite, and propagandistic platitudes—all flowery constructions embellishing simple facts but rendered irritating because the images underneath, all culled from other films and very familiar, are randomly juxtaposed together, or even meaningless. Monuments, buildings, sights and locales are totally melanged. Always the same shots of the same government buildings; always the same aerials of the city, port, and train yard. “Modern Morocco has remained faithful to tradition and its Andalusian past” intones over the image of a mosque minaret and big pool in Fes, fortunately accompanied by Andalusian music. However, the film continues with the Andalusian music score even when images and subject shift to performing Berber folklore troupes—whose music differs completely from the Andalusian style. Then the film jumps to an aerial view of waves on a beach, eventually a parachutist descends across the water to a resort. There is no order, no continuity. After two shots of tourist hotels, the Andalusian music is replaced by traditional rebab music as we “move” to the Sahara region via random shots and voice-over of a history beginning with the prehistoric era merging into Carthage and Rome invasions in one sentence. Maps and documents are too dark to see and jazz guitar underlies the random documents whose writing is too small to read, shot after shot. The voice does not explain the importance of the texts shown in such abundance, while the entire colonial era is reduced to one map showing the Sahara separated from the rest of Morocco. One line of dialogue says that the Sahara was not colonized until twenty-two years after the north. Then quickly it shows Mohamed V’s triumphal return from exile in Madagascar at independence, in archival
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shots, along with the independence agreement. Why here? Skipping from past to present to past with no rhyme or reason only to leap forward into the present again to touch upon Tarfaya, military maneuvers, and more archival images to promote Morocco’s “right” to the Sahara. An acid rock musical score enhances the plopping of newspapers one on another too fast to read the too small titles that the voice describes as the creation of the Union National Sahraoui. All the images and musics cascade one after another rushing along to represent whole events and eras in random images rushing through the years until finally the Green March is over and the king arrives in Layoune to reclaim it as Moroccan territory. Suddenly the film slows to a crawl through many images of crowds rejoicing and a religious speech given in the mosque. . . . But, not over yet, Hassan II inspects his troops to march music, and talks to parliament, and the images quickly change to aerials of towns underscored by symphonic music then baladi music and random images of markets, people, buildings, and services. Layoune progresses with services and buildings, a Palais de Congrés, elections, urban planning, citizen participation, a desalinization plant, electric plant, water distribution, agricultural efforts to reclaim the desert, cows, water pipes, irrigation, education, work, literacy, sports, tourism, communications. “Morocco did what it could for this region.” It is not too difficult to see the problematics of this type of filmmaking and film, which were the primary types of films, it should be recalled, that were shown to certain categories of Moroccans such as rural folk, caravan audiences, and groups needing to be “educated.”
FEATURE FILMS: 1971–1985 It has already been mentioned that a number of individuals entered into filmmaking for the first time during this era, particularly with the introduction of the production fund. Furthermore, a variety of styles and approaches to feature film become evident as more films and filmmakers emerge. A range of new filmmakers and films are discussed here in order to provide an example of a more traditional narrative style that yet is well rooted in Moroccan aesthetics (Ferhati), of a style reminiscent of Brecht, Moliere, and the theater of the absurd set to celluloid (Lahlou), and of an intense self-reflexive interiorfocused symbolism-laden nonlinear style (Derkaoui). Jilali Ferhati Jilali Ferhati makes his base in Tangier, his birthplace and where he sets his scenarios—the northern regions. He began his career with Une Brêche Dans
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le Mur (A Whole in the Wall) in 1978, followed by Poupées de Roseau (Cane Dolls) in 1981 and then did not produce another film until the 1990s when he made La Plage des Enfants Perdus (The Beach of Lost Children),209 in 1991, then Chevaux du Fortune (Horses of Fortune)210 in 1995, Tresses211 in 2000, and Mémoire en detention (Memory in Detention)212 in 2004. Ferhati studied cinema and theater in Paris and is well known as an excellent actor of stage and screen as well as film director. Ferhati set his films in the milieu he knows, the north, because there is a huge difference between people and customs from different parts of the country. Ferhati does not pretend to be able to represent a commonality or elided “Moroccan”; because he focuses on the area and people he knows best, who he understands and knows intimately, he is thus able to represent people in depth. Ferhati also believes that melodramas in moderate form can be a good method for conveying important social messages; a film does not have to be overtly political in order to convey political and significant information about people’s lives. Ferhati’s second film, Poupées de Roseau, is included particularly because it is a melodrama which taps deeply into Tangier’s people, traditions, customs, practices, and politics in an attempt to highlight women’s conditions and struggles in the patriarchal society of Morocco in the 1950s. In brief, the film tells the story of a young widow faced with the harsh experiences of social discrimination and sexual and economic exploitation. Poupées de Roseau (Straw/Cane Dolls, Arayiss Min Kasab) (1981, 82 mins, shot in 16 mm and enlarged to 35 mm)213 The story is set in Tangier in the 1950s when still occupied territory. During the film time, Morocco gains its independence, which spurs the female protagonist, Aisha, to seek her own independence as well. Aisha comes from the countryside and a very traditional family when a young girl (aged twelve) to be married to her cousin, an officer in the Spanish army.214 While still a child, she is raised and trained by her mother-in-law until she can take on her marital duties. Aisha is constantly surveilled and enclosed, not ever able to really be a child because she is the only young girl in the household and must concentrate only on duties rather than play. However, on a rare moment free in the street, she sees Spanish women dancing and drinking at a neighborhood party. Thus, the “outside” to her means play or the ability to mingle with men and move freely; but she is “inside,” confined to home and traditional activities with absolutely no experience herself of the outside world, or life in the public sphere. For example, her husband would do even the grocery shopping, and as a married woman she should only go to the houses of other women for segregated events and ceremonies. Her husband dies suddenly of a heart attack on his way home from shopping, leaving her at age eighteen with three young children. In truth, her world is shattered.
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Family tradition proposes she should marry her brother-in-law. Inexplicably, she rebels for the first time in her life and refuses. She wants to work and survive on her own; she wants a love marriage not a duty marriage. Now she wants to try independence; her mother-in-law supports Aisha against her own son, which reveals that solidarity among women sometimes emerges in the face of misfortune. Suddenly Aisha’s quite ordinary and traditional life, in which she had been docile, submissive, and cloistered, is radically altered and she has to learn to affirm herself and to fend for herself and her children. She has never had to have such external responsibility before, being always taken care of by the husband, and social structure keeping her realm the home.215 She begins her new life by getting a job as a cleaning woman in a bank while her mother-in-law takes care of household chores and the children. Once faced with the street, however, Aisha is overwhelmed and easily led astray. Due to inexperience in the ways of the world, she mistakes that the amorous advances of a bank employee indicate his love and desire to marry her. She is easily seduced by his wiles but also by her own desires to be responsible for her own destiny. Of course the man does not ever want to marry her, and dumps her once she becomes pregnant—even demanding of her “How can I even be sure the child is my own?” With this simple question he reminds Aisha that she has not been liberated but tricked, still subject to male order, male desires, and male definitions of legitimacy. If she would be seduced by him, why not by any man? Her desires are meaningless to him and to the society that will judge her for becoming pregnant out of wedlock. Aisha, innocence incarnate, is a victim of her social group which requires that she remain enclosed at home and protected by male kin. Caught between her desires as a woman/free agent and reigning social mores, her lack of social education lead to her victimization; she is stripped of rights and powers, reduced to a most marginal realm. When the family discovers her illegal pregnancy, the mother-in-law is sympathetic and tries to help her abort with herbs and even hide the pregnancy from others, while the brother-in-law is enraged yet secretly satisfied that Aisha has confirmed the weakness of women. He wants to take Aisha to court to strip her of her house, her children, and the support of family. And the law is on his side. Aisha would be breaking “legal” law as well as “moral” law to birth the child of her illegal union. Her pregnancy threatens her family and society, but also the State, because becoming pregnant out of wedlock is a criminal act on multiple levels. Indeed, she is taken to court which determines her an unfit mother and awards all family inheritance and custody of the children to the brother-in-law. The court scene in this film is especially interesting because the judges speak a classical Arabic that the women (Aisha and mother-in-law) cannot
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understand. They neither understand the premises nor the laws nor the edicts being handed down, and have to ask the brother-in-law to translate for them. This small detail emphasizes the double ostracization that women face in general from the law and the patriarchal authorities. Decimated by the court’s decision to award house and children to her brother-in-law, she miscarries right there in the court. She is left nothing, not even the illegitimate child. Ostracized, alone, and socially “marked,” she subsequently must fight constantly against being treated by men as a prostitute or easy target. She has few women she can depend upon, because they are themselves subject to their husbands who would not want such a woman in their house. In one home where she works as a servant and sleeps in the kitchen, the son sneaks to her bedside in the middle of the night in anticipation that she will have sex with him. Of course she refuses and leaves the next day without revealing the problem to the matron of the house. In another instance, while she is in line with many other women waiting to be hired as housecleaners, a man tries to force her to come with him in a manner that indicates he considers she will sell any “service” he has in mind, not just cleaning. When she resists him he physically abuses her and has to be driven off by another man and other women. In flight from these realities, she eventually gives up and retires to a zawiya, seclusion, protection from the world. The film ends with her and other women draped in white haiks in a cemetery high over the city; she is still young, but we have no clue as to what will happen to her. In a sense a circle has been enacted, from seclusion to reclusion. Aisha is too naive to meet the challenges of the male outer world, to meet the subversities of male desires, or to understand the fallacy of her own. Aisha is stripped of her social and familial support network because she tried to live outside the sanctioned and approved lifestyle. She acted as though individually she had the right to direct her own life—but instead was thrust in ricochet from one sanctioned abuse to another. In the 1950s, Aisha has no recourse but to endure as victim. Her plight is individual as she searches for her own rights, but is also extrapolated into multiple women’s plights—her individual problems are mirrored by the other working women harassed on the streets, cloistered women in the cemetery, and even her married friends who complain of their situations. Love, in her time, in her milieu, is not an acceptable motivation for sexual union—it is delusional and punishable. National liberation in no way equates with female liberation either in social mores, legal constraints, or women’s knowledge of the dangers in the public sphere. In this early historical moment, women in the north of Morocco—in Tangier in this case—are not prepared by life experiences to emulate foreign women models because males and institutions consider Moroccan women as chattel: potent objects to be supervised, constrained, protected—protected from themselves, society protected from their unleashed desires. Woman is considered fitna when her
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desires are uncontrolled, a disruptive force that needs to be tamed for society to maintain its order and peace. By the end of the film, Aisha has learned this lesson very well, and yet her containment can only be effected in the marginal realm of the cemetery. One of the most engaging qualities of the combined efforts of Ferhati as director and Benlyazid as writer is that the film maintains a sense of social realism (in fact is characterized by poignant but harsh realism), historical accuracy, and social meaningfulness while also utilizing melodrama to emphasize the emotional reality of the sociohistorical issues.216 CCM literature describes the power of the work: “Le cinéaste a filmé la peine quotidienne, le poids de la tradition, un étrange partage des sexes où les femmes restent souveraines si elles veulent bien se cacher entre elles, à l’abri de la pollution extérieure. Ignorant le cinéma spectacle, les auteurs ont ‘recréé une fiction ethnographique pleine de sens et de fureur contenus.’” (trans.217). The overall style is sober and bare218 while simultaneously full of intricate details of great significance. For example, the color red is a thread throughout the film. In an early scene when Aisha is still quite young, she goes to buy a cone of sugar for a party given in her honor. In secret, she uses the red wrapper of the sugar loaf to stain her lips red, which marks her arrival as a woman, particularly when coupled with the fact that the festivity is to mark her menstruation and the appearance of red blood, yet another marker that she has attained womanhood. Later on, when she works in the bank, the red lipstick she buys again marks her entry into womanhood—this time outside of conventional morality though. Her red lips represent her availability, and her sexuality. Red is also a marker of her loss, her blood, when she miscarries outside the courtroom; she has been deprived of her womanhood by being deprived of her children by the court. Benlyazid claimed that her story was ethnographic, was reality, and talked about what existed in Morocco. This script was a chance for her to explore how the oppression of women operated, even how it affected herself, so it was a personal exploration.219 Yet critics have called the film “folkloric” because it included ceremonies of parties, weddings, the bath, the funeral, etc., which “are too long for Moroccans and must just be there to appeal to foreign interests”; since Moroccans know what weddings are like, why film this event for such a long time?220 Benlyazid defended herself and the script by saying that these are important aspects of life, of her life and of the lives of many other young women of many different regions of the country, and it is not possible that they be overlooked or hidden, but must be represented as a living reality, and must be described and shown in cinema. In agreement, Ferhati says: Cane Dolls is not exclusively a film about women, it is also an inquisition in favor of those beings who live in humiliation. My choice, concerning the directing of this film which Farida Belyazid wrote the script, is due to the beauty, the
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strength and the coherence of the subject. Nothing is artificial, nor invented, it is a true story, a fact which does not fail to cause indignation. I have never been so concerned and I would have liked to say more about that to which a being put in front of secular institutions must submit, which are the customs and traditions, which render man strong and sure of his true right. But I believe that my images are not the end of my intentions and those of Farida, because we continue to reflect on it still, and many others with us. . . .221
In fact, Ferhati said that his handling of women as a film topic was really no different than would be his handling of men—he was interested in the person living social repression. “I am not dealing with the subject of women in its pure sense, but it is a way to see issues globally. I did not use feminist discourse. I only committed to filming women in society as I saw them.”222 Although other films had women characters as important protagonists and subjects,223 this was considered the first film to really handle openly and deeply the position and problems of Moroccan women.224 The film is also noteworthy in the Moroccan filmography for two important traits: the use of dialogue, and the use of the image. Ferhati’s films seem more realistic because the characters speak an everyday language that everyone can understand, and dialogue is natural, sparse, realistic. One of his tactics is to write his dialogues in French which the actors translate into colloquial as they would speak normally.225 But he also believes cinema is an art of image rather than dialogue, and many of the most moving scenes in this film have no dialogue to accompany what the image conveys beautifully and well. One example would be the use of the red color to convey womanhood and fertility, as mentioned previously. The film was said to have cost 600,000 dirhams, and a production fund award was granted for 270,000 dirhams in 1981. Ferhati emphasized that he had tried for four years to finance the film; he received slight support from German TV in the form of “encouragements,” not a coproduction and otherwise received the production fund award after completion. In 1981 the film was selected for the “Quinzaine des Realisateurs” at Cannes and won the Grand Prix du Cinéma Mediteranéen award in the Valencia festival of 1982. Poupées de Roseau also won the best directing prize and the prize for best female lead in the first national film festival in Rabat in 1982. However, in spite of its overall quality, international success, and festival awards, Ferhati and Benlyazid could not find a distributor willing to handle the film in a reasonable manner. They resorted to renting a theater themselves, and traveling the streets of Tangier in a car with a loudspeaker advertising the screening of their film. They were able to attract 9,000 spectators, and filled the theater for a week.226
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Nabyl Lahlou, L’Enfant Terrible of Moroccan Cinema Lahlou, born Abdenbi Lahlou, studied drama at the Théâtre National Populaire in Paris beginning in 1962, and then the Théâtre des Nations. By 1978 he had written approximately fifteen theater pieces, several of which were produced for Moroccan television (such as The Accident, The Journal of a Fool, and The Dead). Lahlou’s films can be easily identified because his style and aesthetics are completely unique. Lahlou often acts in his own films, because he says he cannot find another actor who can sufficiently embody the Lahlou character. But he also has a penchant for one-man-shows in theater, and I believe that carries over into an enjoyment of directing himself, actually making his films as vehicles for his unique style of acting and character. The man won himself the moniker “L’enfant terrible of Moroccan cinema” for several reasons. He is never quiet about any injustice done or thought done to him; he often pushes the boundaries of “acceptable” behavior in his dealings with the CCM, critics, and audiences; and he enjoys a scandal and will endeavor to create one if necessary. Lahlou resorted to the press to voice his complaints against the CCM, becoming one of a very few individuals willing to reap the wrath of this institution by criticizing it openly, by revealing its internal machinations to the unsuspecting public.227 At one point he even took his complaints about the CCM all the way to the Carthage Film Festival where he had numerous international directors sign a petition against unfair practices to which the CCM had subjected him. Only one Moroccan would sign, and she later found herself unable to get a visa to attend a festival showing her film (Benlyazid). Undaunted, Lahlou continued to make films as he could, wheeling and dealing and making the best of the limited opportunity available to him in Morocco. Those limits are exacerbated by his unique and difficult film style, and his efforts to tackle very dangerous subjects, such as government hypocrisy, even though he does so in very abstract and absurdist scripts. Lahlou is distinct as a Moroccan filmmaker because his films so model themselves after his theatrical style—while avoiding most of the conventions of cinema—to create disengaging, lunacy-filled, abstractly critical absurdist films. Lahlou is primarily interested in the actor and the story, not the lighting, editing, or cinematographic quality of a film. As I indicated in the introduction to this chapter, certain filmmakers are quite content to disregard cinematographic issues in favor of intellectual or word issues. Lahlou is one such filmmaker. His films tend to be heavily oriented toward the spoken word, and often the cinema screen is proscenium-like, resembling the theater stage. Lahlou claims: “I consider myself a theater director and not a cinema director because I ridicule this work. The word cineaste is not interesting to
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me; I am interested in the word director. Cinema for me is very simple and would be simple if I had the financial means. . . . I am one of the people who came from theater and who have enriched cinema with their works.” In addition to Lahlou’s many theatrical pieces, he is one of the most prolific film directors in Morocco, beginning with a first film, Kanfoudi, in 1978–1979 and continuing throughout the 1990s, with a current total of six feature films. When Lahlou first presented Kanfoudi, people immediately classified him as a man who puts theater on celluloid, but also as one of the directors of films that the majority of Moroccans would never understand because his approach was so far outside their realm of experience and ability to interpret (at that time). Lahlou supporters say his films reflect the situation of the world. When he came back from France there had been student movements in 1968, the increase of ideology in the world, the philosophical trend of existentialism dominant at the time, the theater of Samuel Becket was at its peak, and the Beatles and the Stones were the leading music. But what did he find being replicated in the Moroccan theater? He found one group presenting traditional theater while another group was presenting linear plays with a beginning, middle, and end; with exceptions presented by Tayeb Seddikki, theater in general was very traditional. But so were television and films for the most part. Lahlou brought new concepts as well as new subjects to theater and then film, and often criticized audiences when his films were critiqued for being too abstract or not related specifically to Morocco. “Just because we are Moroccans we are not required to stick to everyday subjects but can do worldwide subjects, universal subjects which influence our society.”228 As cinema critic Qamari notes: [T]he cinema of Lahlou has a special characteristic. I personally consider it among the few cinema experiences in the Arab world which bases all its efforts on “strangeness”—strangeness in choice of subjects, the choice of atmosphere/space, clothes, dialogue and sarcasm, irony. This cinema seeks difference, not similarity. . . . [I]n back of Lahlou’s film . . . there is a metaphysical question. Maybe the advantage of Lahlou’s cinema is that it has come from theater, with an accumulation and a memory related to what is called theater of the absurd, theater of the irrational, sarcasm about the individual. We can say that Lahlou’s style is problematic because he doesn’t belong to any school, such as realism. . . .229
He uses dream and exaggerated comedy to speak about man and society because he claims he could not be critical of the situation in Morocco if he used a realist style. But his style is considered alienating to the Moroccan public outside of the intellectual arena. His humor is very dark, his references and symbolisms often obstruse, and he uses Brechtian techniques to distance his audience from the figures on the screen. Yet Lahlou’s theater and film are not
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unlike other modernists, such as Tayeb Seddikki, who insert Western themes and styles while still trying to retain Moroccan heritage, even if it is the symbolic essence of the heritage rather than a direct replication.230 Seddikki claims that irony, a dominant motif in his works as well as Lahlou’s, belongs to an Arab conception of life. Irony is found in the entire Arab world, but primarily only in jokes rather than in other forms such as the image.231 Where Lahlou, as well as Seddikki, differs is that irony is conveyed through image, theatricality, and the whole package that makes up theater and film. However, Lahlou is criticized for his theatrical style when it is transposed to the screen, for his highly disjointed speech and exaggerated gestures, and sometimes for giving too free a reign to his imagination and thus letting the story suffer as it rambles and veers away or even just dwells upon an insignificant element.232 For example, when Kanfoudi was first presented critics called it trash because it was surrealist, playful, spastic, and satiric. Lahlou, however, proclaimed that he works for the elites in Morocco. His theater is too difficult for the majority of the public. Absence of chronology, and vertiginous unfolding of images and scenes irritate a public used to traditional and classical cinema. There are two types of public: the large public, of popular theatrical festivals, soirees of dances, cheikhat[233] singers, and the large public as it exists throughout the world; and the limited public of the university, the intellectuals, the youthful white collar workers. This public is more demanding and constitutes less of an economic force to support the film and is more a reference towards which I orient my work.234
His style is, in his own words, bizarre. Interestingly, twenty years later audiences are much more exposed to alternative forms of aesthetics and style, and thus more attuned to this early film, yet still not very receptive to his latter efforts. It is actually impossible to accurately describe one of Lahlou’s films. While the synopsis seems quite simple perhaps, the plot twists, turns, disruptions and other effects are too complex and numerous to detail fully, and thus an incomplete picture results. Brahim, Yach? (Brahim, Right?) (1981–1982, 35 mm, color, 99 mins)235 This is the first film in which Lahlou himself does not play the lead character.236 The simple synopsis of this film is that Brahim Boumalfi stopped receiving his retirement pension, and for several years he tries but cannot get through the bureaucratic miasma to get his pension reinstated, until in the end he is driven to his death by the whole process. Yet even in death he continues to try to solve his problem and finds that bureaucracy exists in death as much as in life. In an ancillary development, a filmmaker is also driven to his death by the problems that beset him trying to make a film about Boumalfi.
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However, the film itself is not quite so simple. Jibril calls the film a metaphysical derision, a fantasy burlesque that talks of the vanity of human hope in this life and in the beyond.237 The film has also been called a universe of the phantasmagorical bureaucracy gone haywire in which Brahim Boumalfi searches for his dossier while Jalil writes and shoots a film about the man’s nightmare and destiny.238 The main issue, therefore, is the horror of bureaucracy in Morocco. Lahlou claims: ( . . . ) an administration which transforms itself bit by bit into a bureaucracy is no longer a means of service to the citizen, but a repression against him. It turns into a system, and he who holds the destiny of a decision because he is responsible for a stamp or a signature, becomes a dictator, simply because he refuses to be an artist; that is to say someone who works as much for his own happiness as for he or they for whom he has chosen to work.239
Lahlou wanted to show a man a victim all his life of the bureaucracy against which he could do nothing. He did not want to discourage anyone, but he felt he must talk about injustice because it continues to exist and harm people.240 Yet Lahlou’s own description calls this film a comedy: “The man runs around like a scared rabbit looking for the papers that will prove his identity not just in the entrails of a multi-national company but in the womb of a theater director’s lurid imagination, and it is in the film’s visions that the hyperbole lies, not in my words. The director sews fantasy into the real and then unravels both.” All the characters in the film are very unusual, in their looks as well as mannerisms. Brahim is a bit ragged from his persistent efforts to solve bureaucratic puzzles; his hair is wild, his eyes surprised, his form jerky and spastic. His speech is repetitive, stuttered, agonized. The filmmaker is very tall, pale, and bald. He looks more like a rugged biker than a filmmaker. Brahim’s “helper” is a fat, jolly man in a red fez who always seems to be encouraging, hopeful, undaunted, yet devilish. Brahim goes to the administration to try to solve his problem, which is that his name has been suddenly changed to a similar name but that person has died and thus pensions have stopped. Each person he goes to requires, of course, that he get something from yet another office, which itself presents enormous obstacles. Lines for services stretch forever, cobwebs grow while people wait. Even the dead wait in eternal lines. At one point, Brahim is chased around by two bald men in huge contraptions that are modified wheelchair go-carts, with flashing lights and big wheels. This scene continues for a long time, with really no purpose except to heighten the tension of the film by the extension of these men zooming around in their chair-cars chasing Brahim around and around hallways and corridors and blank spaces. Eventually Brahim only needs the signature of the director, a tiny man with a huge cigar carried in a hammock
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by two assistants. First he sends Brahim to another office, and promises to help him, then he does not remember ever agreeing to that at all. Brahim scuttles down long featureless hallways that all stretch on forever, no way to know where one is. At one point Brahim is brought into a large dark room; a light spotlights him in the middle. The curtains in front pull back to reveal the leaders of the administration elevated in a row, towering over him like judges over a defendant. In fact Brahim must defend his claims. Of course nothing comes of his trial and Brahim never succeeds in solving his problem. At the end of the film Brahim finds himself in a huge party for which a troupe of midget musicians plays and dances, soon everyone joins in and it becomes mayhem, anarchy. Brahim runs off to some sort of lobby with plants and fountains, jumping into the fountains, blowing crazily into a horn, thrashing wildly about because he can never get anywhere in solving his problem and has finally lost his senses. There are many other elements in the film that it is impossible to delve into. Each image and scene is full of significance and meaning that words do not even begin to explain. The main point of the description has been to indicate just a few of the instances of craziness, absurdity, and randomness of the flow of the film and characters. In terms of indicting the bureaucracy of business and government in Morocco, Lahlou has certainly succeeded. The criticisms are so beaten to death that it becomes not a subtle indictment at all but very pointed. People in government are in cahoots with people in corporations; both finding avenues to make a lot of money by depriving the innocent lowly workers of their due. Even the filmmaker is hampered in his efforts to expose the hypocrisy and is killed, a not too subtle reference to the way that Lahlou sees that bureaucracy also manages to silence critical filmmakers in Morocco. The film was shown in the Festivals of Berlin, Strasbourg, Carthage, Valencia, Cairo, and Alexandria. Lahlou’s film was so popular that it won the critic’s prize in the Berlin Festival in 1984. Although Lahlou purposefully made the film in Classical/Standard Arabic, so that it would be understood by a wide Arabic-speaking audience, it was never bought nor shown in any Arab countries outside of festivals.241 Lahlou also did not want people to laugh at Brahim, Yach?; he wanted them to think, to reflect. Thus he used classical Arabic rather than Moroccan dialect, because he thought that people would laugh at the Moroccan dialect while they would find classical Arabic to be correct, proper, and sobering. Lahlou was supposed to receive a production fund award of 230,000 dirhams, but rather than giving any of the money to Lahlou the CCM just paid their laboratory costs and apparently no funds remained. When Lahlou received a 240,000 dirham award for L’âme Qui Brait, the CCM again only
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paid their laboratory costs and sent the rest of the money to the bank Société de Banque et de Crédit to pay off his outstanding 1981 loans for Brahim, Yach? This is the film for which Larbi Doghmi, the actor, felt compelled to buy food for the actors and even bought the motorcycle needed for the film, because Lahlou had no funds at all.242 Once completed, the film was not distributed widely—only in one theater in Casablanca and one theater in Rabat—because distributors kept telling Lahlou that Moroccans did not want to see Moroccan films.243 The film supposedly earned 4,000 dirhams in Casablanca, but Lahlou was only entitled to 500 dirhams which he had to split with the distributor. Lahlou’s films are most often condemnations of elements of Moroccan and human societies. Kanfoudi criticizes that money makes people greedy, jealous, and treacherous. The Governor General of the Island of Shakerbakerben accuses journalists of using their position and writing to support political parties and to even insinuate themselves into positions of political power for which they are not really qualified. L’âme Qui Brait (The Soul That Brays) indicts men who collaborated with the French during the colonial period to become rich even at the cost of the lives of resistance fighters. Komany criticizes religious leaders who use religion to gain political power, but then become dupes of individuals who care nothing about religion and only about power and money. Only Lahlou’s film, The Night of the Crime/Killing, strays from his previous style, although still containing some absurdist moments; he constructs his film around the true story of a woman and her lover accused of murdering her husband. Yet this film is still an indictment of human relations as well as of the operations of the legal system in Morocco. Les Années de l’Exil (The Years of Exile) treats Morocco’s “years of lead,” while Tabet or not Tabet treats a true event in Moroccan society, the arrest and trial for corruption of a high-ranking military officer. The critic Qamari once said he believes one can say there is a “cinema of Nabyl Lahlou” and I agree that his techniques and style are similar enough to render his films very remarkably by the same director, but also remarkable is Lahlou’s consistent denunciation of “man’s inhumanity to man” and man’s abuse of power that threads through each of his films. Mustapha Derkaoui Mustapha Derkaoui (also Derqaoui) should not be confused with his brother Abdelkrim Derkaoui. Mustapha is a director, while Abdelkrim is a cinematographer with only two forays into directing thus far. Mustapha studied theater and philosophy in Casablanca in the early 1960s, studied philosophy in the university for a year, then began to study film directing in Lodz, Poland,
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from 1965–1972 at the National School of Cinema, Theater and TV. He also studied at IDHEC in Paris. Derkaoui did begin his career making a few short films while he was in Poland and France studying filmmaking, and later for UNESCO in the mid-1970s. Derkaoui worked for Moroccan television regularly from time to time, and is very remarkable for being able to shift his style depending upon his perceived audience. He utilizes a very traditional and easily navigable narrative style for his works for the general Moroccan public through television and his popular films of the new millennium (Les Amours de Hajj Soldi, Casablanca by Night, Casablanca Daylight), while his earlier films are quite unique and remarkable for their intricate and difficult aesthetics. His films reflect semiotic and aesthetic preoccupations, questions about the nature of cinema itself, and the metaphysics of cinema and creativity. Derkaoui says: “I never wanted to . . . tell a story, ‘make fiction’ since the beginning, but I wanted to invest the cinema with the means that would enable me to better know its operations, and to the extent possible, to make known its workings/machinery to the public itself.”244 Derkaoui faced some difficulties doing cinema when he returned to Morocco after a ten-year absence in Poland and France, which forced him to actively search for a new cinema aesthetic appropriate for him and his situation.245 He is a prolific filmmaker, much as Lahlou, with ten features and numerous shorts and television productions. Rather than delve into one film, this description emphasizes how Derkaoui threaded three films together over time: De Quelques Evénements Sans Signification in 1974–1975, Les Beaux Jours de Shaharazade in 1981, and Titre Provisoire in 1983–1984. One of his main themes is the “impossibility of telling” which suffuses the three films, his film-within-a-film approach which he uses to make films about the problems of making films. Further, he combines documentary with fiction, synthesizing the two methods to try to give credibility to fictional cinema, but which also takes away credibility from the documentary, exposing that mode for being as problematic as fiction. One of the most interesting elements of the three films is that they are interrelated. Beginning with Quelques Evénements, Derkaoui produces characters, issues, and images, that are transferred to the second and even third film, so that he creates a trilogy that yet has only very tenuous ties from film to film. One might also say that all three films are autobiographical, since Derkaoui and other known filmmaking figures play their own roles: Derkaoui is the director, Abdelkrim is the cinematographer, etc. Thus the “documentary” portions of the films are still fiction because they document the creation of fiction, the presentation of representation. Again, Derkaoui’s main interests are to experiment with creativity, with the meanings of images and representations, with aesthetics. The trio of films were the result of this experimentation, rather than being planned and coherently following one upon another.
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Mustapha began to explore the relationship between reality and the camera in his first film, Quelques Evénements . . . and then wanted to extend this dialectic further in Les Beaux Jours . . . , yet that film was only the result of months and months in an editing room trying to figure out how to tell what story, what to do with the footage he had gathered, how to intertwine the real and the artificial that were not really separable. He wanted the second film to be inconclusive, to end without ending, to be perplexing. And then Titre Provisoire was to extend those investigations and to add an even more complex layer by combining synchronous sound with sound added in postproduction to add to the visual mixture and confusion an aural mixture and confusion. De Quelques Evénements Sans Significations (Events without Meaning) (74 mins, 16 mm enlarged to 35 mm)246 The film recounts the story of a young director who haphazardly witnesses, while shooting a film, a crime that was unintentionally committed by a worker in the port against his immediate superior. The filmmaker decides to make a personal inquiry into the motives of the crime, which awakens in him a guilty conscience at being a compromised intellectual and pushes him to think critically about his conceptions of cinema specifically and of art generally, but also about the role of the artist in an underdeveloped society. Derkaoui uses a discontinuous style which critics say makes it hard to follow the development of the story.247 Les Beaux Jours de Shaharazade (The Beautiful Days of Shaharazade) (1982)248 The film is the story of a filmmaker, Farid, struggling with inspiration and creativity—what kind of film should he make, what should his topic be? He chooses a script written by Meriem, a writer who comes to Morocco to escape Lebanon, but he does not want to make the Egyptian-style melodrama and singing film that she envisions. She takes as her central idea the scenario of the life of one of the bar singers, Naima, who dreams of becoming the star of a big cinema project, who seeks fame and escape from her confusing and troubling reality,249 and who eventually leaves her husband and daughter to devote herself to her new life.250 Farid and Meriem give the impression of forming a strong couple, united by the ties of creation, and of collaboration; but their relationship comes undone nevertheless under the eyes of the spectators, the division between them coming from differing ideas about Shaharazade, the result of myths and fantasies of each of them.251 Farid does not want to be confined to Meriem’s script, or her ideas about Shaharazade. When Naima starts to sing, the technician cries “cut!” and thus stifles and suffocates Naima’s voice and singing. But Naima’s singing is her only voice, her only way of “being” that raises her from the lowly, the downtrodden, the overcome.
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Farid pays no attention to Naima’s problems or needs; he frets and suffers only about his own philosophy and needs. How will he make his film? What model will he follow? Will he follow Egyptian style relying on singing, dancing, drama, and pricking the emotions, or the Hollywood cinema relying on technical feats and expensive decor and stunts? He has a huge decoration made that resembles A Thousand and One Nights, but after all he does not like it, it does not work, it is Meriem’s conception not his. What is the right path, and what are the alternatives? Soon Farid no longer controls his work; he disappears and the film makes itself.252 Quietly, delicately, emerge the misunderstandings between the sexes which has repercussions also at the level of other couples, that of Abdou and Naima.253 Abdou is a man with no goals except to make money however he can; he has always been in love with Naima, but they have been separated a long time. One night he finds her singing in a bar under the name Shaharazade. She has divorced her husband in order to be the star of a film, her lifelong dream, much as Abdou had divorced Naima long ago to pursue his lifelong dream of becoming rich. But Naima’s dream is not being fulfilled. The distinctions between Naima and Shaharazade dissolve, leaving the woman in liminality. She lost Abdou to his pursuit of wealth, lost her husband and child to her own dreams, and is losing her dream to the conflict between Farid and Meriem. She soon becomes a shadow figure in the cabaret which has itself become an enclosed, hermetic world in which struggle conflicting desires and dreams. Another thread of the film is that a group of adolescents from the same popular quarter of Casablanca, now adults, reencounter one another in the cabaret, where old relationships reconnect with new lives. These friends just happen to be the main players in the dramatic events of the film: Farid, Abdou, Naima, and others. Further, the cabaret, already the central locus of the film, becomes the “symbol of disequilibrium of family spaces” peppered with conflicts and surcharged with tensions. The cabaret becomes an artificial brothel, where the finery and the sequins of the women are as real as the fantasies of the men who congregate.254 Farid is shooting the film in the cabaret, but he also meets his friends there, gets drunk there, fondles women, and expresses much of his angst in this very enclosed, stifling, intense atmosphere. Everyone’s goals are at odds. Further, the film pits the elevation of Abdou, the nouveau riche, against the downfall of the artist and creator, Farid. At one point, in the nightclub, Farid—dead drunk and caressing an unknown hand—asks Abdou to finance his film. The scene is poignant for its reality: those who create do not have the means, and those who have the means are sterile and sterilizing. Abdou and Farid represent the two faces of the man in Morocco of the time: Abdou is the
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traditional model, merchant-like, in his love as well as business; he divorces Naima in order to marry his boss’ daughter so that he can climb the ladder of power and success. Farid, on the contrary, is the model of the new man: profound, serious, concerned, and agitated by the problems of the world, sensitive, vulnerable, tortured, and saddened by injustice, aborted creativity, frustrated talent, and sacrificed potentialities.255 Yet while Farid theoretically cries out for the principles of justice and dignity,256 he completely disregards Naima’s obvious distress and suffering at his elision of her desires to become a star. So Farid fails and the “old”-style Moroccan man, the merchant, the climber, the user, and usurer survives. Both men have tried to use Shaharazade for their own goals, yet their goals are more important to them than the woman herself. Abdou tries to remove Shaharazade from the cinema and cabaret, but Naima cannot take the weight of the real world and ends by showering her money down a hotel stairwell then casually manages to be hit and killed by a passing car. Thus, in the end Shaharazade the stifled in turn stifles the others—her death causes the downfall of the film and the ethical and financial ruin of the filmmakers. But Abdou continues undaunted to make his upward climb, cementing his hold over the real, the powerful. In this film Derkaoui tries to transpose or subvert the melodrama form, to interrogate and subvert melodrama by confronting it with its different, its other, the documentary, the supposed real.257 He also uses a mix between Egyptian cinema with known stars, and auteur cinema with confusing, symbolic, disruptive elements. The characters in the film play double roles; they are essentially double characters who bear within themselves fictional dimensions that are perfectly connected with the realistic ones: Abdou is Abdelwahab Doukkali, a famous actor and singing star; Naima is Naima Lamsharqi, a famous actress; Farid in the film is Farid Belkahia, a well-known artist; and Meriem is Meriem Fakhereddine, a writer.258 The doubling of characters is further complicated by the doubling of “fictional” events and “nonfiction” events, which the viewer cannot distinguish, and thus cannot separate the “real” characters from those “constructed” for the film. Derkaoui overlaps several stories, not in linear or progressive order, and presents the viewer with a charming yet very difficult film to interpret and follow.259 Derkaoui is not concerned whether or not his public—the public which he disorients spatially and temporally—comprehends his work with facility. He leaves the image incomplete, demanding each spectator on his own to complete it, to add his own contribution to the unfolding of the film. Les Beaux Jours de Shaharazade is a skeptical interrogation into “cinema engage.”260 He presents to the audience the dilemma the filmmaker faces in a developing country in deciding what kind of film to make, and to whom to
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appeal.261 But, in the film, the filmmaker is not interested in the oppressed, in Shaharazade; he is interested in the oppressor.262 Everybody rejected the film at the time it was released, but more recently it has been accepted as a substantial contribution to the cinema field. Some critics believe that Derkaoui failed in this film through an excess of intellectualism, in having the scenes and shot sequences unfold without any linking thread so that it seemed like the film unfolded outside any system, as complete improvisation. On the other hand, some say the film was more realistic that way, especially the way scenes were cut up, with chopped dialogue, almost the same as if we were hearing what a barman would hear, bits of conversations without beginning or end—that the style is suitable for the story being told. The third film of the trilogy, Titre Provisoire (Temporary Title) (1982– 1984, 120 mins, 35 mm, color)263 continues this same investigatory trend into the function of the cinematic worlds. Even more so than the previous films, this project is a film within a film, and contains parts of the two previous films. This time the subject is Derkaoui as a depressed filmmaker who has difficulty finishing his film, is separated from his wife and kids, suffers a breakdown due to the loss of a dear friend, and in the end is stabbed. The film begins without a title sequence, as a reference that it is a continuation of another film, that there is no end, and no separation of fiction and nonfiction worlds. Titre Provisoire investigates the sociocultural role of the filmmaker in Morocco, mixes biological family and film family, emphasizes the difficulties of cohabitation and relations, and is a sort of autobiography which uses Derkaoui’s real family and crew. The film maintains the tactic of doubling and dualizing the characters; in this instance Derkaoui portrays himself and his own sufferings. To make more confusion, characters and images from Les Beaux Jours de Shaharazade, the actors with their double identities from that film still have double identities as actors in Titre Provisoire. Added are their “real” selves who keep their real names, and orbit around Derkaoui as director in a way that forces him to share their suffering as they share in his. The camera moves between the panoramic when it is a question of the story’s characters, and backward traveling when the camera introduces spectators watching the characters. The camera’s movement is mirrored at the level of sound. While scenes and images are all mixed up and the spectator does not know when someone is acting or being their “real” self, the sound often overlaps or opposes fictional sound with nonfictional sound. The voices of Mustapha Derkaoui, Krimou, the spectators, the radio and TV, but also the voices of dream and reality are all mixed.264 Titre Provisoire takes up the theme of marginality, primarily of filmmakers but also of others who are out of sync with society—women in particular. But in this case, an impasse is reached, a block. New to this film is an
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introspection which puts the principle protagonists in the face of their own images and relationships, which are difficult to say the least, and which tie them to or estrange them from each other.265 Many reproached Derkaoui for having made a film about himself, his close ones, and his friends. Derkaoui responded that the film is not an autobiography, but a fiction—and either it is good or it is bad. He is not the subject of the film, rather there are several subjects: the relationship of a couple, the relation of a son to his father, work relationships, friendships, etc., which are treated as a dream within a dream, a film within a film.266 Actually, the subject of “film within film” seems a bit repetitive because of the quantity of discussion about the “problems of filmmaking” in Morocco. Further, the film seems to remain on a somewhat superficial level, coasting over numerous figures and situations, without going into depth into any one of them. Derkaoui’s efforts in creating the image and the atmosphere are quite successful, but the story itself and the subjects do not engage the viewer. In the end I could not care less about anybody in the film; they could live or die as long as their confusion came to an end! The confusion distances one, along with the distanced acting, the shooting, the staging, and noise. Although the style becomes tedious after a while, in retrospect the effort and tactics are quite awesome. Derkaoui wanted to discomfit the spectator, to make sure that the viewer was presented with scenes that were not automatically understandable. He wanted the spectator to be unable to grasp each meaning and thereby understand the depth of the problem being presented about representation.267 There is no linear progression to the story and no sense of development or resolution except that perhaps Derkaoui dies at the end. People appear and disappear, scenes lead nowhere, yet there is a thread leading through if one is attentive. Multiple levels of story, multiple levels of sound, and displaced scenes make this film difficult, avant garde, but not really surreal because the images are stable if not always fitting clearly into a story. And in the end what distinguishes Derkaoui’s work is that he is so very careful. Although the spectator may be confused, confounded, even misled at times, multiple viewings of his films reveal them to be very carefully and very tightly controlled and manipulated, from acting, to image, to sound. He specifically emphasizes the cinematic quality of film, expending great care in lighting, movement, and decor, yet places equal responsibility on the soundtrack to convey the intricacies that cinema can offer that theater and television cannot. While other avant-gardists such as Smihi and Lahlou emphasize the intellectual over the technical, Derkaoui has mastered both realms. Again, he is further talented by being able to work in the more mundane forms necessary for television as well as the highly eclectic form he prefers for film.
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CONCLUSION This chapter has sought to clarify and document how filmmaking in Morocco is a product of multiple forces at work, not just individual filmmakers, or the State, or the infrastructure, but all and more. While films do stand alone as objects worthy of analysis and understanding, it is important to know the numerous levels of control, censorship or influence which actually generated the individual film. For example, Ferhati, Lahlou, and Derkaoui above all in their own ways critiqued society, the State, and Moroccan institutions, but their individual styles rendered those critiques acceptable. Yet perhaps their individual styles also rendered those critiques less telling. And given the situation within Morocco, indeed the styles were as or more important to discussions about cinema than were the messages behind the styles. Messages were often elided, while styles and functions were emphasized by every sector outside of the filmmakers. The era 1971–1985 was notable for the shift into feature filmmaking and the real commencement of the debate over the function of cinema, the aesthetics of cinema appropriate for Morocco, and how the State should participate in this type of cultural production. This period was an intermediary period, a development from the original impetus toward making films for the purpose of encouraging the population to identify as members of a nation, but not the end of the transformation of perspectives on cinema. New endeavors were experimented with, new individuals entered the domain, and new issues came to the fore in discourse about cinema in Morocco—both the cinema that existed and the cinema that “could” or “should” exist. Many new filmmakers emerged, and with them many orientations to the feature film. Some filmmakers preferred the traditional Hollywood, Indian, Egyptian models and made films accordingly, primarily melodramas, dramas, musicals, and popularly oriented films. Their conception of filmmaking in Morocco was that films should be directed to the mass public, the average consumer, and provide entertainment, escape, and release while still being anchored to the specificities of Morocco. Such film styles were more likely to be distributed and exhibited in Morocco, although not necessarily widely, well, or with sufficient income. Roadblocks to these films remained the limited number of theaters in the country, the high rate of taxation on exhibition, and the system whereby exhibitors and distributors claimed the major portion of any income from film screenings. A few filmmakers temporarily pursued the Third Cinema approach, making films critical of the treatment and underdevelopment of the masses, the workers, the powerless in Morocco. Yet this venture did not last long due to government censorship and the inability of those targeted masses to actually
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see such films because distributors did not want to handle them, exhibitors did not want to show them. As a derivative of the Third Cinema and Italian Neorealism movement, some filmmakers were notably successful with the realist approach which enabled them to tackle social problems without arousing government censorship or reprisal. Such films were still subject to the whims of distributors and exhibitors, but were more likely to find support than the remaining orientation to cinema as follows. A few filmmakers explored the realm of abstract, surrealist, symbolist, and intellectually engaging/challenging filmmaking. These filmmakers were more interested in their own experiences with cinema, with how they could manipulate and tease the forms and aesthetics, and how they could generate a very personal and unique manipulation of cinema. Audiences were of minor concern, if a concern at all; if any public was considered important, the intellectual and elitist classes were cultivated rather than the populace at large. These filmmakers did create very notable styles for themselves, but their contribution to the overall cinema domain in the country totally depended upon what the analyst considered important: cinema for the people of a country, or cinema to represent a country in festivals, or cinema that challenged custom with new forms and aesthetics, or cinema that made money, etc. In spite of the divergent styles of films, it was notable that they, for the most part, shared in having a negative conclusion to the story. Protagonists were often disappointed, depressed, beaten down, rendered insane, represented as ineffective, and in other ways reflecting perhaps a general social feeling of frustration, blocked capabilities, and lack of options. Whether critiquing society or reflecting their own experiences as filmmakers struggling through a complex labyrinth of rules, regulations, and responsibilities, the filmmakers collectively created a sombre image of the era in Morocco. That sombre image was also reiterated in the culture of complaint that arose as the primary option to voice discontent and inability to effect change in the highly censorial and censored environment that occurred in the 1970s and persisted through this era. Unable to critique the system or the government in an overt manner, criticisms were often turned toward the other players in the cinema sector, such as the exhibitors and distributors, the public, the CCM, or the filmmakers, depending upon who was complaining. Along with the differences in filmmaker orientations came differences in reception of films by critics, who became the arbiters between filmmakers and the public. While some critics decried any film that modeled itself after popular films from the United States, India, or Egypt, others believed this type of filmmaking the most appropriate for the people of Morocco. Those who objected to popular cinema preferred either cinema of realism and the Third Cinema orientation, or emphasized the abstract and surrealist film-
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makers as the greatest achievement in filmmaking in Morocco. While the public was generally unable to consume Moroccan films, the critics shaped public opinions about cinema because the public could easily consume the newspaper reviews while never being able to compare those opinions to the actual films themselves. No consensus was ever achieved among critics of the domain of cinema in Morocco, either concerning the films being produced or the system in which filmmaking and consumption occurred. Because the majority of cinema critics emerged from the expanding cinema club movement, which most often emphasized Third Cinema aesthetics, social realism, and film masters from countries with more advanced cinema industries, criticism often seemed inappropriate for the actual milieu and audiences of Morocco. But the cinema clubs did make extensive inroads in building the number of clubs, in programming films for a variety of audiences, and for sustaining interest in Moroccan filmmaking. They were often the primary avenues for Moroccan filmmakers to find constant audiences, and the clubs and members were also responsible for generating most of the television shows, histories, conferences, analyses, and debates on the industry and films. The State through the vehicle of the CCM was the prime recipient of critiques of the development of the cinema sector. Although taxation allowed filmmaking to exist in a country that otherwise needed to divert its minimal funds toward development projects of other kinds, the State was always criticized for the heavy taxation of cinema exhibition. But even when film production was no longer a function of the State’s endeavor to unify the nation, to educate the populace, to inform widely dispersed populations in the absence of radio and television, the State was still called upon to maintain its support of film production, even of entertainment cinema and cinema as art. In the absence of private sector initiatives, the State developed the laboratory, equipment, and other infrastructural facilities within the country, developed and maintained a fund to divert monies to individual filmmakers, and continued to support theaters in the country while still taxing their profits. Yet, by the end of this period, the State still met only with criticism. The production fund was administered badly, and/or the funds were insufficient to allow filmmakers to make quality films, and/or the funding allowed any idiot to make a film, and/or the infrastructure was deficient, and/or there were no trained technicians, and/or corruption perverted all levels of the cinema domain from critics to filmmakers to the CCM to distributors and to exhibitors. The one sector really elided during this period, which fortunately begins to find support in the subsequent years, was the public, the consumer who actually bought the ticket and sat in the theater. While filmmakers matured into their craft, and the State modified the funding process somewhat, the consuming public only began to emerge in the 1990s as an
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important element in the cinema endeavor rather than existing as an unknown, a negligible quantity. While numerous cinema festivals throughout Morocco enable certain communities to often access a variety of international films as well as Moroccan films, most festivals only accommodate a small community rather than traveling and addressing the population at large. In particular the CCM-organized national festivals (one and two) either completely ignored the general public by focusing on filmmakers and critics (festival one), or marginalized the public by not resulting in any real publicity or advancement of the Moroccan films that participated. Neither international nor national in focus, the CCMsponsored festivals seemed to begin as quite insular and to function only as a chance for industry professionals to gather and critique each other. NOTES 1. Nos cinéastes devraient en grande partie joindre une notice à leur film ou un mode d’emploi pour que le spectateur puisse désamorcer (defuse) ces mines sémiotiques dont est souvent truffé le film. Et s’il n’a pas compris tant pis pour lui, il n’a qu’à relire Metz, Mittry et Barthes. . .! C’est, dit-on—un cinéma d’auteur! En fait, c’est un cinéma où chacun fait son film, et adieu l’émotion! Adieu les bonnes histoires! La joie et les plaisirs du cinema! (Mohamed Belfquih, C’est mon écran après tout!: Réflexions sur la situation de l’audiovisual au Maroc (Publié avec le concours du Service Culturel Scientifique et de Coopération de l’Ambassade de France au Maroc, Janvier 1995), p. 43.) 2. Orphelin d’espace, empêché de parvenir à ceux qui l’attendent et à qui il est destiné: c’est un cinéma menacé par le silence et l’exil. Il aura au moins, à défaut d’exister pleinement, découvert et mis au jour le système scandaleux de la politique de blocage et d’étouffement de cette expression nouvelle dans le cinéma arabe. Pour ce système, seul un écran noir fait l’affaire! (Borhane Alaoui, “Ecran Noir,” Le Monde (October 23, 1982), p. 2.) 3. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, with Nabyl Lahlou. 4. I am not convinced by the argument, although it is used continuously through the period of the 1970s and 1980s and even into the 1990s! 5. Abderrazak Abdellaoui, “Le financement de l’Industrie cinématographique” (Mémoire fin d’Etudes, Institut Superieur de Journalisme, Rabat, 1981–1982), Annexe p. 1, interview with Nourredine Sail. 6. “Je ne crois pas que le fait d’être un cinéaste du Tiers-Monde oblige à faire du cinéma primaire . . . en tant que cinéaste conscient du Tiers-Monde je reclame le droit d’être esthéte, d’être artiste aussi.” (Lamalif #34, November 1969.) 7. Christine Kerdellant, “Le Maroc Refait son Cinéma,” Jeune Afrique #1416 (February 24, 1988), pp. 42–44. 8. . . . [U]ne tradition s’est bien installée dans le cinéma marocain: l’intellectualisme excessif et quelque fois franchement rébarbatif double d’une prétention téméraire à
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fair non pas du cinéma accessible, agréable, et visuel, mais des oeuvres d’Art hypercompliquées que regroupent des reférences littéraires, philosophiques et autres que le cinephile le plus aigri, l’intellectuel le plus pointu ont du mal à comprendre sinon à supporter. (Taleb, p. 50, citing Mohamed Hajji, Le Matin du Sahara, Novembre 1988.) 9. Le public maghrebin, habitué des artifices du récit traditionnel, est assoife de voir un film maghrebin qui raconte une histoire qui a un début et une fin. Et il etait normal qu’il se trouve confus devant une production cinématographique qu’il estime “difficile d’accéss” puisque présentant tout un code de signes et de symboles culturels qu’il appréhend difficilement. Dans Wechma (Hamid Bennani, 1970), les symboles religieux sont mentionnés par antiphrases. Bennani s’explique ainsi “Mon film repose sur quelques principes que j’ai tirés d’une conférence de Roland Barthes. Par exemple, ‘l’antiphrase,’ ‘le palimpseste’ et ‘le mannequin.’ Ces concepts m’ont permis de developper cette ambiguité du language que je récherche.” Moumen Smihi faisait, par exemple, dans Caftan d’Amour reférence à pas moins de quatre cinéastes: Lang, Hitchcock, Mizoguchi et Buñuel, et a deux philosophes: Lacan et Roland Barthes. (Taleb, p. 53.) 10. Gabriel; Solanas and Getino, “Toward a Third Cinema,” Cineaste and Movies and Methods. 11. Boughedir, “Panorama des cinémas maghrébins.” 12. “plus approfondi et plus radical que ne l’est le cinéma marocain. Le nôtre est plutôt référenciel et émotionnel que révolutionnaire.” (Souiba, “L’Ecriture Cinématographique au Maroc,” p. 99.) 13. “Nous ne voulons pas faire du cinéma subversif, ça ne nous intéresse pas. Il s’agit avant tout de faire du cinéma un moyen adéquat de dénonciation, et non une arme à la quête d’une subversion folle et insoutenable.” (Souiba, “L’Ecriture Cinématographique au Maroc,” p. 105.) 14. Akharbach, p. 47. 15. Interview with Majid R’chich. 16. Abri, p. 37. 17. Hamdane, p. 30. 18. Modified May 7, 1973 by Dahir 1-73-339. 19. “l’activité cinématographique ne peut plus être exercée que par les entreprises nationalité marocains.” 20. Hamdane, p. 65. 21. Dahir No. 1-77-230 of September 19, 1977. 22. Ejmahri, pp. 29–39. 23. The original legislation stipulated that each producer of a short film must put a copy on file at CCM; this requirement was also neglected and some early films produced by the CCM have been lost. The CCM now maintains an archive, but only of films made by Moroccans who worked at the CCM or who themselves felt the necessity of donating a copy of the project. The CCM never had the authority nor the financial base to enforce the regulation that filmmakers place a copy of their film in the archive; and filmmakers often didn’t have the funding to make a copy of their film. The archive and library that was envisioned was much more grandiose than what was actually possible for the CCM to create, and efforts to create such a facility persisted up to the 1990s.
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24. Souiba and Alaoui, p. 22. 25. Brahimi, p. 108. 26. Brahimi, p. 23. 27. “Pour l’institution étatique, le cinéma a une triple fonction: il est à la fois un support de diffusion culturelle, un moyen d’information et surtout un enjeu économique, double, parce que, d’une part l’exploitation cinématographique réalise chaque année un chiffre d’affaires de plus de dix milliards de centimes (dont la moitié est perçue par l’etat sous forme de recettes fiscales) et d’autre part, le cinéma est considéré comme agent de développement.” (Brahimi, p. 23.) 28. Akharbach, p. 25. 29. Akharbach, pp. 25–26. 30. Brahimi, p. 111. 31. Souiba and Alaoui, p. 29. The main problem is that the CCM keeps trying to upgrade equipment, but never provides the sufficient training of personnel to use it effectively. This goes also for production equipment, it is bought but technicians can’t keep it operational. 32. Driss Chouika and Mohamed Kaouti, “Entretien . . . Mustapha Derkaoui, Un Ras-le-Bol,” Dirassat Cinimaiya, Etudes Cinématographiques, Revue de la Fédération National des Ciné-Clubs du Maroc, #2 (Kenitra, Morocco, 1985), pp. 79–70, 70. 33. Souiba and Alaoui, p. 28. 34. Mohamed Jibril, “Un Festival a l’Essai,” Lamalif #140, Nov.-Dec. 1982, pp. 24–28, 26. 35. Abdellaoui, Annex p. 5. 36. Mouna Hachim, “La nostalgie du temps passé,” Maghreb Magazine 34 (Mars 1995), pp. 62–63. 37. These monies included charges for hotels, food, transportation, and other such requirements, but also included fees paid to the CCM for permits and licenses, and salaries paid to Moroccan personnel. 38. A service fee, a show fee, a customs stamp, and a donation to the CCM or timbre quittance, tax sur les services, taxe sur spectacles, timbre douanier, redevance au CCM. 39. The new tax varies from 9 percent on up to 3,000 dh to 25 percent for more than 12,000 dh receipts. From it, 40 percent goes to public treasury, 35 percent to fonds de soutien, and 25 percent to CCM direct; some other changes made include the impôts des patents, la taxe urbaine set in 1978, impôt sur les bénéfices professionnels set in 1959, le droit d’auteur set in 1970 (1.5% on net receipts), droit de palestin (either 10 centimes per ticket or 20 centimes per ticket), taxe sur produit et services (12% of net receipts or 3% of gross). 40. Ejmahri, pp. 29–39. 41. Ejmahri, pp. 29–39; other distribution includes 7 percent for the poor, 9 percent for the State, 14 percent for the municipality, 1.5 percent for author’s rights protection, and 5 percent for Palestine 42. Brahimi, p. 113. 43. “Road to Morocco Passes through MFC,” Variety (May 9, 1990), p. 52. 44. In 1980 2,755,000 dirhams in taxes went to renovation of 198 theaters; 371,900 dirhams for building 4 new—in 1981 2,294,000 dirhams in taxes went to renovation
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of 147 theaters; 399,998 dirhams for building 4 new—in 1982 2,138,000 dirhams in taxes went to renovation of 125 theaters; 765,000 dirhams for building 4 new. 45. Souiba and Alaoui, p. 25. 46. On pourrait être tenté de dire: puisqu’il y a une demande potentielle non satisfait, il suffit de construire de nouvelles salles pour élargir le marché et améliorer la rentabilité de l’exploitation. Or il existe un obstacle majeur qui pèse de tout son poids sur la destinée de l’exploitation du film au Maroc, c’est celui de la taxation du spectacle cinématographique. Cette taxation atteint une moyenne record de 51.5 percent des recettes brutes. Ce qui n’est pas du tout pour encourager l’investissement dans ce secteur. (“Informations Sur le Cinema au Maroc 1983,” p. 28.) 47. Akharbach, p. 27. 48. “Du dialogue de sourds au monologue de l’incompris,” Le Matin de Sahara (October 19, 1982), np. The dahir creating the soutien de production was the Decret No. 2-79-744 of 11 Safar 1400, December 31, 1979, fixing the conditions and the modalities of the octroi des primes for the promotion of production and the exhibition. 49. Mohammed Reggab, “Lettre Ouverte: Reggab Accuse,” Dirassat Cinimaiya, Etudes Cinématographiques, Revue de la Fédération National des Ciné-Clubs du Maroc #1 (Kenitra, Morocco, June 1985), pp. 75–79. 50. Souiba and Alaoui, p. 16. 51. Akharbach, p. 76. The CCM opened the 7éme Art in Rabat, with 260 seats, in April 1978. 52. Brahimi, pp. 118 and 123. 53. Instead, Souheil Ben Barka, filmmaker and director of the CCM in later years, began building a Dawliz theater in Tangier (a huge hotel, entertainment, shopping, cafe, and theater complex) and eventually expanded into Casablanca, and finally in the mid-1990s expanded into Rabat/Salé. His theaters often program Moroccan films as well as art films and major international releases. 54. Akharbach, p. 31. 55. “Pour ou contre la prime d’encouragement à la production cinématographique,” Lamalif #125 (May 1981), p. 39. Award is not granted until after the film has been completed and has received a censorship visa. 56. “Pour ou contre la prime . . . ,” p. 39. 57. Centre Cinématographique Marocain. Fonds d’Aide a la Production Cinématographique Nationale. Note d’information sur le soutien financier à la production cinématographique. 58. Fatima Boutarkha, “Le Cinéma Marocain” (Mémoire de Fin d’Etudes, Centre de Formation de Journalistes, Rabat, 1976–1977), pp. 18–19. 59. Boutarkha, p. 30. 60. 1988–1995, Fonds d’Aide (38,082,500 dirhams of money). 61. Abdellaoui, p. 13. 62. Daa, pp. 50–51. 63. Mohamed Jibril, “Du Nouveau chez les cineastes marocains?” Lamalif #113 (Feb. 1980), pp. 57–58. The filmmaker organization elected officers: Latif Lahlou as president; other offices were held by Souheil Ben Barka, Abderrahmane Tazi, Abderrahmane Khayat, Ahmed Badri, Abdelkrim Derkaoui, and Abdelaziz Ramdani.
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64. Daa, pp. 50–51. 65. Abdellaoui, p. 19. 66. Le Cinema au Maroc 1984. 67. Abdellaoui, p. 21. Another source gave the figures for 1980 as 2,755,000 dirhams in taxes went to renovation of 198 theaters; 371,900 dirhams for building 4 new theaters. 68. Therefore, each feature film of the period could garner up to 480,000–500,000 dirhams in support; Akharbach, p. 32. At the present time about 270,000 dirhams is awarded for a film whereas the average cost of a Moroccan film is 600,000 dirhams; Abdellaoui, p. 17. The prime de base (200,000 dirhams) was awarded to each 16-mm or 35-mm film meeting the established criteria. Additional stipulations were that at least six posts exist: director, production manager, scriptwriter, dp, editor, and sound. Only one person could fill more than one position and the technical team must hold “professional credentials” (i.e., be licensed by the CCM). The prime de qualité, attributed to films which were of exceptional artistic quality, amount varied but could not exceed 300,000 dirhams. 69. Thus short films could gain from 30,000 dirhams to a total of 60,000 dirhams per project. 70. Mohamed Chaoui, “Les freins à l’émergence d’une industrie cinématographique,” Lamalif #101 (Oct./Nov. 1978), pp. 50–52, 52. 71. Abdellaoui, p. 15. The CCM instituted the following regulations for applying for production funds: a filmmaker had to deposit his scenario at CCM in order to receive a shooting authorization; the script could be revised by the CCM at that time; then the file had to be transferred to the laboratory which rented the material and equipment and processed the film. After shooting and deliberations of the CCM awards commission, the lab notified as to its costs, which were deducted from the award. 72. Centre Cinématographique Marocain. “Fonds d’Aide a la Production Cinématographique Nationale. Note d’information sur le soutien financier à la production cinématographique.” 73. Abdellaoui, p. 40. 74. Le Cinema au Maroc, 1984. It is apropos to compare the cost of a feature film or documentary film at this time to the cost of a television commercial, to understand the constraints placed upon the filmmakers. Publicity spots in 1984 cost 60,000+ dirhams for 20-second low-budget production, up to 160,000 dirhams for a 20–30second high budget spot, and on up to 370,000 dirhams at highest end for the same duration. Of course in the United States publicity spots are also more expensive than low-budget films and documentaries to produce, and these figures are for comparative purposes only. 75. Abdellaoui, p. 18. Saad Chraibi, “Produire des films? et apres?” Lamalif #132 (Jan./Feb. 1982), pp. 48–49. 76. Dahane, “Les Tendances du cinéma marocain,” p. 42. The State established the fonds de soutien in 1980, and between 1980 and 1984 30 features benefited from aid varying between 100,000 and 450,000 dirhams. 77. Dahane, “The Trends of the Moroccan Cinema (1959–1986).” 78. Akharbach, p. 33.
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79. Lahcen Laoufi, “Le Cinéma et la Jeunesse Marocaine” (Mémoire de Fin d’Etudes. Institut Supérieur de Journalisme, Rabat, 1982–1983), p. 81. 80. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, Roundtable about Moroccan cinema and production fund with Hassan Benjelloun; Hamid Bennani; Mr. Driss Ksikes, journalist in Liberation newspaper; Mr. Hassan Elwahidi, filmmaker in RTM; Mr. Abdellatif Elassadi from the CCM; Brahim Essayeh, filmmaker, producer, translator, and specialist in dubbing; Mr. Ahmed Araib, journalist in Maghreb newspaper. 81. Nabyl Lahlou, “Lettre Ouverte au Directeur Général du CCM,” L’Opinion, April 21, 1989, p. 6. 82. Lahlou, p. 6. 83. Meriem Oudghiri, “MPS Produit son premier film marocain,” L’Economiste, May 6, 1993, p. 3. 84. Brahimi, p. 118. 85. Chaoui, p. 52. The State started the CCM off with investments of 12,260,000 dirhams for film production, establishment of the infrastructure of the new CCM, purchase of production equipment, creation of a cinema complex with color lab, and establishment of a film archive; there was also talk of private investments on the order of 9 million dirhams for establishing a studio complex in Marrakesh, for creating theaters, and for film production. However, none of these plans were ever actualized, by the CCM or anyone else. 86. Dahane, “The Trends of the Moroccan Cinema (1959–1986).” 87. Laoufi, p. 82. 88. Chraibi, “Produire des films? et apres?” 89. Akharbach, pp. 64 and 66. 90. By the 1990s, for 26 million people or more there were fewer than 200 theaters, most in terrible condition—even with decades of funding for theater renovation and building. 91. Hachim. 92. Borhane Alaoui, p. 102. 93. Nazih. 94. Akharbach, p. 40. 95. Abri, p. 34. 96. Himit, pp. 39–40. 97. Borhane Alaoui, p. 104; another obstacle was the cost of transportation; the cheapest transportation was the bus, but it was not suitable for most cinema goers who would want to leave the suburbs to attend the European or higher-class theaters downtown, because the bus stopped running often just after the evening theater screening had begun. Therefore only individuals who had cars or could afford a taxi could attend theaters outside of their district. Because the majority of better theaters were located in urban areas, it resulted in movie-going being almost totally an urban activity. 98. Akharbach, p. 44. 99. “Interview with Ben Barka: Le compromis certes, mais sans me dépersonnaliser,” Lamalif #115 (April 1980), pp. 36–39, 38. 100. A.H., “Le Dawliz, une aubaine pour les cinéphiles et les cinéastes.”
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101. A.H., “Le Dawliz, une aubaine pour les cinéphiles et les cinéastes.” 102. Himit, p. 86. 103. Nadia Ouhbal, “Nous n’allons plus au cinema!” Le Matin du Sahara Magazine (15 au 22 novembre 1987), p. 11; Theaters were supposed to have been regulated by the State through a commission founded in 1939 to monitor cinema houses, called La Commission d’Hygiene et de Securite Locale, authorized to visit cinema houses twice a year, spring and fall; the commission was composed of several members with one representative charged with health, a representative of the Minister of Employment, one of police, one of RAD, and one of the firefighters. 104. Borhane Alaoui, pp. 100 and 101. 105. Himit, p. 94. 106. Borhane Alaoui, p. 101. The traditional notion of family in Morocco makes the street and thus café’s and cinemas privileged domains of males, while the home and family spaces are women’s. However, that also means that the television is much more a feminine space than male—and women are the primary target market for TV during day and early evening, and perhaps entire family during dinner time and late. 107. Chaoui, p. 51. 108. Le Cinéma au Maroc, 1984. 109. Mahjoub, p. 62. 110. Abdellaoui, p. 30. 111. Nazih. 112. Brahimi, p. 124. 113. Informations Sur le Cinéma au Maroc, 1983. 114. Brahimi, p. 120. 115. Taleb, p. 30. 116. Taleb, p. 36. 117. François Kodjo, “Recommendation de la FEPACI (Federation Panafricaine des Cineastes),” in “Audio-visuel et développement,” Revue de Tiers Monde 79 (nd.), pp. 605–614. 118. Borhane Alaoui, p. 97. 119. Akharbach, p. 57. 120. Boutarka, pp. 53, 58. 121. Mohamed Al Hassani, “Interview with Ben Barka,” Al Alam Al Sinimayi (nd), np. 122. Al Hassani. 123. Taleb, p. 32. 124. Akharbach, p. 91. 125. Boutarka, p. 54. In her thesis research, Fatima Boutarka interviewed Boumrani, the president of the Chambre Marocaine de Distributeurs de Films (a professional association, controlled by the law established by the dahir of September 1959, and responsible for the interests of the distributors). Boumrani reiterates that the distribution sector should not be held responsible for promoting Moroccan film in the nation. Rather, the State is responsible; because the State levies such high taxation on theater sales, the state renders itself thereby responsible for the affairs of the cinema industry; Fatima Boutarka, p. 55. He claims that the only way a Moroccan film can earn any money is to get foreign
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distribution, which would require that it be an international coproduction, especially with an international star!; Fatima Boutarka, p. 57. Furthermore, for a film to make money, it should recuperate at least 60 percent of its cost in the local market, and the rest in international distribution. Yet with all the theaters in Morocco it is only estimated that a film can make barely 10 percent of its costs, especially given the high taxation on theaters; Fatima Boutarka, p. 61. The solution, according to president, is that the theaters themselves need to be improved, and the number of theaters increased to at least 500. Then it would be necessary to remove taxation from theater owners, and particularly not to tax Moroccan films at the same rate as international films. Yet he contradicts himself by saying that cinema has a more important role than to be simply a market item; cinema should above all play a cultural role, which is why the number of theaters should be increased, because they can also serve as cultural centers and not just cinema halls. Yet other distributors disagree. Boutarka presents the contradictory position of Mr. Afifi, which also mimics the position taken by filmmakers, that freeing theaters from taxation is not the right answer, because it is the fundamental support for the cinema industry in Morocco and there is no other system that can be used to support national production. 126. Tom Porteous, “The Islamisation of Modernity,” Middle East 220 (Feb. 1993), p. 19. 127. Farida Moha, “Débat sur les intellectuels au Maroc avec Mohamed El Achaari et Abdelhak Serhane,” Libération, July 8, 1996, p. 6. 128. Ejmahri, pp. 29–39. 129. When asked to explain the plethora of pornographic films all over Morocco, Ben Barka eluded an answer except to say that 95 percent of world film production was action films, and there was nothing that could be done about that. 130. Driss Chouika, “Entretien avec S. Ben Barka,” Dirassat Cinimaiya, Etudes Cinématographiques, Revue de la Fédération National des Ciné-Clubs du Maroc, #8 (Kenitra, Morocco, Fevrier 1988), pp. 53–62. 131. Boutarkha, p. 20. 132. Boutarkha, pp. 42–43. 133. Boutarkha, p. 21. 134. Akharbach, p. 34. Latifa recalls that filmmakers must submit their films to the censorship board before they even propose them to the board which allocates the production fund, which increases the auto-censorship which is already very strong among filmmakers needing support. 135. Akharbach, p. 84. 136. Akharbach, p. 85. 137. . . . on a dû remarquer à travers les quelques longs ou courts métrages qui ont été produits, un certain recourse aux astuces, au camouflage et aux symboles au niveau du texte et de l’image. Cette pratique permet au cinéaste d’échapper parfois à la censure, malheuresement elle expose en même temps son produit à l’incompréhension du public moyen. (Daa, p. 46.) 138. Akharbach, p. 86. 139. Mohamed Dahane, “Souvenirs d’un Animateur,” Dirassat Cinimaiya, Etudes Cinématographiques, Revue de la Fédération National des Ciné-Clubs du Maroc #4 (Kenitra, Morocco, June 1986), pp. 79–76, 79.
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140. Amadou Gaye, “Le Public du Cinema a Rabat” (Mémoire, Année Universitaire 1988–1989, No. 9, Institut Superieur de Journalisme, Rabat); “Document . . . The National Federation of Cinematic Clubs in Morocco. The General System (Watheeqah . . . al-Jama’ah al-Wataniya al-Indiya al-Cinimaiya bi al-Maghreb. alNithaam al-’Aasaasi),” Dirassat Cinimaiya, Etudes Cinématographiques, Revue de la Fédération National des Ciné-Clubs du Maroc, #10 (Kenitra, Morocco, Mars/Avril 1990), pp. 40–43; Hamdane, p. 78; Mehdi Haimeur, “Le cinéma doit tenir compte des problèmes économiques et sociaux,” Lamalif #24 (November 1968), p. 58; Gaye, “Le Public du Cinema a Rabat”; Akharbach, pp. 77–78. 141. Hamdane, p. 78. 142. “Document . . . The National Federation of Cinematic Clubs in Morocco”; Souiba and Alaoui, p. 39. The FNCCM reached its height in the 1970s, headed by Noureddine Sail. 143. Naji. 144. Dahane, “Souvenirs d’un Animateur,” p. 76. 145. Dahane, “Souvenirs d’un Animateur,” p. 79. 146. The creation of the National Federation of Cinema Clubs sustained a true cultural movement at the national level. In several months the federation network covered the most part of the large cities and extended to small localities and to distant villages. 147. “Resolutions of the Third World Film-Makers’ Meeting,” p. 21. The Resolution of the Third World Film-Makers in Algiers, 1973, reveals the discordance in a way between claims being made associated with third cinema and revolutionary cinema, and what was actually being produced by Moroccan filmmakers and what was being purveyed by the cinema clubs. Films being a social act within a historical reality, it follows that the task of the Third World Filmmaker is no longer limited to the making of films but is extended to other fields of action such as: articulating, fostering and making the new films understandable to the masses of people by associating himself with the promoters of people’s cinemas, clubs and itinerant film groups in their dynamic action aimed at disalienation and sensitization in favor of a cinema which satisfies the interests of the masses, for at the same time that the struggle against imperialism and for progress develops on the economic and social and political levels, a greater and greater awareness of the masses develops, associating cinema in a more concrete way in this struggle.
Third Cinema was emphasized by many filmmakers in Algeria, and by the cinema clubs in Morocco, yet eschewed by Moroccan filmmakers who were the front-line facing government censorship and prohibitions. 148. Hamdane, p. 94 . 149. La vocation tiers-mondiste de la fédération s’affermit parallèment à ces échanges avec le Maghreb. L’Amérique Latine fut présente sur nos écrans par la diffusion des films de Glauber Rocha, Jorge Sanjines, Octavio Gomez et tant d’autres. Ce fut une période faste pour les ciné-clubs qui virent le nombre de leurs adhérents double et tripler en quelques semaines. (Dahane, “Souvenirs d’un Animateur,” p. 76.)
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150. “The General Proclamation—1981,” Dirassat Cinimaiya, Etudes Cinématographiques, Revue de la Fédération National des Ciné-Clubs du Maroc, No. 12 (Sept./Oct. 1990), pp. 46–48. 151. Dar al Shababs: the Ministry of Youth and Sports created youth clubs throughout the country in order to function as a site of education, sports, and interaction for youths otherwise having no place to gather. 152. Akharbach, pp. 77–78. 153. “Remarks and Propositions for the Cinematic Corporation’s and Club’s Experience (Malaahathaat wa Aqtaraahaat hawal tajrebah al-Jaama’ah wa al-Andeeah al-Sinimaiya),” Dirassat Cinimaiya, Etudes Cinématographiques, Revue de la Fédération National des Ciné-Clubs du Maroc, No. 8 (Kenitra, Morocco, Fevrier 1988), pp. 3–6. 154. “Remarks and Propositions.” 155. Saad Chraibi, “Federation Nationale des Cine-clubs du Maroc: Passé, Present, avenir?” Lamalif, No. 134 (March-April 1982), pp. 58–59. 156. “Remarks and Propositions.” 157. Chouika and Kaouti, p. 76, my translation: Filmmaker Derkaoui demurred: “There is a . . . point which I believe has negative repercussions on cinema, and here I want to speak of the mania which the cinephiles exhibit, especially the 40,000 to 50,000 cinema club adherents—who persist in accepting and lauding things which are not acceptable and which are not beautiful and in no way deserve to be lauded. I understand that this comes from an instinct of loyalty which makes them laud national films, giving them a value which they don’t inherently have.” 158. Mohamed Noureddine Afaya, “The Position of Cinematic Criticism in Morocco (Mowaq’ al-Naqd al-sinima’i),” Dirassat Cinimaiya, Etudes Cinématographiques, Revue de la Fédération National des Ciné-Clubs du Maroc, No. 6 (April 1987), pp. 7–10; “. . . cinematic criticism in Morocco actually is an immediate or an indirect result of the experience of the national federation of cinematic clubs. The majority of those who see in themselves the faculty of cinematic critic were either animators of one of the cinematic clubs or they have profited from its cultural practices, either on the level of films which the federation provided them with the possibility of watching in Morocco or through the cultural meetings and manifestations which it used and it still organizes. Therefore, cinematic criticism in Morocco is mostly connected with the cinematic clubs’ activities more than it is a result of a national or a non-national cinematic market. That is why the cinematic critic in Morocco is a self-taught whose critical education and knowledge was formed in the process of the cultural cinematic practice and the contact with the necessary texts of this knowledge.” “Literary criticism for instance is taught at the universities and some of its criteria are clarified in syllabi. But cinematic criticism is a theoretical procedure that is strange to the educative institutions in Morocco and even our cineastes who were formed abroad did not contribute in the making of a critical writing which might have inspired some beginners in their discussions around cinema except for some few exceptions like Hamid Bennani in the beginning of the 70s”; (My paraphrase:) The author breaks criticism into three modalities: oral, newspaper written, and analytical/ interpretive criticism. The oral form is born in the cinema clubs which encourage
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oral debate and conversation and opinion expressing about films. However, this type of criticism is not always based in a training of criticism, yet it still has an influence on newspaper criticism because often the newspaper critics come straight out of the cinema clubs. But there are no venues for the analytical criticism outside of Dirassat Cinimaiya, although occasionally newspapers serve as a forum. 159. Mohamed Dahane, “Cinematic Criticism in Morocco—Reality and Horizons (al-Naqd al-Sinimaiyi fi al-Maghreb waaqa’ wa aafaaq),” Dirassat Cinimaiya, Etudes Cinématographiques, Revue de la Fédération National des Ciné-Clubs du Maroc #6 (Kenitra, Morocco, Avril 1987), p. 36. 160. Farouk Chraibi, “‘Les cendres du clos’ ou l’anti-baraka?” Lamalif #122 (January 1981), pp. 48–49. 161. A quel bonheur faisait-il allusion? Au triste bonheur de voir le film? Au faux bonheur de le voir sortir sur les écrans, ou au simple bonheur de compter un film de plus sur la liste des films marocains produits depuis . . . depuis toujours. . . . Un gros plan qui prétendait intérioriser une expression dramatique sur des visages de joueurs amateurs ou professionnels, n’ajoutant à l’action ni un talent—quand ils en avaient—ni un jeu souvent impuissant, ni même une présence, simplement la reproduction de leur image sur une pellicule en couleurs. . . . D’un gros plan donc à un autre, sans manquer de transition, de plan fixe, sans cadrage souvent à un autre plan fixe, bougeant la caméra, cherchant apparemment l’introuvable, ou comme pour un reportage de télévision, le sensationnel, voilà qui n’est guère pour reposer les yeux, ni pour permittre d’apprécier une certaine qualité de l’image. . . . 162. Akharbach, p. 79. 163. Laoufi, p. 46. 164. Hamid Nahla, “Le cinéma et le public marocain,” Lamalif, No. 159 (Oct. 1984), pp. 56–60; Mustapha Azelmat, Mohamed Ayad, and El Arbi Housni, “Maroc: Enquete Nationale sur la Population et la Sante (ENPS-II), 1992,” Ministère de la Santé Publique, Secretariat General, Service des Etudes et de l’Information Sanitaire, Demographic and Health Surveys (Columbia, MD: Macro International Inc., August 1993). 165. Akharbach, p. 79. 166. Informations Sur le Cinema au Maroc, 1983; Ouhbal, p. 11. 167. Sijilmasi. 168. Souiba and Alaoui, p. 39. 169. The 6th edition of the African cinema meeting in Khourigba was scheduled for March 26 to April 2, 1994, Tazi as president and Sail as coordinator. 170. A sa création, ce festival nourrissait l’espoir de constituer une réaction positive à l’appel des cinéastes argentins pour un troisième cinéma. La rencontre de Khouribga se justifiait dans son ouverture au nouveau cinéma africain qui ne cachait pas sa communion d’idées avec ce qu’il est convenu d’appeler le troisième cinéma. . . . dépourvus de moyens, leurs producteurs ne peuvent jusqu’à nos jours pas s’offrir le luxe de faire des films de grande facture, réduisant leurs budgets à des chiffres très bas et des coûts de production insignifiants. Ce qui n’est point en déphasage avec la philosophie du troisième cinéma, dont le luxe artificiel des décors et le gaspillage connu des autres cinémas sont bannis par opposition à l’omniprésence du réalisme social. (Souiba and Alaoui, p. 39.)
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171. Haffner, pp. 48–55. A sample of a season’s film screenings in Khouribga in 1988: Pauline at the Beach (Rohmer), Tree without Roots (Christov), The Great Voyage (Tazi), Senso (Visconti), Two Things in Life (Hawbral), Ran (Kurasawa), Days Oh the Days (Maanouni), The Girl in the Red Slip (Xiaoya), Piece Not Achieved for Piano (Mikhalkov), The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (Bunuel), Adoption (Miszaros), etc. 172. The 6th edition of the African cinema meeting in Khourigba was scheduled for March 26 to April 2, 1994. Abd. Tazi president and Sail as coordinator. Festival was canceled. 173. Souiba, “L’Ecriture Cinématographique au Maroc,” p. 30. 174. . . . le film marocain qui est plutôt étranger chez lui, le CCM opte pour l’organisation du festival national de films. D’abord pour evaluer la production nationale par le corps des métiers relevant du secteur, habituer ensuite le spectateur marocain à voir son image sur l’écran et inciter enfin les distributeurs et exploitants des salles à revoir leur politique et d’incluire, le cas échéant, un quota de films marocains dans leur programme d’activités. C’est ainsi que le CCM continue de réunir tous les intervenants dans le secteur pour réfléchir sur le cinéma marocain et dégager les meilleurs outils permettant son évolution. 175. Souiba and Alaoui, p. 40. 176. Souiba and Alaoui, pp. 37–38. 177. Mohamed Jibril, “Les Cineastes Marocains dur la sellette,” Lamalif #162 (January 1985), pp. 27–32, 27. 178. Souiba and Alaoui, pp. 16–17. 179. Jibril, “Un Festival a l’Essai,” p. 24. 180. Jibril, “Un Festival a l’Essai,” p. 24 . 181. Jibril, “Un Festival a l’Essai,” p. 27. 182. Jibril, “Un Festival a l’Essai,” p. 28. 183. Akharbach. 184. I will not be able to discuss any of the feature films made during the earliest years of this period because I discuss only films I have been able to see rather than relying only upon other sources. Several of the early 1970s feature films have been written about at least in broad description. Therefore, the feature films I discuss in this section, are those from the mid to latter part of this era. 185. Larbi Bennani made one additional short in 1976 and his first feature in 1995. 186. Abdellaoui, p. 39. 187. Souiba and Alaoui, p. 49. 188. Jibril, “Les Cineastes Marocains dur la sellette,” p. 29. 189. Souiba and Alaoui, p. 70. 190. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, Oct. 27, 1993, with Nabyl Lahlou and Larbi Dogmi and film Brahim Yach? 191. Hamdane, p. 36. 192. Jibril, “Un Festival a l’Essai,” p. 27; this article about first national film festival, Rabat, 1982. 193. Claude Michel Cluny, Dictionnaire des nouveaux cinémas arabes (Paris: Sindbad, 1978), pp. 13–14.
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194. Cluny, p. 20. 195. Souiba and Alaoui, p. 37. 196. Interview with Moumen Smihi, 1995. 197. Jibril, “Un Festival a l’Essai,” p. 28. 198. Music and acting by Nass al-Ghiwane; scenario, image, and directing Maanouni; sound Ricardo Castro; editing Atika Tahiri. 199. “La musique du groupe devient une sorte d’identité culturelle remontant dans le temps jusqu’au début du siècle pour embrasser la musique Gnaouie, elle est ce fond musical ouvert tout au long du siècle par le Protectorat qui y substituait une musique importée.” (Souiba, “L’Ecriture Cinématographique au Maroc,” p. 63.) 200. With Hicham Dahmane and Hadoum Bent Bouazza; script, dialogue and direction Mohamed Abbassi; image Mostapha Stitou; editing Ahmed Bouanani and Naima Saoudi. Hicham Dahmane plays Said. 201. “Accueil chaleureux pour ‘Malwad Lhih’ au Festival cinématographique de Berlin,” L’Opinion, May 2, 1988. 202. Dialogue, production, and direction: Ahmed Yachfine; additional dialogue: Mohamed el Kaghat; decor: Abdelkrim Ghattas; production manager: Abdellatif Yachfine; camera/DP: Abdelkrim Derkaoui; sound: Hassan el Amiri; editing: Abdeslem Agnaw; music: Haj Younous; with All el-Arab Kaghat, Ibrahim Jawhari, Rachida Azfar, Khadija Mhamdi, Charifa Mrani, Mohamed Fadis, Seddik Janati, Fatiha Belkhayyat, and Naima Yusri. 203. Mohamed Boualem, “Regard sur le film Marocain: les raisons de la colère III,” Le Message de la Nation, No. 79 (May 29, 1995), pp. 44–48. 204. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, Nov. 18, 1993, with Yachfine and film Cauchemar. Yachfine’s parents were from Moulay Bouazza, so he had heard stories since childhood. When Yachfine asked the regional people to participate in the film, they were hesitant; but became eager once they learned about the subject of the film and they recalled that period. 205. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, Nov. 18, 1993. The film was shot in the area and in original locales; for example, scenes in the office of the general comptroller were shot in the original office the comptroller had used during colonialism, and the map in the film was the original one from the office preserved by the people of the region. The decorator was immensely aided because people of the region all helped him and furnished him with items from the time; they even found an abandoned storeroom in someone’s house which had tents, rifles, and many other decorator items. Yachfine did not use professional actors. He was primarily criticized because he dubbed the dialogue. As no good location sync sound recording equipment was available in Morocco, and Yachfine wanted to use the people in the region, he had no option but to dub their dialogue afterwards. 206. Ahmed Araib, “La voie du témoignage,” Al Maghrib, December 2–3, 1990, p. 13. 207. Jibril, “Les Cineastes Marocains dur la sellette.” 208. With Mustafa Belhaj, Alhajoub Raji, Sofia Ziani, Mohamed Gharbi, Fatima Regragi; scenario: Abdelhaq Zerouali; produced by CCM; editor: Meziane; photography: Stitou.
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209. Maroc-France (1991), Réalisation: Jillali Ferhati, Scénario et dialogues: Jillali Ferhati, Image: Gilberto Azevedo et Jacques Besse, Son: Francis Baldos, Montage: Nathalie Perrey, Décors: Abdelkrim Akkelach, Musique: Djamel Allam, Production: Heracles, 35 mm, couleur, 1h28. Interprètes: Souad Ferhati, Mohamed Timod, Fatima Loukili, Larbi El Yacoubi, Mohamed Larbi Khazzan, Nezha Zakaria. Mina believes in her lover’s promise to marry her, until she becomes pregnant and he avoids her, which makes her hit him with a large branch, that ends up killing him. When her father finds out about her pregnancy and the cover-up of the crime (Mina buries the man in one of her father’s huge piles of salt—he’s a salt maker), he cloisters her in a vacation villa until she gives birth. At the same time, the stepmother begins to construct an expanding belly for herself, with the plan of pretending that the new child is hers. When Mina finally births, the stepmother pretends to be the new mother, but Mina can’t take the sham, clutches her baby to her back, and reveals to the village that she is indeed the mother, that she would rather run away with the child than give it up to another. The story is very movingly told through silences and small utterances that reveal worlds more than dialogue could. 210. Writer/Director: Jillali Ferhati, Photo: Gilberto Azevedo, Montage: Hélène Muller, Sound: Faouzi Thabet, Music: Ali Souissi, Assan Souissi, Producer: Héraclès; 83’, 35 mm, color; Cast: Nezha Rahil, Jillali Ferhati, Brigitte Roüan, Abdelhamid Zoughi, Jean-Louis Richard, Driss Karimi, Hicham Ibrahimi, Larbi El Yacoubi. Mohamed has one dream, to see the horses race in France. He abandons his wife and job to try his luck in Tangier, his birthplace, to see if he can get to France. He can’t get a visa, so along with two others who want to cross the Mediterranean, he tries the chance at clandestine migration, with no result. At the same time, his childhood friend, Elizabeth, a French resident of Morocco, has always and still does love him. She’s returning to France, and manages to get Mohamed a visa, but at the ferry boat he freaks and flees the scene, leaving her to travel alone. His only alternative, with his blind companion who wants to go to France to have his eyesight restored and see his son, is to try their luck on little paddle boats that they find on the beach. The film ends with the paddle boats and the blind man’s cane washed up on some beach. With this tale, Ferhati is one of the first of the Moroccan filmmakers to treat the subject of clandestine migration, as well as the history of French residents in Morocco. 211. 2000, couleur, 35 mm, 93’. Director: Jilali Ferhati, Scénario: Xesc Barcelo et Jilali Ferhati, Image: Kamal Derkaoui, Montage: Hélène Weiss Muller, Son: Claude Bertrand, Musique: Ali El-Hassan Souissi, Interprète: Mohamed Miftah, Mohamed Ramzi, Faouzi Bensaïdi, Salima Benmoumen, Saloua Regragui, Mohamed Ousfour, Hicham Ibrahimi. Production: Heraclès Films. One day in Tangier, sixteen-year-old Saida goes to visit her sister who does housekeeping for a lawyer, a candidate for local elections. The lawyer’s son, Hicham, a ne’er-do-well rapes her. From that moment on Saida no longer is joyous nor carefree—instead she lays prostrate in her room and refuses to speak a word to anyone. However, her little brother, Amine, believes he knows what has happened, and seeks revenge for his sister. 212. Maroc 2004, 94’, 35 mm scope, Dolby SR, Ecrit et Réalisé par: Jilalali Ferhati, Adaptation des dialogues et textes: Fatema Loukili, Image: Kamal Derkaoui, Son: Eric Vaucher, Montage: Ali Benchekroun, Musique: Ali and Hassan Souissi, Production:
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Heracles Production and MPS-Cinéma. Interprétation: Mohamed Marouazi, Fatema Loukili, Jilali Ferhati, Raouia, Safia Ziani, Fatema Hijji Benhida, Bouchaib El Amrani, Driss Mamoun, Larbi El Yacoubi, Abdelkader Tabali, Synopsis: Upon his release from prison, Zoubeïr, a young delinquent, agrees to help another prisoner, Mokhtar, who had become amnesiac during his long detention, to search for his relatives. Together they set off, but soon their quest becomes a painful return to their memories. Privileging a poetic approach over a historical one, Memory in Detention reflects on the trauma of a society recovering from years of violence and torture, but also from betrayal and from shame of what has come to be known as the “Leaden Years.” Zoubeïr must come to terms with the fact that Mokhtar may have been responsible for his father’s death, while Mokhtar has to unburden himself from the weight of the truth. 213. CCM documentation provided by filmmakers. Scripted/written, and produced by Farida Benlyazid who was also director of production. Jilali Ferhati directed, edited and was responsible for set decoration. Director of photography was Abdelkrim Derkaoui, sound engineer Abderrahman Khabbaz, popular music and songs Zineb Alaoui. Male leads: Jilali Ferhati as Aisha’s husband, and Ahmed Ferhati as brotherin-law, female leads: Souad Thami Ferhati as Aisha, and Chaabia Adraoui as motherin-law. Filming lasted five weeks and occurred in Tangier, Asilah and their environs. Postproduction (editing and sound) was undertaken in Madrid. 214. J. Alessandra, “Destin de Femme,” Lamalif #142 (Dec./Jan. 1983), pp. 56–57. 215. “Regard sur le film Marocain: Les raisons de la colère.” 216. “Regard sur le film Marocain: Les raisons de la colère.” 217. The filmmaker filmed the suffering of daily life, the weight of tradition, a strange separation of the sexes where the women remain sovereign if they well hide themselves, at the doorway of exterior pollution. Ignoring the cinema of spectacle, the authors have recreated an ethnographic fiction full of meaning and contained anger. 218. Alessandra. 219. “Farida Belyazid: L’Identité a travers l’objectif d’une camera,” Al Maghreb, October 22, 1982. 220. Kalil Damoun, Cinema Studies 3, 1986. 221. Poupées de Roseau n’est pas exclusivement un film sur les femmes, c’est aussi un réquisitoire en faveur des êtres qui vivent l’humiliation. Mon choix, quant à la réalisation de ce film dont le scénario est de Farida Benlyazid, est dû à la beauté, à la force et à la cohérence du sujet. Rien n’y est artificiel, ni inventé, c’est un fait divers, un fait qui ne manque pas de soulever l’indignation. Je n’ai jamais été aussi concerné et j’aurais aimé en dire bien plus sur ce que subit un être en proie aux institutions séculaires que sont les coutumes et les traditions, qui rendent l’homme fort et sûr de son bon droit. Mais je considère que mes images ne sont pas un aboutissement de mes propos et ceux de Farida car nous y réfléchissons encore, et beaucoup d’autres avec nous. . . . (Grand Ecran #25, May 2, 1988. Television program hosted by Mohamed Dahane.) 222. Grand Ecran #25, May 2, 1988. 223. Tazi B.A.’s Amina as an example. 224. Kalil Damoun, Cinema Studies 3, 1986. 225. Grand Ecran #25, May 2, 1988.
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226. Akharbach, p. 90. 227. Lahlou, “Lettre Ouverte au Directeur Général du CCM.” Lahlou voices numerous complaints about the operations of CCM. Komany was presented in May 1988 and December 1988 and was refused funding both times. In 1980 the Governor General of Shakerbakerben Island was awarded 280,000 dirhams which was to allow for its finishing and blow up, but the CCM only paid 134,091 dirhams. In 1981 Brahim Yach? was awarded 230,000 dirhams, but Lahlou never saw any of it—the CCM simply used it to pay their laboratory costs with no accounting. In 1984 L’âme Qui Brait was awarded 240,000 dirhams and again the CCM gave none of it to Lahlou—they paid their laboratory costs and sent the rest to the bank Société de Banque et de Crédit which paid off his 1981 loans for Brahim Yach? The CCM made a videotape of Brahim Yach without Lahlou’s permission, and made copies of the video—again with no permission or contract. At one point the director of the Algerian cinémathèque asked for copies of Lahlou’s three films housed in the CCM laboratory; he never received a reply from the CCM. When Lahlou asked CCM laboratory to make copies of his films so he could make videos in order to sell them and finance his film Komany, they took months to respond. They eventually responded that the CCM didn’t have any film stock, so Lahlou had to take the negative to Madrid for the work, where he found the negatives in a terrible condition; it took him more than a month to restore them. When he asked the CCM for the technicians who he usually would work with, to make his new film Komany, they ignored him and wouldn’t respond, so he had to hire an Algerian team; he was subsequently criticized for not using Moroccan personnel. He won a prize for his acting in Brahim Yach? in 1981, 5,000 dirhams, but never saw a penny of it—and no one at the CCM since that time to now can give him any information. 228. Grand Ecran #17, March 7, 1990, with Nabyl Lahlou. 229. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, with Nabyl Lahlou. 230. TV program on theater with Mohamed Maftouni speaking. 231. Salwa Nouaymi, “Interview with Tayeb Saddiki at the Carthage Festival 1984,” All the Arab Magazine, No. 121 (December 1984), p. 56. 232. Jibril, “Les Cineastes Marocains dur la sellette.” 233. Cheikhat women are singers and dancers for hire for parties or celebratory gatherings; they are considered to have loose morals because they entertain men; they are very different from other types of singers because they are considered to “entertain” in a number of ways (not just singing), play very traditional music and songs, and are not related for example to a “troupe” of folkloric performance. 234. Jacques Alesandra, “Nous Sommes Tous Des Infirmes,” Lamalif #137 (June/ July 1982), pp. 48–52. 235. Script, dialogue, editing and directing were undertaken by Lahlou, image by Mostapha Marjane, music by Mohamed Belkhayat, and actors were Larbi Doghmi and Nabyl Lahlou along with numerous others. 236. Grand Ecran #17, March 7, 1990. 237. Mohamed Jibril, “Brahim Yach,” Lamalif #146 (May/June 1983), p. 53. 238. Souiba, “L’Ecriture Cinématographique au Maroc,” p. 62. 239. “. . . une administration que se transforme petit à petit en bureaucratie n’est plus un moyen au service du citoyen mais une repression contre celui-ci. Elle devient
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un système, et celui qui tient la destinée d’une décision parcequ’il est responsable d’un tampon ou d’une signature, devient un dictateur, tout simplement parcequ’il refuse d’être un artiste, c’est-à-dire quelqu’un qui fait son travail aussi bien pour son propre bonheur que pour celui de ceux pour lesquels il a choisi de travailler. (Abdelkader Abou Abdallah, “Nabyl Lahlou se prononce sur les composants de son film,” L’Opinion, 1982. nd, np.) 240. Alesandra, “Nous Sommes Tous Des Infirmes.” 241. Alesandra, “Nous Sommes Tous Des Infirmes.” 242. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, Oct. 27, 1993. 243. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, April 30, 1992, with Nabyl Lahlou. 244. Je ne voulais donc pas . . . raconter, ‘faire de la fiction’ dès le départ, mais je voulais investire le cinéma par des moyens qui me permettrant de mieux connaître son fonctionnement, et dans la mesure du possible, d’en faire connaître les rouages au public lui même. (Souiba, “L’Ecriture Cinématographique au Maroc,” p. 92.) 245. Khalil Damoun, “A Temporary Title, or the Duality of Subject and Object (Unwan Mou’qat ou Thanaa’ieya al-Dhaat wa al-Mouddoo’a.”) Dirassat Cinimaiya, Etudes Cinématographiques, Revue de la Fédération National des Ciné-Clubs du Maroc #6 (Kenitra, Morocco, Avril 1987), pp. 17–20. 246. Ahmed Araib, “Le reflet d’une epoque,” AlMaghrib, June 28–29, 1992, p. 13. Written, directed, and edited by Mustapha Derkaoui while Abdelkrim was cinematographer/DP. Actors included Salah Eddine Ben Moussa, Aicha Saadou, Sakina, Abbas el Fassi Fihri, Hamid Zoughi, Mohammed Dirham, Khaled El Jamai, Larbi Belakkaf, and others. The film never got an exhibition visa from the censors, as the following story indicates, because “there is no unemployment in Morocco”; one day the Moroccan Minister of Information visited the studios at Ain Chok in Casablanca. He came across a filmmaker in the process of editing his film. Interested by the operation, the minister questioned the filmmaker about the content of the film. Without hesitation, the filmmaker replied that the film treats the problems of unemployment in Morocco. “But there is no unemployment in Morocco,” replied the minister to the filmmaker without defense. And thus was shaped the future of the film produced in 1974 but not shown to the public until 1992. Neither forbidden nor censured, the film had an uncertain status for eighteen years. 247. I can write very little on this film, not having had the opportunity to see it myself. The film was once screened in a festival in Meknes in 1975 and not again in Morocco until the 1990s, although it also showed abroad in the Festival of Paris in November 1975. 248. Written, and directed by Mustapha, with image by Abdelkrim Derkaoui, but editing by Mohamed Meziane. Actors were Farid Belkahia, Abdelwahab Doukkali, Naima Lamsharki, Meriem Fakhereddine, Larbi Batma, Mohammed Kafi, Touria Jabran, and the Derkaoui brothers. 249. Souiba, “L’Ecriture Cinématographique au Maroc,” p. 56. 250. Mohamed Essatori, “Ayam Shaharazade al-Jameelah (Beautiful Days of Shaharazade),” Al Itihad al-Ishtiraki, February 25, 985, np. 251. Fatima Mernissi, “Les Beaux Jours de Shaharazade,” Lamalif #135 (April/ May 1982), pp. 56–57, 56.
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252. Ben Mohamed Boualem, “Les beaux et mauvais jours du festival,” Al Maghrib, October 15, 1982, np. 253. Mernissi, “Les Beaux Jours de Shaharazade,” p. 56. 254. Mernissi, “Les Beaux Jours de Shaharazade,” p. 56. 255. Mernissi, “Les Beaux Jours de Shaharazade,” p. 56. 256. Mernissi, “Les Beaux Jours de Shaharazade,” p. 56. 257. Souiba and Alaoui, p. 81. 258. Damoun. 259. Mernissi, “Les Beaux Jours de Shaharazade,” p. 56. 260. Boualem, “Les beaux et mauvais jours du festival.” 261. Essatori. 262. Boualem, “Les beaux et mauvais jours du festival.” 263. Mustapha Derkaoui still does the script, dialogue, editing, and directing, while Abdelkrim remains cinematographer. Actors are Farid Belkahia, Touria Jabrane, Khadija Nour, Saida Naja, Aziz Saadallah, Larbi Batma, Omar Sayed, and the members of the filmmaking team. 264. Temporary Title: Aounwaan Mouqat. Presented at the Club of the Screen in Meknes meeting organized in cooperation with the National Federation of Cinema Clubs in Morocco. The screening was followed by a roundtable discussion with Derqaoui himself present. 265. Jibril, “Les Cineastes Marocains dur la sellette.” 266. Jibril, “Les Cineastes Marocains dur la sellette.” 267. Damoun.
Chapter Three
New Developments, New Audiences, 1986–2006
If everything has been turned upside down by the Seventh Art in less than a quarter of a century, ours has seen not a single modification, no significant progress whatsoever. The Moroccan press has greatly aided the promotion and common knowledge of Moroccan films. The public always responded “present,” if for no other reason than to demonstrate its true support of a sector which it waited to improve. Unfortunately, the Moroccan film has proved nothing and has not responded as it should to the aspirations of its admirers. . . . If for others their cinema nourished their hopes with different modes of life and in different ways of perceiving their culture, their history, ours has totally failed!1 Affirming the cultural personality of Morocco is a historical necessity. It occurs necessarily through a quality national production, knowing that it constitutes a formidable means of creativity, of education, and of diversion at the same time as an important economic activity while inserting itself fully in the politics of development at the regional and national levels.2
In the years from 1986–2006, many of the issues in and problems related to Moroccan cinema changed little from the previous two eras, though the end of the 1990s and new millennium saw a number of emergent filmmakers and new trends in terms of film distribution and audience reception. The constant criticism of the field of filmmaking, the persistent lack of funding coupled with limited distribution/exhibition, and the disputed laws and regulations of the Centre Cinématographique Marocaine (CCM) remained important. This chapter will focus only on the changes during this era and the qualities that render this period unique. These include major changes that affected the production fund; new concepts on film funding; that substantial revision and new funding approaches had a great impact on the films produced during the latter part of this era. Other notable changes concern the perceived role of 187
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the filmmakers and of films. Rather than the filmmaker only being a source of complaints against the government, the CCM or the overall system, the filmmaker came more under fire for contributing to the stagnation of national cinema production in Morocco—while the CCM, filmmakers, and critics looked to filmmakers from abroad to breathe new life into Moroccan filmmaking. Furthermore, the previous notions of what kind of films should be made and for what public took a more evident turn away from elitist conceptions of auteur cinema, festival orientations, or personal cinema and self expression, more toward “entertainment” and the need to define or address the Moroccan “audience” heretofore relatively unexplored and unknown. One specifically new development in the mid-1990s, was the effort made by the CCM and Moroccan filmmakers to recuperate emigrant filmmakers of Moroccan descent, living in Europe, into the fold of “Moroccan cinema.” Therefore, five primary components will be: changes, or perhaps better noted as reversions, to concepts about the function of cinema and films; the changing status of the audience; the revisions to the support fund; the influences of new technologies on Moroccan filmmaking; and the changing status of the filmmaker.
THE CONTEXT AND THE INSTITUTIONS The CCM and a newly formed Comité du Suivi des Recommandations du 1ér Colloque sur le Cinéma made the following recommendations during the third national festival of cinema in 1991. Given my previous assertion that one of the four major changes notable between 1986 and 2006 was the reversion to older forms of conceptualizing the role and influence of cinema, the statements are particularly important.
THE ROLE AND FUNCTION OF CINEMA 1. The cinema . . . is probably one of the most remarkable things of our times. By its technical means that assure it a large dissemination, its aesthetic and its ability to integrate other arts or forms of expression and creativity such as the novel, the theater, the fine arts, and music, it continues to have a considerable impact in spite of the impediments of the other large audiovisual domains which are TV and video. 2. For several countries, the cinema has been and remains a formidable means to make themselves known outside of their borders: this is the case for Egypt, the United States, France, England, Germany, Italy, Japan,
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India, the USSR, and others. At the moment when Morocco searches to disseminate throughout the world an image that will make her appreciated for her full value, it would be extremely valuable to develop a national cinema production of quality. 3. Sharing in the idea that every true development should first take into consideration the human element, the cinema remains one of the best means for disseminating a mass national culture especially considering that in our country the educational institution cannot itself alone accomplish this task. 4. Considering that the cinema is a cultural component, the participants in the colloquium believe that its promotion will inevitably contribute to the affirmation of the national cultural identity. 5. . . . cinema is an industry which has the particularity to call upon several auxiliary industries and by this fact favors the creation of employment. There already, at the time when the Conseil National pour la Jeunesse et l’Avenir (CNJA) searches for the measures to develop a plan to absorb the unemployed college graduates, it seems more necessary than ever to encourage national cinema production and to facilitate the shooting of international productions. This action will contribute to creating a dynamic able to reanimate several vital sectors of the economy of our country, to permit our technicians to retrain themselves periodically and to acquire a truly professional training.3 These recommendations presented succinctly the revivification of some issues first introduced in the 1960s about the role and function of cinema, and provided a brief summary of the new conceptions about where Moroccan cinema should be directed, what its goals and functions should be in this era. After thirty years of debate and experience, it is noteworthy that some underlying assumptions and desires remained fixed in the imaginations of individuals working in cinema. Cinema has continually been looked toward to create identification with the nation, although no evidence has ever been collected to affirm or deny that cinema in Morocco performed such a function. The first recommendation specified that cinema should be elevated over other forms of audiovisual expression for having such an intensive impact, that cinema can be disseminated to a large audience and that its aesthetic demands the participation or contribution of other forms of creativity. The underlying assumption of the recommendation is that film can accomplish what television and video cannot; however, the explanation or elaboration of the difference remains unexplored. Of course there is a large aesthetic difference between images originated and displayed on film and images via video or television. But, is the aesthetic so important that it overrides other concerns? The recommendation totally elided the problematic of the cost of disseminating
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“film” versus telling the same stories and using the same participation of other creative forms but on television and video in a context such as Morocco, and the enduring estrangement between producers of film and distributors/ exhibitors which rendered most of the country persistently outside the realm of film consumption. Furthermore, the writers of the recommendation may have been referencing the belief in the strong impact of cinema from elsewhere on Moroccan consumers, which again does not address why films shown in theaters in Morocco would be considered more powerful an influence than television and video as vehicles of the same products. The second recommendation emphasized that Morocco needs to produce films of quality, in order to make itself known outside its borders, but as the third section indicated, the domain of cinema should disseminate national culture to the Moroccan populace which is underserved by the educational system. Reinvigorated is the idea that films represent, or can represent, people and culture both accurately and unproblematically, and can speak to insiders as well as outsiders. Thus, if film content is an unproblematic reflection of the nation and people, it becomes very important that the images be “appropriate” both of and for the Moroccan people, mores, attitudes, and values being represented. But who decides what is “appropriate”? Furthermore, how would such films find their ways to represent to Moroccans and to “others” when such difficulties persist in disseminating any Moroccan film? Cinema is again posited to be an effective agent of development and unifier of a people into a national body. As specified in recommendation four, the promotion of cinema would be the affirmation of national cultural identity, which is also the assumed by-product of recommendations two and three. A film can, supposedly, conflate the nation, culture, and individual self in representation and thus, apparently unproblematically, affirm identity. Again, the underlying assumption was that film could do this whereas other forms of audiovisual media could not. Yet the underlying assumption was never explained or clarified. Finally, cinema, comprising both national productions and international productions shot within Morocco, was called upon to solve numerous problems for the nation, such as providing employment for the vast numbers of unemployed, reinvigorating several unnamed economic sectors of the country, and professionally training technicians. Resonant with France’s position during the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) negotiations, Moroccans positioned the cinema sector, not the entire audiovisual sector, as having great economic benefits for the country, although at the time the State was still funding all cinema production through taxation.4 How contradictory. Unlike France, Morocco refused to consider either quotas on importation of films, or that foreign film productions pay some portion of the costs of supporting Moroccan film production.5 The CCM continued to rely upon foreign
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film productions solely as training grounds for Moroccan technicians, even though there was ample evidence that the foreign productions were inadequate training vehicles and only rendered Moroccans minor support personnel or “figurehead” positions.6 Therefore, it is unclear how filmmaking and cinema in Morocco could be transformed from being a beneficiary of State and tax monies into being a generator of income, an employer of masses of unemployed, a supporter of the State, without some transformation in the overall conception of the industry—which was not mentioned in a justification of the recommendations. One of the most important elements of the recommendations is that they reiterate what has been claimed but never been proved for decades, and reveal that the various sectors of the industry either live in absolute denial, or in constant hope that miraculous changes will occur to the industry overall through repeated assertion. Similar to the recommendations above that ignore all the concerns expressed persistently and never validated during the previous eras,7 even by the end of 1995 the Minister of Communication reiterated several proposals that had not produced any positive results for decades: national production needs to develop alternative resources, such as the synergy between the CCM and radio television marocaine (RTM) and private investments; Morocco should be promoted as a location for international productions by removing bureaucratic limitations; theaters should be renovated and their number increased.8 The minister raised the issue of funding sources by calling for synergy between the CCM and the RTM, which did actually emerge very slightly during this period. However, private investment has been a realm that never much supported either Moroccan film or other public media; in fact, the cultural trend has generally always been for private capital to remain in private hands, in family hands, or at most turned into habbous or foundation support. The State made no incentives for private capital investment in cinema, so such a recommendation again seems to be more of a desire than a true accomplishable goal. Further, keeping Morocco a site for international productions had everything to do with bringing in hard currency to the country and nothing to do with aiding Moroccan cinema. The only corollary to Morocco remaining primarily a location for international productions was the development of international coproductions. Coproductions and other funding sources/issues will be elaborated below. Theater renovations have been discussed extensively as an option for supporting the industry and need not be reiterated here (see exhibition/distribution below). As well as these recommendations, additional ones were made in 1991 in Meknes in order to promote and benefit the cinema industry in Morocco. Many, as those above indicate, were replications of issues brought to the fore decades previously, but continually considered potential solutions to
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the problem of cinema in Morocco:9 exempt payment of taxes and import fees for products and materials used in cinema industry; exempt payment of taxes and import fees for work on films done abroad; exempt from taxes the monies individuals invest in cinema; exempt films “art et essai” from taxes and import fees; allow the import of explosives and neutralized weapons for use in film; permit the use of military materials such as helicopters, vehicles, neutralized weapons, tanks, etc., for productions;10 allow the participation of the Forces Armées Royales, Gendarmerie Royale, Sûreté Nationale and Forces Auxiliaires in both national and international productions; create a code for the audio-visual domain controlling the relations between film, video, and TV; regulate the televisual and video sectors to control the exhibition of films prior to their Moroccan theatrical release; *impose a quota upon RTM and 2M to exhibit and produce Moroccan films and telefilms; enforce pirating prohibitions and prohibitions against video shows in cafes; give a subvention to distributors who agree to promote Moroccan films abroad and who import quality films to Morocco; encourage cinema theaters specifically in rural areas; create a higher institute for cinema; *insert cinema as an educational program in secondary education; create specialized departments to teach cinema in universities; encourage cultural associations interested in cinema such as cinema clubs; encourage research in the domain of cinema; create scholarships for developing publication in this area; *recuperate into the fold the children of Moroccans living abroad; create a real program for the national cinémathèque; organize training rotations for technicians; set aside a portion of aid for cinema for film dubbing; promote new films with easier and more open access to advertise. While these recommendations were quite diverse, only the three marked with asterisks were relatively new, and the most unique was the concept of recuperating émigré Moroccan filmmakers from Europe (which was the highlight of the fourth national festival of cinema in 1995); however, most were redundant. Their redundancy is one of the most important reasons to mention them at this time. Why? Because there was really no formal structure whereby filmmakers or concerned individuals, whether alone or congregated in an association or group, whether minister or committee, could actually influence decisions taken by the government to guide the CCM and thus cinema policy from 1956 to 2006. With the creation of a Ministry of Communication that took over governorship of the CCM and cinema, some small changes were affected, such as permitting the use of armed forces and weapons in films. However, other changes within the sector came about only because filmmakers themselves made individual decisions, such as coproduction filmmaking or cooperative filmmaking, and distribution specifically of Moroccan films, and these
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changes had no influence on the larger sector’s operations. The larger sector would only change according to the State’s fulfilling its own perceived needs. In most ways, this new era only continued the same discourse and declamations from the previous two eras, one of the only real forms of continuity in filmmaking in Morocco. As mentioned, one of the four major shifts pertinent to this era concerned the conception of the role and function of cinema; the following subsections will deal with two pertinent issues: film’s ability to strengthen relations between Morocco and other countries; and the role of Moroccan films in creating an audience or public. Moroccan efforts to create relations with other countries netted very little result overall, except for the few endeavors of individual filmmakers to make coproduction agreements with European countries. However, since such cooperative relations were highly emphasized in public discourse about the possibilities open to Moroccan cinema, it is important to include the issue here. But the real advancement in Morocco, or perhaps it would be best to say the real beneficial move, was for filmmakers to direct their attentions toward attracting Moroccan audiences to their films. This topic is studied below.
RELATIONS BETWEEN MOROCCO AND OTHER COUNTRIES Although individuals in the cinema sector in 1991 still believed that cinema should be considered a productive sector of the economy, and treated as such, that conception was little shared by government or industry.11 In contradiction, authorities actually considered cinema an “unproductive” sector compared to agriculture, tourism and industry—investment never reaped reward.12 Thus, taxation on cinema goods and products was never lessened and was never going to be lessened, in spite of the demands and recommendations to the contrary; furthermore, the Moroccan State never took great pains to develop (or continue) firm or productive relations with other nations in the realm of cinema. Evidently, one group considered cinema to have a powerful influence as a product and an industry, while another group or sector considered cinema negligible. The Moroccan government, in the absence of a belief in the powerful economic benefit of cinema, would have to believe in the powerful effects of film on national identity and national culture, much as it did in the 1950s–1960s, to truly support changes to the industry and to support international agreements and relations, as well as cooperation among diverse sectors internally.13 A related concept held by many in the cinema realm that State-initiated agreements with other North African, Arab and African nations could
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strengthen Moroccan cinema,14 although others denied that such a relationship had/has even a chance to exist. However, in addition to the problem of finding a means for diverse ministries within Morocco to cooperate internally, this notion of interregional and international cooperation would require various sectors of State government to cooperate on external relations.15 Yet the nations of North Africa, Africa, and the Middle East already had ongoing problems with cooperation and collaboration in other very important domains, such as borders, industry, and political support. Why would cinema be an easy domain over which to agree internationally when even national policies were problematic? Why support cinema over other more economically productive international relationships? Although the notion of inter-Maghrebi cooperation was promoted since the 1970s, and a few agreements were actually effected, efforts never lasted nor produced the anticipated results. Morocco did import films from Algeria and Tunisia to show on television, in cinemas, and in festivals, but the efforts were marginally reciprocated. In 1991 in Meknes during the third national festival of film, managers of the cinema organizations in the countries of the Union of the Arab Maghrib (UMA) signed an agreement for multilateral cooperation in terms of the coproduction of films, assistance to producers wanting to distribute their films in the region, the removal of import and taxation restrictions on films, the creation of a support fund for inter-Maghrebi productions, and the organization of a festival limited solely to UMA countries.16 This agreement also was never implemented in any of the concerned countries in spite of the numerous claims that such an arrangement would be lucrative and beneficial.17 In 1995 in the 8éme Rencontres du Cinéma Méditerranéen organized by l’Association des Amis du Cinéma de Tetouan the inter-African cooperation issue was raised as it had apparently been several years previously, to no result. Unfortunately, whereas political issues might be the major obstacles to agreements between North African countries, political issues would have to be coupled with racism and the locus of political power as added influences in terms of relations between Northern and sub-Saharan African countries.18 A cultural notion of Moroccan superiority is an inheritance from the former days of slavetrading and slaveholding and still influences the national imagination. Furthermore, Morocco considers itself the gateway to Africa, and a leader of rather than exactly partner with, other African countries. However, rather than politics, racism or political differences, the main problems all the filmmakers from the region enumerated were where to find production money, where to find distribution outlets, and how to garner audiences. None of the countries had solutions to offer, so no real progress in cooperation could be made, just as no success was possible with the Maghreb Union, the Pan-Arab movement, or any Pan-Islam movement. National goals and specificities
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always interfered with regional initiatives. Furthermore, agreements between Morocco and northern countries (Europe) would be deemed safer, potentially more productive, and more resonant with Morocco’s goals to participate in the European Union (EU), whereas creating blocks with other North African and African countries might jeopardize Morocco’s acceptance into the EU, lead to reprisals much as Libya faced, and perhaps make it harder for Moroccan filmmakers to expand in the more lucrative markets that already existed in Europe but would have to be built in Africa and the Middle East. Therefore one of the primary components of a discussion of Moroccan relations with other countries would have to be Morocco’s relations with the former colonizer, France, and with Europe. In most arenas related to cinema in Morocco, France has had a strong influence since before independence; in this new era, while France had redefined its orientation to francophone countries somewhat, in terms of how it should proceed to maintain productive relationships and ties, France still had a very strong influence on films and the industry overall in Morocco. Further information about France as a partner in Moroccan film production is discussed in a section below, Coproduction, as part of the Support of Moroccan Cinema. Often neglected when talk focuses on “interregional markets” or international markets, is that the market really refers to audiences, people who buy tickets to see the promoted films. Never discussed is how Moroccan filmmakers could hope to garner international audiences when so abysmally separated from their own national audiences. At least in this new era, the debate over “entertainment or popular” cinema and “intellectualist” cinema has more than ever taken into consideration the Moroccan people in ways other than pandering to their supposed perverted tastes, or wrenching them into new ways of looking at films. Moroccan filmmakers and critics slowly begin to take a more considerate approach, to try to learn a bit about Moroccans as audiences, and to try to understand that very unknown yet coveted object.
THE MOROCCAN AUDIENCE While up to the 1980s Moroccan filmmakers were going through a crisis of identity and producing personal and abstract works in equal numbers to more audience-oriented films, the existentialist films repelled the public who did not see themselves in those scenarios.19 Whereas previously filmmakers only complained that exhibitors and distributors kept audiences from Moroccan films, eventually the audience became a subject to take seriously in more concrete ways. Filmmakers began to bear the blame for not being able to
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garner audiences, as here emphasized by Araib in a roundtable discussion about Moroccan cinema: it is not reasonable that the audience that finances cinema remains absent in the mind of the director; this is not bearable in Morocco whose cinema is not like that of India or the United States or France but rather like that of Spain, Portugal, Turkey and Greece. They all have cinema that they understood would become neither an industry nor a trade one day but rather remain a cultural production in which there is the image of the Portuguese or the Spanish that should be preserved, and here the country interferes strongly to support the director to make his film.20
With the shift toward laying blame for lack of audience on the filmmaker, discourse about audiences also changed, as did the types of films being produced. Many filmmakers reoriented to try to make films more resonant with their audience, if not with their own realities. Nouri, one of the more popular filmmakers, sums up the emerging viewpoint: The films of the 80s and the 90s “wave” changed the orientation of Moroccan cinema. There is an awareness that if we want to have the start of a cinema industry in Morocco, we must make films for a wide audience that can be understood by a wide audience. The West has created festivals as a way to derail national cinema industries, to keep national cinemas out of the market and oriented just to festivals.[21] But Moroccan directors can get out of that “trap” and make films that Moroccan audiences like.22
Previously mentioned, numerous features made between 1971 and 1985 were directed toward popular audiences, but were modeled as musicals or melodramas from the Egyptian or Hindi films. In this new era, 1986 onward, films sought to be popular while still anchoring their style in Moroccan specificity rather than copying from other filmmaking models. Thus some simple and accessible films emerged23 with one ambition—to merely reflect Moroccan society, such as Enfance Volée (Nouri), Femmes . . . et Femmes (Women . . . and Women) (Saad Chraibi), Marock (Laila Marrakchi), Ali Zaoua (Nabyl Ayouch), and others. Several Moroccan films gained huge audiences, up to 400,000 spectators, such as Un Amour à Casablanca (Love in Casablanca) (Lagtaâ), and A la Recherche du Mari de ma Femme (Tazi), and more recently Mektoub and Ali Zaoua (Ayouch), Marock (Laila Marrakchi), and Les Bandits (Said Naciri). The formerly oft-cited notion that Moroccans did not want to see Moroccan films was squashed, as Abdelkrim Derkaoui emphasized: “There are people who like their nation and want to see their national productions, and others do not care. We reach those who care. Take into consideration Love in Casablanca; people saw the film two or three times!
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Students went in groups . . . , so no one should say that Moroccan youths do not like Moroccan films.”24 But filmmakers still accused several influential factors for hampering the cinema sector, such as their lack of financial and technical means, that television was not helpful enough, that cinema culture was offering foreign models, that satellite dishes also offered images Moroccans could not match for quality and cost, the absence of constructive criticism and of national training programs for script writers, editors, and workers of all levels, and the ongoing lack of cooperation from the distributors and exhibitors. And it is this latter which is most relevant when discussing audiences. Some filmmakers still believed that audiences were passive receivers of mediated messages and overwhelmed by the influences of style and aesthetics coming from American blockbuster films (and others).25 Fortunately, other filmmakers respected the capacity of individuals, even Moroccans, to appreciate a variety of cultural products, to adapt and understand constraints on Moroccan products: Saad Chraibi: The audience does exist and this is evident. We should not lie to ourselves. There is an audience. If we give it films to which it can relate, the audience will. We should not give the audience only one kind of film, should not limit the audience to one kind of film to which he should respond. We should give a variety, so that even in his response he will have to choose from various kinds of films. Each film can have its own path, but must still attract the audience.26
And fortunately for some Moroccan directors, audiences have responded to new films in a very positive way, which breathed new life and energy into the sector. Now rather than emphasizing the audience as receptor of controlled “development” messages the Nation wanted to use to cement national and cultural identity among Moroccans, the audience could “be” Moroccan and be served with films that entertained while reflecting elements of Moroccan culture and specificity. However, as indicated by Chraibi above, there is not a single, unified Moroccan audience. While some films completely resonated with youths and their problems in culture and society, those same films would totally alienate other sectors of the population. Thus Chraibi’s call for multiple types of films to serve multiple audiences is brought into relief. The problem for Moroccan cinema then becomes more oriented to who is allowed, encouraged and funded to make films in this new era. While some established directors continued to produce, particularly at the end of the 1990s and in the new millennium filmmakers from abroad were funded inordinately compared to the “old-timers” due to the belief that the newcomers would breathe new life into the cinema sector (discussed further below).
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THE CENTRE CINÉMATOGRAPHIQUE MAROCAIN It is useful to return to the recommendations made by the Comité du Suivi des Recommandations du 1ér Colloque sur le Cinéma and the CCM opening this chapter. While recommendations one and four could not actually be implemented, recommendations two, three, and five were more concretely applicable. Below are illuminated several measures that did attempt to improve the quality of Moroccan cinema, and to address issues and representations more resonant with Moroccan audiences, and to increase audience identification with the films made. However, it has not been measured whether national cultural identity improved in Morocco through cinema, or whether films became the “best means to disseminate a mass culture.” Most certainly cinema was not made the means of salvation for unemployment or economic improvement. The constant conflicts between ideals and reality in the cinema sector will be emphasized. Although much former criticism was lobbed only at the CCM as being responsible for the sad state of affairs of Moroccan cinema, during this era blame was shifted even further toward filmmakers—who were criticized for lack of creativity, lack of ambition, and lack of talent.27 Souheil Ben Barka, appointed by King Hassan to head the CCM in 1986, had this to say about Moroccan filmmakers and the situation of filmmaking by 1988: The CCM does not prohibit anyone from making films, we just give limited funds. But we will aid filmmakers in numerous ways if they obtain funding from elsewhere, in terms of equipment, transportation, laboratory and other ways of aid. The main problem of Moroccan cinema is creativity—that Moroccan filmmakers do not know how to make quality films, except for three individuals, including myself. The scripts are weak. Since there are only three good directors in Morocco, there need only be 2–3 good producers and distributors, which there are. If the other filmmakers do not get what they claim to need, then it is because their films are weak, not because there is a systemic problem. Filmmakers wait for the state to do everything, to give them money, to make it possible for them to make films rather than for them to go out and make cinema on their own. Some people got to make films who are not true filmmakers because they could get some money from the state. They just want to be talked about, to see their names in the news! On the other hand, it is true that films can never make back their investment in Morocco because there are not enough theaters, so filmmaking will always end up being subsidized by the state.28
Ben Barka was one of the most vocal critics of Moroccan filmmakers throughout the early decade of this era, though with his replacement by Nourredine Sail discourse became more positive and supportive of filmmakers. Ben Barka’s acerbic criticisms of other filmmakers did not exempt him nor the
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CCM from criticism in turn. When Ben Barka was first appointed to direct the CCM, Moroccan filmmakers were sure that many changes would be effected because as a filmmaker Ben Barka would recognize all the problems oft cited, but at the time Ben Barka was working on his superproduction The Battle of Three Kings and turned direction of the CCM over to the secretary general, Abdellah R’mili, for several years.29 Ben Barka thus demonstrated at the outset that his own career goals were more important than those of other Moroccan filmmakers, who he disrespected anyway. Ben Barka could and did make vocal denigrations of Moroccan filmmakers numerous times, without reprisal. Yet when the tables were turned, and a vocal filmmaker such as Nabyl Lahlou lodged public complaints against the CCM and specific officials, retaliation was swift and not subtle.30 For example, Lahlou publicly criticized Ben Barka for advertising The Battle of Three Kings in Variety, because Ben Barka pretended to advertise other Moroccan films made during 1986–1989 but really only misrepresented the situation to make himself, the CCM and Morocco look better. Lahlou also criticized Ben Barka’s ads for the film because they did not emphasize the nationality of King Abdelmalek, that he came from Morocco, what he was fighting for, only that there were exotic locations, and harems—the worst way to advertise Morocco! For Lahlou the worst fault was that of the film’s $50 million budget (the equivalent of 40 billion centimes), Morocco’s 20 percent participation equaled 8 billion centimes (no records substantiate this sum, however)—which would have allowed, Lahlou claimed, more than 20 Moroccan filmmakers to make films, or even for the CCM to renovate its equipment and train its personnel and even train some specialists. So how could Ben Barka merit such sums, especially when his film was not very popular with Moroccan audiences? Soon thereafter Lahlou claimed that aid to his latest film was curtailed. Lahlou also intensely criticized the CCM and the Production Fund Committee for being corrupt, hampering Moroccan filmmakers, and for illegally denying him the final portion of his aid for the film Lailat al Qatl (Night of the Crime).31 Yet the CCM did and does “hold all the cards” one might say, for Moroccan filmmakers. Within the country, the CCM controlled all the means of production, all the infrastructure, all the permits, and the licenses. Therefore, even if a filmmaker could get financing from abroad, 100 percent, she/he could still be blocked by the CCM if a permit was not issued to film. However, the CCM was not necessarily as vindictive and dark as Lahlou painted it to be, and instituted several changes in an attempt to render the domain of film production more professional in Morocco. Some complaints indicated, however, that the CCM only made the sector more bureaucratic and discriminatory rather than actually professional.
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New rules established by the CCM required that a film director, in order to receive a professional card, had to have a diploma of professional training and three short films which she/he had directed, or nine short films for which she/he had been assistant director. As a result, becoming a director began to resemble achieving a “grade” in a bureaucracy, meant that many years would pass because of the few numbers of films being produced, and meant that no feature films in four years were made by a first-time filmmaker.32 But the new ruling also meant that completely inexperienced filmmakers would not be awarded large sums to produce their first films as features. Because of new regulations, the industry was considered more stable, but also more elitist. An unknown, without a diploma and established connections in Morocco in the cinema industry, would never be able to make a film in Morocco even if she/he had the script and the money. Furthermore, a gulf was created between individuals who worked for television and those who worked in cinema, when previously the boundary between the two fields had been very permeable. A director for television was not given a professional card and was therefore not eligible to present a project to the CCM.33 The new regulation also favored youths who studied film abroad, while there were no institutes within Morocco to train local newcomers (until the early 2000s, and results of this intervention are not yet available), who were then forced to try to get funding for short films or work as assistant directors on nine films—quite a large number given the statistics concerning short and feature productions. While laws and regulations of the CCM did stipulate some levels of accomplishment required of individuals who wanted to direct films and apply for the production fund, no regulations were instituted for technicians either that worked for the CCM or worked in the field.34 The only recommendation for improving technicians and training in the country was somehow inexplicably boiled down into a recommendation to create a cinémathèque, which was allotted a 3 million dirham budget (see below).35 Besides the cinémathèque, Ben Barka did have great plans for renovating the CCM and the cinema sector when he began directing the CCM in the late 1980s. He was quick to close fraudulent Moroccan production companies that were preying on foreign films, and instituted a regulation that production companies would have to be legally registered and meet specific CCM requirements in order to receive the work permit necessary to produce a Moroccan film or work with foreign production companies.36 Furthermore, he wanted the CCM to “fix” prices that impacted film productions in Morocco, such as hotel rentals, car rentals, and so forth. Since Moroccans usually had to make deals for these services anyway, many of Ben Barka’s reforms were primarily beneficial only to foreign production companies shooting in Morocco. Ben Barka lowered taxes for distributors to enable them to import
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better films, and increased the amount of funding for Moroccan films. Ben Barka wanted 1988 to be a turning point in Moroccan cinema, a moment when the CCM would become autonomous, and he would be known for building the largest studio in the world outside of Hollywood (45,000 square meters, in Marrakesh), that by the projected date of 1993 would draw many international productions to the country.37 Unfortunately, by 2006 there was no evidence of such a studio though other Moroccans and foreign investors did create studios in Ouarzazate—outside of the CCM purview. Ben Barka decided against any restrictions on distribution or exhibition, no application of quotas for Moroccan films, but that the CCM would have its own theaters in addition to the cinémathèque, such as 7éme Art in Rabat, which could buy Moroccan films.38 By 1996 no additional CCM-owned theaters had been built. Furthermore, because video clubs and video players were having such an effect on cinema practices in Morocco, Ben Barka had the CCM immediately crack down on video clubs that sold and rented pirated tapes. He preferred that the CCM focus on increasing the number of film theaters—to double the number of theaters in five years—so that Moroccan films could ostensibly make their money back from Moroccan audiences.39 Yet this issue of how Moroccan films would generate incomes was and is still very obscure. Ben Barka himself claimed that even the best-selling Moroccan films could only make about 30 percent of their budget back in Morocco, yet he continued to emphasize theater building and enhancement over film funding. Of course, he does own several theater complexes and has vested interest in this particular segment of the sector. While he maintained that films could earn no real income, he still promoted the concept that state financing of films should be replaced by financing from the private sector.40 If the director of the CCM had such contradictory perceptions about how the industry should or could work in the country, no wonder solutions were so very difficult to implement. The CCM, in 1994, received a state budget allocation of 19 million dirhams (while the RTM received 185 million) which would be supplemented by a percentage of taxes collected on tickets sold in theaters.41 In 1995 the CCM laboratory and auditorium were somewhat renovated. The archive center of the CCM recuperated the old copies of Moroccan newsreels from the first years of independence, and furnished those documents for editors working on films requisitioned by the Minister of Communication. The archive center also contributed to cultural programs by lending films, and permitted national and foreign researchers access to view films as needed. The CCM also continued to produce in-house films, and in 1995 generated twelve newsreels in Arabic and French, two newsmagazines, a short documentary on the United Nations, two feature-length films, and three other short documentaries. Whereas the CCM had twenty-eight employees in 1964 and produced about
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thirty short films per year, by 1992 there were more than 200 employees and many fewer films produced.42 The CCM was very active in cosponsoring or organizing other public events, however, such as several German film series at the Goethe Institut in Rabat and Casablanca, and a traveling exhibit of films to celebrate the “centenary of cinema.”43 In fact, the CCM did sponsor and fund the five short films which comprised the program of the “centenary,” called Five Films for 100 Years (developed later). While most caravan activities had been canceled by this time, the CCM sent two caravans to twelve areas to show a specific program to celebrate the centenary.44 The CCM’s mandate indicated it was supposed to advertise and promote Moroccan cinema, and the centenary was one such effort,45 as was the cinémathèque. Notable during the latter part of this era was a major change to the Fonds d’Aide, the appointment of Nourredine Sail as director general of the CCM, the takeover of CCM oversight by the Ministry of Communication, and the “return” to their Moroccan roots by a number of filmmakers with Moroccan heritage abroad, along with new festivals and cinematic activities throughout the country.
LE CINÉMATHÈQUE MAROCAIN The Cinémathèque Marocaine was inaugurated July 17, 1995 by the Minister of Communication, and opened to the public on November 3, 1995.46 Its mission was to conserve the national patrimony, to acquire films of world cinematic heritage, to program public projections of cultural interest, to preserve visual and sound documents, written documents, posters, photographs, etc., relative to the films which the cinémathèque had decided to acquire, and to undertake cooperative relations with foreign cinémathèques. Plans included a library of books on cinema to promote research, several video screening rooms for research and projection purposes, an archive of the print materials referenced above, along with the storage facilities for acquired films. Subsequent to its opening, the cinémathèque programmed three public projections per week of Moroccan and international films.47 Unfortunately, attendance was meager or nonexistent because the theater was a bit inaccessible to anyone without a car, the screenings were at an hour when buses stopped running before the screenings were over, and the projections were badly publicized.48 Much promotion was neglected because the CCM had always had a limited budget and staff compared to all the duties it was mandated to fill. But the main duty of importance at this time was the CCM’s administration of the support funds.
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CINEMATIC SUPPORT FUNDS Much as was the case in the era of 1971–1985; this era required that Moroccan filmmakers find alternatives or support mechanisms rather than to entirely depend upon the support fund to make films. Therefore discussion of the support funds begins with brief information about alternative supports. While cooperative filmmaking had been tried previously, in this era, as indicated below, results were more productive. But a totally new option was discussed after 1985, and that was coproduction of Moroccan films with either European partners or other North African, Middle Eastern, or African partners.
COPRODUCTION In the 1995 8éme Rencontres du Cinéma Méditerranéen mentioned previously, a colloquium on “La Co-production Cinématographique FrancoMaghrébine” was organized so that attendees could discuss the issue of coproduction and cofinancing with France as an option for filmmakers from developing countries. Some filmmakers insisted on the importance and validity of coproduction monies from France, given the limited sources of production funds available to filmmakers from developing countries.49 Other filmmakers, however, insisted that France was only helping itself rather than African filmmakers because the aid was insufficient and usually supported French facilities and personnel and came with many stipulations attached.50 A third group believed that coproductions with France were of a dual nature, but called attention to the absence of an inter-Maghreb or inter-African cooperation which could challenge reliance upon France or even mitigate such reliance. French representatives at the colloquium assured that there was no neocolonialist character to the cinema politics of France, and that France simply wanted to aid Southern countries.51 However, no one could overlook the reality that most agreements with France and other developed countries were organized to primarily benefit the host country rather than the receiving country. Many international coproduction agreements with Europe required Moroccan filmmakers to use foreign personnel (cameraman, sound engineer, director of photography, etc.) and do postproduction in the foreign country.52 While this requirement might be good in the short term for providing better quality films,53 in the long term it would make Moroccans reliant on outsiders rather than gaining experience and expertise themselves to make their own quality products.54 Furthermore, a dependence upon the trained personnel and infrastructure of France and other European countries would do nothing to bolster the conditions of North
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African, Arab, or African infrastructures. Cheikh Doukouré, from Guinea, continually complained of the lack of interrelationships between North Africa and the rest of the continent, and emphasized that South-South cooperation was necessary to overcome dependency on the North, the former colonizers. Rather than a Tunisian, a Moroccan and a Guinean competing for the same small piece of funding directed toward the south, alternatives should be created. There seemed to be more competition among the nations of Africa rather than cooperation, which was very frustrating to those such as Cheikh Doukouré who believed they had much to offer their colleagues, if allowed, that would improve the quality of films. Furthermore, most films made as coproductions with European countries were rarely distributed afterwards, whereas South-South cooperation would supposedly open vast markets throughout Africa for North African films.55 Yet Moroccan directors and the State, who during this era became the primary targets of criticisms for their activities, films, and attitudes, were unwilling to pursue South-South opportunities. Filmmakers, in spite of their complaints, were very defensive about the quality of their films in comparison to films from neighboring African countries.56 For decades Moroccan filmmakers had blamed the quality of their films on lack of funding, but as films were more well funded, such as Yarit and Enfance Volée (2 million dirhams each film), most films still could not compare in quality with cinema from Algeria, Tunisia, or lesser developed African countries, such as films by Souleyman Cisse.57 Critics began to lay blame not on lack of funding, but on the creativity of the filmmaker.58
COOPERATIVE PRODUCTION However, other avenues were tried in addition to coproduction or collaborations with outsiders, such as cooperative filmmaking among Moroccans, and seeking funding from television and cable both nationally and internationally. Cooperative filmmaking was of course tried even in the earliest years of feature production in Morocco, but new to the late 1980s and 1990s was success in the endeavor. In 1988 Mustapha Derkaoui promoted collectivism as a means to overcome two problems: financing, but also finding available technical personnel and enough personnel to do all necessary tasks professionally, even promotion and marketing.59 The various filmmakers would pool their resources to produce each film (all receipts would be reinvested in the collectivity), and would also agree to work on each others’ films. The collectivity produced five features: First Story (M. Derkaoui), The Hammer and the Anvil (Noury), Love in Casablanca (Lagtaâ), The Wedding
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of the Others (Benjelloun), and Chronicle of an Ordinary Life (Saad Chraibi). Every film but The Wedding of the Others received monetary support from the production fund, but as Chraibi indicates, none of the films could have been made successfully, they believe, without the cooperation of the group and shared resources. Commenting upon his own film: This film could not have been made without this new structure which supports national production. The committee read the scenario in the end of 1988 and at the beginning of 1989 it gave a grant, of 500,000 dirhams. Everybody knows that this is not enough money, not enough to make a film or even 2 or 3 scenes. This amount of money made us try to decrease expenses in our techniques, buying raw film. . . . After this came the people who are the manpower of the group (which is composed of many members), and I think everybody knows them. The technical group is the one that made the 5 films [above], the Groupement Marocain du Production Cinématographique which was formed in Casablanca in 1988. Without the help of this group this film could never have been made.60
Especially interesting about this cooperative is that the members were all known to have quite divergent aesthetics. Derkaoui was very abstract and experimental in his work, while Noury and Benjelloun were known for being more oriented toward melodrama. Lagtaâ’s film, Love in Casablanca, became a sensation in Morocco very quickly, attracting huge Moroccan audiences, because it dealt with topics that were of interest to the majority of filmgoers and topics very timely to Moroccan society, treated in a melodramatic manner. The most important aspect of this cooperative venture was that it proved Moroccans could indeed cooperate and break away from conceiving of filmmaking as an insular and personal endeavor in which no one could help, much less intervene. These five filmmakers, especially because of their diversity in styles, subjects, and approaches, set a challenge to other Moroccan filmmakers to find alternative support mechanisms to permit filmmaking in spite of CCM clamp-downs and other obstacles. The next several subsections emphasize how much the CCM had indeed clamped down on filmmaker funding in this era, and thus changed the production climate a great deal.
PARTICULARS OF THE SUPPORT FUNDS In the previous era (1971–1985) aid to the cinema sector was called the Fonds de Soutien, which was in place from 1980 to 1988, and allowed awards to renovate and build theaters as well as a production award to be made to any individual who applied.61 As a result of criticisms, a new system was created,
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known as the Fonds d’Aide which was supported by a new parafiscal tax (10% on ticket sales).62 The reform affected theater building and renovation only slightly, having more influence on the production sector. The reform required filmmakers to have professional cards in order to apply for funds, and to have a legal production company through which funds would be dispersed. Further, automatic awards were canceled and a system established to award funds based on selection of scripts or finished films. In 1987 the aid available was about 1 million dirhams.63 In 1988 the CCM tripled the cinema support fund, and altered its rules.64 In 1994 the Ministers of State, Interior, and Information announced that the government would grant 5 million dirhams yearly to the Fonds d’Aide only for production (in addition to funds generated by taxation).65 The supplement was becoming necessary after 1993 because the production fund consistently lost money each year. Since renovated theaters did not pay taxes, many owners decided to renovate. Thus, the production fund diminished eventually by 30 percent because less money was paid into it.66 The treasury of the support funds was still equally divided between production and theater renovation—46.5 percent for production, 46.5 percent for exhibition (the remaining 7% was reserved to cover the management expenses of the support committee and to finance the national festival or an international festival).67 However, while the division of funds remained as previously, some major changes were effected to the committee in charge of the funds. The new Support Committee would be composed of a representative from eight sectors: producers, directors, distributors, exhibitors, technicians, cinema clubs, the artistic and cultural field, and the field of criticism or journalism. Unlike the previous committee, no ministries were included, although the Ministry of Finance was allowed to observe.68 An effort had been made in this new committee formation to render the award of funds based on personnel directly involved in the domain, rather than imposing ministerial and organizational views. Immediately as the committee was formed, however, representatives raised the issues of what criteria would be used to judge which script or film would receive funds, what would comprise “quality” or “merit” in a film, and how would amounts be determined? Leaving itself open to perpetual criticism from all sides, the committee never formalized any criteria, or set any clear standards, and simply avoided the issue altogether. Instead, the committee reported that “quality would reflect itself in a work.” Projects were now to be judged based on scripts or completed films sent to and evaluated by the aid committee at twice yearly meetings; the committee would assign larger amounts, but to three to four films only (out of an average of ten to fifteen submissions) based on their assessed merits, though this
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number would increase later into the 2000s. Each production company could present two films per year for aid.69 The new fund required the film to be professional and either 35-mm or 16-mm format.70 By January 1988, awards varied between 500,000 dirhams and 2.4 million dirhams.71 Films not selected from script form could still get aid after completion if the committee felt them to be examples of “quality” work. The amount awarded to a film (no more than 2/3 its budget) still deliberately left part of the film’s budget uncovered, so producers were forced to find private backing via television, a bank, a coproduction, or other sponsor. One of the most vocal critics against funding only a portion of a film’s budget came from the head of the Chamber of Film Producers, who also served as president of the production fund committee for more than six years. Mohamed Lotfi maintained that the aid should cover the entire budget because “It is the state’s duty to aid cinema, for artistic, social, technical, and propaganda reasons. . . . Film is the ambassador of a country.”72 Furthermore, even an excellent film would not be able to make more than 20 percent of its cost from exhibition or other sales, so other sources of financing could not be repaid. Production assistance was again divided into percentages.73 Of the entire fund, 75 percent would be allotted after review of scripts (65% for features, and 10% for shorts), while 25 percent would be reserved for previously unawarded films submitted after production (15% for features and 10% for shorts).74 Since the production company took all risks when a film was not submitted or accepted for a production fund award until after production, most filmmakers at least tried to get an award based on their script. The money awarded to the production company would itself be dispersed in percentages.75 Aid could be terminated by the commission and the CCM if the work had been stopped without valid justification, if the work was finished but was not considered to be the work presented to get aid, if false declarations had been made, or if the film was very badly delayed.76 In several instances filmmakers were denied their final awards. Lahlou was cut from his final 25 percent because he could or did not provide sufficient justification of his expenditures. Derkaoui was cut because his film was not deemed of sufficient quality. Some filmmakers took umbrage that the fund was more oriented to funding features than short films, arguing that new filmmakers were hampered from progressing in the field. A beginner had to make three short films before being eligible to apply for funds to make a feature.77 However, the stronger argument was that filmmakers needed to train on short films in order to be able to make features of higher quality. Furthermore, more funds had to be allocated to the production of features because they cost more, but also because a greater number of individuals already had professional status as directors who should not be further hampered from gaining funds to make films.78
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Over the decades of the 1990s to 2006, the Moroccan Ministry of Communication increased its support for the motion picture industry from 30 million dirhams to 100 million dirhams by 2001. In 2004, a new change to the support funds was again made: films would be funded with an advance on receipts from distribution and sales, before or after production of a film; there would be funding for scriptwriting and rewriting. Further, popular films in theaters would permit producers to recuperate their investments, and encourage production outside the fonds d’aide. In 2006, Marock, by Leïla Marrakchi, beat attendance records by selling 130,000 tickets in only two months after its release; while some films received 400,000 to 500,000 spectators, no American film surpassed 100,000.
COMPLAINTS AGAINST THE NEW FUNDING Not surprisingly, there were immediate complaints lodged against the new system of funding, much as there had been complaints against the previous system. Of immediate concern was the built-in diminishment of funds that would be available for production as more theaters renovated. Somehow the issue could never be resolved of whether additional theaters in Morocco would provide the solution to the crisis that filmmakers faced, although it would of course help distributors and exhibitors. But in spite of the funding going toward theater renovations, Morocco, like her North African neighbors, faces a continued diminishment in the number of theaters. A second criticism concerned the possibility of fairly judging a worthwhile project by its script alone, given the much greater sums being awarded to individual projects.79 An ongoing debate existed over whether quantity or quality should be the goal for supporting Moroccan films.80 Should the production fund select only a few films to which it awarded large sums, or numerous films which would receive small grants? Furthermore, limiting the grants to selected films meant that filmmakers would be required to compete with each other rather than cooperate. The committee was criticized for awarding funds to “friends” and people who would be known, discriminating against lesser-known filmmakers or perhaps less popular individuals.81 The contradictory position opined that the committee did not award friends, but those filmmakers who most often submitted scripts, who had the best reputations, were the most well known, and who had good scenarios. Of course those individuals would be more known and worked with than some others.82 However, in the end, the films awarded funds were not necessarily any more oriented to the Moroccan audience
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than previously, nor of appreciably better quality. Therefore, questions were raised as to the efficacy of the changes in the system of awards. Why should a filmmaker be given production funds time and again if the films were not of sufficient merit either in their ability to attract audiences or in their quality even as festival productions? Furthermore, should not individuals who made good films be forced out of the enclosure of the production fund to seek finances elsewhere?83 Criticisms targeted the committee as well as the system. Mohamed Lotfi was criticized for holding the position of president of the committee for six years when maximum terms were set at two years. Some committee members were coming back for second terms when other individuals in the field were not being given the opportunity to serve once, which defied the goal of making the committee more responsive to the sector and the public by encompassing multiple points of view.84 Finally, individuals who would benefit from the aid were being appointed to sit on the committee, against the stated guidelines. Therefore, the committee was losing a necessary air of fairness, authority and competency.
ANTICIPATED CHANGES TO THE FUND Few changes seemed to be anticipated to the Fonds d’Aide by 2006, in spite of numerous complaints. By and large the system was considered sufficient for the time being, except for the increased reliance upon funds from the State. The Chamber of Producers made several recommendations to the Minister of Communication, which were potentially to be implemented to address the problem of funding. New funds would be raised from a tax on publicity, such as a percentage of the costs of television, magazine, newspaper and other similar advertisements. Additional monies would come from an increase in the tax on every Moroccan’s electricity bill; those funds were formerly directed solely to the RTM, but with the increase the funds would be divided: 50 percent for the RTM, 40 percent to the CCM for film production, and 10 percent to aid the cable channel, 2M.85 The fact that the CCM and government turned toward other sectors for funding film production emphasizes a contention that none of the domains of cinema existed separately from each other. Advertisements were made to be important to film production, which would no doubt influence both fields, particularly since many Moroccan filmmakers also used their production companies to produce commercials for Moroccan television and 2M. But, the two arenas still left to themselves were distribution and exhibition.
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EXHIBITION AND DISTRIBUTION Distribution and exhibition have been relatively well elaborated by now. Exhibitors in this era were still taxed heavily by the CCM86 unless they renovated, and were otherwise relatively unregulated, although they continued to be recipients of support funds to build and renovate theaters. The number of theaters, however, continued to decline, particularly in rural areas. Distributors were free to conduct business as they saw fit, with no State requirements to help or support Moroccan filmmakers. Neither exhibitors nor distributors wanted to relieve filmmakers of the burden of producing advertisements for Moroccan films, which remained one of the major points of disagreements between the sectors.87 Only a few developments between 1986 and 2006 distinguished those sectors from their previous characterizations. Distribution Distribution, like exhibition, did not change drastically in this era, but small modifications and concessions were noted, which will be discussed in the section on “new trends” that follows. One distributor presented a good overall perspective on the problem that distributors face, from the distributor’s point of view:88 Belkadi: In the domain of films, the [distribution] rights are on one hand and the film and advertisement are on the other. A copy in 1956 cost 200 thousand francs, now it is 1 and a half million francs. The distributor of course brings 2 copies—it is not possible to bring more than 2 copies. In the past a copy could be shown for 70 or 80 times because the [projectors] were preserved and they were kept in good technical working order and technicians came from time to time to repair them; now there is no control. You can have a new copy, show it once, and it becomes terrible afterwards. How can a distributor bring 10 copies just because the copies are so quickly ruined? It is impossible. The film should be shown all over Morocco, and the distributor prefers to give priority to big cinema theaters, then the popular districts of big cities, then after a year or a year and a half comes the turn of small cities. Of course each time you send a copy to a theater, the projectionist cuts part of it to join one band with another, and each time he cuts, part of the film is lost. How can I give a copy of a film that costs 1 million and a half francs to a small cinema theater for 500 dirhams in Berrachid and so on? Everything should change. Cinema has declined because of neglect and forgetfulness; the owners neglected their cinema theaters, and cinema has become a trade with no profit.
While exhibitors complained that they bore the burden of taxation, distributors also complained that distributors were only allowed during this period to
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retain a percentage of theatrical sales after taxation, so if one had made a deal for 25–35 percent of sales, that would only pertain to the amount left after taxation, not really a huge sum. Yet they bore the burden of trying to bring films into a country which could no longer really pay for them, but which then complained because only cheap films were imported. However, distributors would try to maximize profits by primarily purchasing cheaper films, such as American films which they could buy for only 30,000 francs or less, from which Moroccan distributors could make good profits. Since French and European films cost more, they were less sought after.89 On the other hand, some films with good reputations just could not be sold to exhibitors who would not believe they could get an audience. Distributors, however, considered themselves suppliers of what was in demand, and that they could not bring films which were not demanded. If only a theater here and there was willing to exhibit a film, the film could not earn back its cost. So the distributor had to bring films that theaters would buy and program.90 In that case the distributor was as much a victim of the exhibitor as the Moroccan filmmaker and audience would be, except for those instances in which the distributor owned several exhibition venues also. On the other hand, the distribution sector had its own internal squabbles. Small distributors were being pressured out of business by the larger firms and those with their own theaters. The larger companies had become practically omnipresent, and dictated to the smaller ones what they could or could not do; they kept the small players out of the market. Because the larger companies could afford more expensive films, the smaller were stuck with the action or Indian films which cost less, but made less too, particularly when the theaters the smaller distributors could serve would be primarily those in rural and distant areas. Further, the public was becoming more cultivated and exposed to better films and thus less willing to settle for the super-low-budget films which the small companies could bring.91 But in the eyes of Moroccan filmmakers, who had constantly been required to pinch and save to make films, distributors who wanted to buy a Moroccan film for the same cost as a foreign film were perceived to be insulting. A distributor paying a Moroccan 30–40,000 dirhams for a film, including posters, would not even be covering the cost of a print of the film.92 For example, the sum would be about the equivalent of $3,000–$4,000 for a film and its publicity, whereas the film copy would cost the filmmaker at least $3,000 alone. Tazi claimed that Moroccan distributors had offered him such a low price that he could sell his film to Algerian television for triple the amount, and it was common knowledge that television could never pay much for the rights to a film.93 Furthermore, distributors always required the filmmaker to provide the ever-contested advertising even though the filmmaker would never make
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any money from the exhibition—being limited to what was left after the taxes, the exhibitor, the distributor and the costs of the film copy, promotion, translation, subtitles, and any other requirements.94 Some filmmakers, such as Derkaoui, long ago decided not to avidly pursue distribution because for the same cost of making posters, advertisements, and announcements he could work on an additional film, and the money to be gained from distribution was never enough to offset his expenses providing the film and materials. Thus he just focused on making a new film.95 Yet distributors also had negative attitudes about Moroccan films compared to films from elsewhere. One distributor from the 1995 Tangier national film festival indicated that it was a festival of trivial films, that none were worthy of distribution. Given this attitude, and the following of the exhibitors in this belief, it is not surprising that few Moroccan films got even local distribution. However, some changes were occurring in the sector. One of those was that one distributor had taken up the cause of Moroccan filmmakers and had begun to make more efforts in their direction. This new trend is explored after the following subsection on the exhibition sector. Exhibition Although theaters had been receiving support funds for years to renovate, only a few took real advantage and improved the overall quality of facilities. Since with new legislation the new or renovated theater was exempted from paying taxes (for ten years and five years respectively), the only theaters paying taxes remained the run-down ones which usually had cheaper ticket prices since they tended to serve youth audiences. Further, the renovated theater was supposed to draw crowds back to the cinemas, which they did, but since they no longer paid taxes, the larger ticket sales and increased income did not go back into the cinema infrastructure at all. However, the increased attendance at renovated theaters justified the claim that renovation was the appropriate avenue to pursue to boost cinema in Morocco—just not Moroccan cinema—and only in highly urbanized areas.96 For example, the Lynx in downtown Casablanca and Cinéma Renaissance in downtown Rabat were both remodeled and attracted between 15,000 and 20,000 spectators per week while nonrenovated theaters owned by the same company only gained between 8,000 and 10,000 attendees each per week. The general consensus was that perhaps only five to ten theaters in Morocco could show a film reasonably professionally in a good environment.97 Otherwise, throughout the country the deplorable state of the cinema theaters continued to turn all but male youths from attending the cinema.98 Again, theater numbers overall were declining; out of 205 urban centers, only 85 had theaters.99 Attendance
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overall also fell, from 33 percent to 16 percent.100 But other practices harmed attendance figures besides the quality of theaters. One problem had to do with advertising film screenings. Often exhibitors announced films that they never showed, or announced films but postponed the screening indefinitely; when they finally would decide to program the film, they would not announce it to the public. Sometimes a film would be programmed at the last minute and only advertised to passersby of the cinema.101 Another problem had to do with the times at which films were scheduled. Most theaters did not attract spectators in the evenings, unless they were crowds of kids for very low budget films. There were afternoon screenings around 3 p.m. and early evening screenings at 6:30 or 7, but not later unless the theater was 7éme Art or Dawliz with a very good reputation. While early evening hours would seem appropriate, those were particularly dinner hours for families. Therefore cinema attendance was declining because they were not accessible to families, only to youths.102 Furthermore, the continued lack of climate control harmed theaters because it was too cold to attend in winter and too hot in summer. In fact, in summer attendance would drop by 50 to 60 percent, to the point that many theaters just closed in August. Overall, however, the concurrence of other means of entertainment has the most effect on the number of theaters, constantly on the decrease in Morocco, due to diminishing audiences. However, one new trend beginning in the late 1990s was the construction in Casablanca of a multiplex cinema, Megarama, which became extremely popular for offering a number of screens, climate-control, a snack-bar (the first theater to offer such in Morocco), and a central location. Megarama has been active in supporting the distribution of Moroccan films, though in limited number of screenings and only those films which would be most popular with their targeted audiences of young adults and families.
NEW TRENDS IN DISTRIBUTING AND EXHIBITING MOROCCAN FILMS While approximately 32 million tickets were sold per year around 1986, no Moroccan film had more than 50,000 entries, according to CCM figures. Exceptions were Al Hal and Amok and only a few others until Un Amour à Casablanca and A La Recherche du Mari de ma Femme, which is very little considering that in Morocco some films gained 800,000 entries during this time.103 One reason was that a Moroccan film was usually only exhibited in one or two theaters nationally.104 For example, Tazi’s Badis came out in Casablanca for two weeks, then for three weeks at 7éme Art in Rabat, and did not even make 6,000 entries.105
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Out of the forty-five distribution companies in Morocco in 1992, two distributors could be specifically named for actively supporting Moroccan filmmakers.106 The distributor Najib Benkirane began by distributing Love in Casablanca,107 and then moved from there to take on other films such as A La Recherche du Mari de ma Femme, and Enfance Volée.108 In addition he would also distribute Maghrebi films, especially Tunisian films that found a large audience in Morocco and Egyptian films of quality like Youssef Chahine’s L’Emigré, and others. Producer Sarim Fassi-Fihri also made sure a number of Moroccan films were programmed in the nation’s cinemas, and was very active in promoting Moroccan cinema wherever possible. There were improvements but a problem still existed. Because Moroccan filmmakers made only one or two “bankable” films per year, the distributor could not make much of a living from supporting so few products so selectively. But Benkirane said: “As a Moroccan citizen I should be proud of Moroccan cinema and try to contribute in improving Moroccan cinema. In fact, there are profits and incomes for my distribution company and what makes me happy is that the profits are more than some big American films in Morocco. . . . All the Moroccan films had good receptions and good incomes.”109 One problem Benkirane faced was that by taking on the cost of making posters and ads himself, rather than expecting the filmmaker to do it, he spent more money and had to charge higher prices for the films, and thus exhibitors had to charge higher ticket prices (with CCM permission of course). But the higher prices inconvenienced poorer Moroccans. However, for Tazi’s A La Recherche du Mari de ma Femme, four copies were distributed to five theaters in Casablanca (someone had to bicycle parts of it between theaters), and even with higher ticket costs there were at first 400 spectators during the week and 800 on weekends, particularly families.110 While Tazi was happy to earn much more from distributing this film than he did with a previous film (Ibn Sabeel after two years earned Tazi only 20,000 dirhams, which did not cover the cost of the print), he claimed that there were areas still needing work. For example, Benkirane did not consult Tazi in the design of the publicity for A La Recherche du Mari de ma Femme and produced a poster which featured Mouna Fettou as the largest element advertised, when many considered her role to be minor.111 Tazi raised the ancillary concern to distribution, which was piracy. His film had sold many pirate copies particularly in Casablanca, thus Tazi had filed a lawsuit against some video clubs and filed a complaint with the CCM which was supposed to be monitoring and prohibiting piracy. In the new millennium, particularly after Nabyl Ayouch showed that youth filmmakers could reach both youth and adult/family audiences, a number of Moroccan films have been distributed that broke box office records again.
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Laila Marrakchi’s Marock, for example, had more than 130,000 entries in approximately two weeks on screens (earning 345,000 Euros), while Symphonie Marocain by newcomer Kamal Kamal had 96,000 spectators (earning 180,000 Euros), and Les Ailes Brisees by Majid R’chich earned 118,000 Euros. These figures are impressive given there are only 85–115 screens within Morocco, and cinema attendance usually figures around 2.5 million. However, it still remains an ongoing concern that though production numbers have increased with the new support fund, few films actually find distribution in theaters in Morocco or abroad: in 2000, for example, 10–12 features were produced annually while only 3–4 found distribution in the nation’s theaters. In addition, whereas television was for a while an alternate distribution vehicle for Moroccan films, their acquisitions took a different turn in the new millennium.
EXHIBITION AND DISTRIBUTION OUTSIDE OF MOROCCO However, even though Moroccan films were beginning so very slowly to find distribution, and also audiences, in Morocco, distribution only within the national borders drastically curtailed the earning potential of the film. Real profits could only be made if a Moroccan film were to find distribution abroad, much as was the motivation behind creating distribution agreements with other North African and African countries, or with Europe. Usually a coproduction agreement with France or Spain or other countries in Europe would automatically allow a film’s distribution abroad, in the coproducing country at least. But any films made by Moroccans that were not coproductions had a difficult time gaining entry into other markets. Even though a Moroccan distributor took up the task of managing Moroccan films within Morocco, none had agreed to handle films abroad. Therefore this was yet another task levied upon the burdened filmmaker, to make distribution arrangements with overseas distributors in various markets.112 But new technologies were beginning to impact upon distribution and profit making for Moroccan films in this era. No longer did filmmakers look only to theatrical exhibition but had to take into account sales to national television at least, if not also sales to international television and satellite broadcasters. But filmmakers also had to deal with the loss of profits due to piracy made possible by video copying of films, and that television releases were prime sources of such piracy. Furthermore, Moroccan filmmakers had to contend with the proliferation of films and programs available through video, satellite and television which drowned out the meager number of Moroccan films looking to find audiences.113
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PIVOTAL INSTITUTIONS Many influential new developments in ancillary realms impacted cinema in Morocco. Censorship was a powerful force in numerous ways while cinema clubs burgeoned and produced criticism and critics who strongly shaped public perceptions of Moroccan film. Because relatively few “new” developments occurred in many arenas during the era 1986–2006, some of the following sections are quite concise. One new category has been added, due to the emergence in the 2000s of cinema training facilities within the country, which had been clamored for since the 1960s but finally saw fruition due to financing from outside of Morocco, while some initiatives were 100 percent Moroccan. Censorship Censorship had an influence on the cinema sector during this era in quite a different manner than in previous decades. Once cinema caravans ceased serving remote regions of the country, abandoning those populations to satellite and television emissions, a form of censorship was applied to those communities. They were not deemed worthwhile targets for Moroccan cinema, except in the very select case of the centenary of films, which still did not travel to every region. And these regions would not be served by cinema clubs, most likely. Censorship in this instance took the form of simple neglect of entire communities, refusing service to them, while in other instances it took the form of active efforts to prohibit speech, activity, or other communication. While events between 1986 and 2006 were not as taut as those in the 1970s, censorship at many levels still occurred. Article XIX (Centre International Contre la Censure) and OMDH (Organization Marocaine des Droits de L’Homme) denounced the lack of press and audiovisual freedom in Morocco.114 They considered it problematic that all public audiovisual transmissions were supervised and authorized by the palace or Minister of Information, that there was no private ownership of media or plurality of voices (the royal family had interests even in 2M). They further complained that journalists were not free to express information and opinions and to travel within and without Morocco freely—only a select few with highly censored reports were allowed to travel. They also called for measures to be taken to protect newspapers, journalists and citizens—in terms of demanding that closures, arrests and censure be legally and institutionally authorized rather than secret. While these denunciations and calls for reform may seem somewhat general, events of the period continued to lend credence to the need for such
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enunciations and present hard evidence of why filmmakers would continually self-censure in such a climate. In 1992, a leading member of the Association Marocaine des Droits de l’Homme (AMDH), Ahmed Belaichi, was sentenced to three years’ imprisonment for making derogatory remarks about the armed forces.115 In that same year, Noubir Amaoui, the Secretary General of the pro-USFP (Socialist Union of Popular Forces) Confédération Démocratique du Travail (and also a senior member of the USFP) was sentenced to two years’ imprisonment after having been convicted of making “insulting and defamatory” remarks about the Moroccan government. Several Moroccan newspapers were proscribed in the aftermath of the conviction. One latter example was the attack and intimidation of a popular Moroccan comedian who attempted to perform at a sit-in at the Union of Moroccan Workers in Rabat in the summer of 1996. Ahmed Snoussi (Bziz) was physically attacked by police outside the sit-in, was intimidated by letter, his performances were closed by police, and his telephone tapped. Other forms of criticism, cynicism, or satire have been virtually eliminated, according to a report published by the Committee of Vigilance (a watchdog committee) formed to supervise the State’s takeover of cable television station 2M in 1996. After a year, the committee cited more than six major censorship activities, ranging from the cancellation of a popular TV show Face aux Jeunes with Ahmed Benchemssi, the diminishment of live broadcasts, and the unfavorable working conditions of 2M journalists, among others.116 In general, however, government in Morocco was supposed to have lessened the severity of its censorship in order to appear more suitable for membership in the EU. Though there were journalist arrests and press seizures into the 2000s, the cinema sector saw a lessening of censorship which allowed a new liberty to make films on previously taboo subjects, such as Un Amour a Casablanca’s focus on female sexual activity, and a number of films on Morocco’s “years of lead,” Marock’s revelation of Jewish-Muslim relations among the upper classes, Narjiss Nejjar’s look at female prostitution in Les Yeux Secs, and a host of films which touched on women’s subjugation. Cinema Clubs By the mid-1980s the Federation (FNCCM) began publishing a journal Études Cinématographiques/Dirassat Cinimaiya. Between 1985 and 1990 the Federation had produced and distributed thirteen high-quality issues; the publication was funded only by subscription and membership dues until 1988, when the CCM aided the publication with funds.117 Although by 1987 the FNCCM (then fifteen years old)118 had 27 cinema clubs119 with 50,000 members, those members often were not “paying” members, which put a great deal of financial
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strain on the Federation and curtailed many intended projects. A brief survey conducted of club membership revealed that only 4 percent of the individuals belonged to the Fédération Nationale des Ciné-club du Maroc (FNCCM) while 22 percent belonged to a cultural center.120 Many individuals would have paid for membership in a cultural center because of the prestige and ancillary services offered—such as their libraries, social events, and language classes, in addition to their film screenings and film activities. The Federation, on the other hand, offered fewer services and less prestigious options.121 The foreign cultural centers were more than an alternative for cinema club members, they were also a great and necessary resource for the cinema clubs. For example, the French cultural center had a very modern cinema infrastructure, with a catalog and video library as well, and also programmed films for children as well as film weeks, conferences, special projections, and other film events.122 The main benefit of the cultural centers to the cinema clubs, besides the added opportunity to participate in events, was the opportunity to gain access to films which could only be imported by the cultural centers rather than through standard for-profit distributors in Morocco. The cultural centers would also, occasionally, host screenings of Moroccan film, particularly in the latter years when coproductions were more dominant. Because individuals were more able to receive international programming and films from numerous countries through a few culture centers, but numerous satellite dishes and video clubs, the cinema club no longer served as the single source of information and films outside of those programmed in theaters. Therefore, membership in the clubs diminished over time, and cinema became less an important subject to rally around and be committed to in group activity.123 The Federation of Cinema Clubs ceased publishing its journal, and eventually the CCM planned to trim the budget allotted the cinema clubs.124 But during this period the cinema clubs remained the primary source of Moroccan activities concerning cinema, outside of festivals, in spite of the plethora of blockades put up, such as lack of funds, lack of support, reliance upon individual initiatives, etc.125 While cinema club activities in many areas might have lessened, those in the major centers such as Fez, Rabat, Casablanca, Tangier and a few others remained quite strong. The Rabat cinema club was active in promoting Moroccan films.126 In Casablanca the Federation of Cinema Clubs, the local Ciné-club Action, and the French Cultural Center hosted a week of Moroccan cinema in March 1987,127 which included two round tables on the theme “Moroccan Cinema: Truth and Perspectives” in the presence of directors, producers, distributors, and critics. An outgrowth of the cinema club movement in the early 1990s and evidence of the emphasis placed upon the clubs as training Moroccan cinema
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critics, was the formation of the Union des Critiques du Cinéma au Maroc (UCCM). The aim of the organization was to valorize a national cinema of quality and to promote a high quality cinema culture. Their goal was to organize writers and critics in order to propagate a cinema consciousness, to contribute to spreading Moroccan cinema culture within and outside the country, to publish works concerning cinema in general and Moroccan cinema in particular, to publish a specialized review on cinema, to create a center of study and documentation and research on the cinema of Morocco (as well as the Maghreb, Arabs, and Africans), and to organize meetings and festivals at the national level.128 Unfortunately, even the few events that were announced in the press were canceled, and the organization seemed to face extreme difficulty in meeting any of its objectives. In June of 1995 the organization changed its name to the Association Marocaine des Critiques de Cinéma, of which there is little information about the success or not of this incarnation. However, in addition to the influences of new technologies such as satellite dishes and videos, other activities within Morocco would also have contributed to the decline of cinema clubs, such as the continuation of numerous festivals throughout the country. Cinema Caravans By the era of 1986–2006 most, although not all, caravan activity had ceased, revived primarily for the celebration of the centenary of cinema in 1995 as mentioned previously. Only a small quantity of caravan activity persisted even though caravans remained important for the Saharan provinces. In 1995 only 130 films were projected in 60 sessions, including those for the centenary. One factor that must be reiterated, however, is that the rural areas served formerly by caravans, and now ostensibly served by television, radio, and satellite transmissions, still did not receive Moroccan film screenings except those on television. When once asked of Ben Barka why rural communities and Berber speaking populations in particular were not targets for cinema activities, he bluntly explained that the CCM could not afford to target communities which did not have economic power behind them. Since rural populations and some primarily Berber-speaking regions were relatively poor, they would not be served. In the face of this lacuna of services, private individuals took up the project of making feature fiction productions in video format, in Berber dialects—one of the activities which private entrepreneurship did take up when the State and State-funded activities ceased to really include the hinterland populations, or special populations such as Berber speakers.
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Cinema Education and Training Initiatives in Morocco While a select group of Moroccans have entered the cinema domain through being educated in European or American universities or institutes, Moroccan filmmakers and activists had long demanded that the state fund a cinema institute within the country. The State never rose to the occasion, however, and cinema training activities had to be introduced either by activist filmmakers such as Nabyl Ayouch or by Moroccans with strong financing from Italy, in the case of Mohamed Asli who secured Italian funding to build a school in Ouarzazate, or the French-Moroccan initiative in Marrakesh which is extremely recent. Three schools of cinema now exist, one in Marrakesh (private, FrenchMoroccan), one in Ouarzazate (public, but originally created by Mohamed Asli with Italian funding), and one private Moroccan school in Rabat. The University of Ibn Zohr in Agadir announced that it would give professional degrees in production management and production techniques, while the Office de Formation Professionnelle et de Promotion du Travail (OFPPT, Secrétariat d’état à la Formation Professionnelle) foresaw training of more than 120 individuals in cinema production roles. Nabyl Ayouch had been hosting initiatives that ranged from screenwriting competitions (Prix Mohamed Reggab) between 2001 and 2003 which allowed winners to produce short films in 35 mm and introduced eight newcomers into the field, to his Film Industry project that sought to produce thirty films between 2005 and 2007 with young filmmakers. The educational endeavors are so recent that little can be written about them at this time except to mention that they should fill a lacuna felt by many Moroccan youths who desperately desired to enter the cinema domain but could not afford or get visas to attend European or American schools. Another form of private entrepreneurship, which again is quite unusual in Morocco, concerned the organization of several new festivals in Morocco during this era. Much of the information about the relevance of festivals, and other media and organizations in Morocco was addressed previously. Below are changes or significant events that render the era of 1986–2006 unique. And several important changes did occur in this period. A huge new festival was launched in Rabat and an international festival in Marrakesh annually.
CINEMA FESTIVALS IN MOROCCO National Festivals of Moroccan Cinema The CCM as already noted set aside monies for the purpose of hosting a national festival. During this era six festivals were held: the third national festival of cinema in Meknes in November 1991 (seven years after festival
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two), the fourth national festival in Tangier in December 1995, the fifth national festival in Casablanca, November 1998, the sixth national festival in Marrakesh in January 2001, the seventh national festival in Oujda, June 2003, and the eighth national festival in Tangier, December 2005. The national festivals followed the pattern established in the beginning, serving to promote Moroccan films produced since the previous festival, allowing the press to pose questions to filmmakers and contributing personnel, and providing the opportunity for several roundtables and discussions of topics concerning the industry. While journalists and specifically interested individuals may have traveled to attend the festivals, the average cinemagoer would not have been able to attend except when the festival occurred in their immediate vicinity. Thus, the festival rotated, but since no films were shown in retrospective, the festivals did not serve really to expose Moroccans in general to the films made by their countrymen—except that articles in newspapers would cover the events at the festivals. Rather, the festivals were solely local events, and oriented toward the industry primarily. One of the major problems that prevented festivals from serving as effective tools to support Moroccan cinema was that they were too local in scope in two significant ways. First, the festival organizers made no outreach to filmmakers or cinema professionals from outside of Morocco, in spite of numerous demands that the CCM use the festival as an opportunity to make Moroccan cinema known abroad and to make the festivals more professional. The lack of international outreach was matched by a lack of concrete efforts in national outreach, since no sessions specifically concerned distribution or exhibition or marketing, except for the roundtables which decried their absence. Second, many attendees at the festivals saw them as a sort of family gathering and thus suitable venues in which to bring forth their complaints and problems with other individuals. The festivals became arenas for complaints and struggle among people, cultivating animosity rather than celebrating the artists and their work, a focus on the bad and not on the overall movements of the industry.129 On the surface, the national festivals looked more professional over time, with brochures evolving from mimeographs and photocopies to professionally printed booklets containing beautiful photographs from films, with more detailed descriptions of films in both Arabic and French. Yet the outward appearance was not necessarily matched with professionalism at all levels. The third festival was an occasion for members of the cinema professions to criticize the CCM for not utilizing the talents and perspectives of said professionals in organizing. The filmmakers and members of other chambers thought they should have a stronger role in organizing and shaping the festivals dealing with their own films. Thus, from the fourth festival onward
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numerous filmmakers were involved; but the CCM remained the primary organizer and responsible party and still very little outreach beyond Morocco was sought. The fourth national festival specifically sought to bring to Morocco filmmakers who lived and made films in Europe, whether the filmmakers were of Moroccan descent, children of Moroccan emigrants, or emigrants themselves. A great deal of attention was paid to these youths, most of whom won prizes, and who were lauded as being the “hope for the future” of Moroccan cinema. Individuals who had been born in Europe or had made their homes there, and who really had no prior interest in making films within Morocco, were being courted and lured to “their homeland.” In particular, the invitees to the festival were courted to consider making films, as Moroccans, with funding from the CCM. The national festivals, few and far between as they were, and significant to Moroccan filmmakers, did not represent the majority of festival activity in the country. Other Festivals in Morocco Numerous festivals other than the national festivals continued to occur in Morocco between 1986–2006. The truncated following list gives an idea of the number and variety, only providing a small bit of additional information on the festivals which originated during this time period and had a great impact on the country: The International Festival of Youth-Cinema, Rabat, July–September 1987;130 1988, Festival of the White Dove, in Tetuouan with Salah Abou Seif, Agnes Varda, Theo Angelopoulos, Michel Khleifi, Nacer Khemir, and Ettore Scola; they did not attend Khouribga afterwards. The third meeting of African Cinema in Khouribga, April 2–9, 1988; the fourth meeting, March 17–24, 1990: many African countries participated, including Egypt, Burkina Faso, Ivory Coast, Mali, and Tunisia. Khouribga continued to be an excellent meeting place for a cinema festival because there had been a cinema club there with 200 active members since 1967, a film each week, a program of events and a vitality among members. The 1988 meeting had a budget of 900,000 dirhams (630,000 francs), extended 100 national invitations, about 30 foreigners were invited from Arab, European, and African countries, and cooperation was received from local, municipal and provincial authorities along with the national federation of cinema clubs. Four ministers were at the grand opening. At least 50,000 spectators attended the films of 14 countries, and famous filmmakers discoursed about their films as well. Projections were free and films were reshown in the nearby towns of Oued-Zem and Boujaad. There was a retrospective of Moroccan films. This
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event was not known as a festival, but as a meeting, where the goal was to present films and discussions about films, with filmmakers, interested parties and the general public—not a closed or competitive environment like a festival. But there were two prizes: le Prix Paulin Vieyra, which awarded 15,000 dirhams, and le Prix du Public, which awarded 25,000 dirhams.131 A “cinema and immigration” colloquium occurred during the 9th annual Rencontres Cinématographiques de Tétouan;132 Journées du Cinéma Africain, March 6–April 14, 1995, was organized by the Service Culturel, Scientifique et de Coopération de l’mbassade de France au Maroc along with the Cinémathèque du Ministère de la Coopération (France)—films were screened in Safi, Casablanca, Marrakesh, Agadir, Fez, Tangier, Tetuouan, Oujda, Meknes, Rabat, Kenitra, and El Jadida; Door to the Sky was the only North African film shown; others were sub-Saharan African films. The French Institute and Cultural and Scientific Cooperation Service, with Unifrance and the Franche-Comté Region offered the Première Rencontre du Court Métrage Franco-Marocain in March 1997. Every year since 1991 in Rabat there has been a festival at Cinema Renaissance called “Cinéma Inaperçu,” hosted by Hassan Saïdi. The Festival du Grand Cinéma Inaperçu was cosponsored by the CCM and two theaters in Rabat, with the purpose to show less easily distributed films, although they were still primarily huge budget American films such as Pulp Fiction, Natural Born Killers, The Mask, and so forth. Every year since 2002, Marrakesh has been home to an international film festival which draws attendees from around the globe, but particularly from India, the United States, and Europe, it being primarily funded and organized by France. The festival at times schedules Moroccan films in ancillary screenings not part of the festival per se, there being a hue and cry of disappointment during the years when Moroccan films were not scheduled. This festival does not promote Moroccan films except as an aside from its glamorous and highly publicized courting of international stars and films. Rabat Festival The Rabat Festival was the newest to Morocco’s festival scene, begun in the summer of 1995, repeated every summer thereafter, and located entirely within Rabat/Salé. This festival differed from others because it was not entirely cinema oriented, yet the energy directed toward cinema, particularly Moroccan cinema, was more vital and activist oriented than evident in any other national arena. The Rabat Festival featured all different kinds and nationalities of creativity, from theater to music to books and included a large component of Arabic cinema, from Egypt, Tunisia, and Morocco. In a round-
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table on Arabic cinema, the organizers included the prefecture of Rabat and other private and public individuals working together, particularly Moroccan filmmakers and cinema clubs. The festival administration made a claim that they would defend Moroccan and Arabic cinema: We, as an elected body in Rabat, have taken it upon ourselves and decreed that we will fight with all our administrative might against the closing of any movie theater or changing it into any other commercial establishment. We will take in charge any movie theater and innovate and safeguard it so that it remains open to the public. This is part of the philosophy of the festival and this is part of our duty as elected/representative members of Rabat. Our interest, however, does not exclusively focus on cinema as we encourage all other forms of creative art and creative thinking.133
The organizers noted that many people were attending the festival’s cinema screenings, which belied the theretofore adamant claims by exhibitors that there were no audiences for Moroccan or Arabic films (entry was 5–10 dirhams— very affordable—for many shows). The festival was cosponsored by UNESCO and the Commission Européene.134 Alioua, the main organizer, specifically worked with other organizations and volunteers to break the barriers between the public and administration, to have events in diverse public spaces such as G5 (a poorer outlying neighborhood), downtown, and Oudayas (near Salé and the medina of Rabat), intermingling free and low-cost events with some even quite high ticket events. The idea was to expose Moroccans to their own culture as well as culture from other countries, to allow for the opportunity which otherwise was limited to the rich. Unfortunately, many of the events in the outlying and poorer neighborhoods were badly organized for those who would depend upon mass transportation, since there would be no transportation late at night at the end of some events. However, since those events were intended to serve those usually elided neighborhoods, they were very successful. The festival also specifically had films for children, programmed several of the newest Moroccan features, sponsored an evening devoted to Moroccan short fiction films, and organized several internationally attended cinema roundtables. One of the main reasons to present information about these festivals is to emphasize that Moroccan cinema during this latter era was receiving more attention than ever before, and was often disseminated in a variety of towns through the variety of festivals. As well, it is clear that individuals could work cooperatively in several realms and produce large and complex events, but most often the resources tapped for these projects were institutional rather than private. This is very important, because while there were numerous millionaires and quite rich families in Morocco, their monies were diverted into family-funded institutions or associations (or habbous) if contributed at all,
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rather than disseminated to efforts such as films or festivals. Thus, the constant emphasis on filmmakers needing to seek funds from the private sector seem misdirected in the environment of Morocco. However, festivals were not the only source of comparative style, quality, and content against which to evaluate Moroccan films, since television and other technologies had been gaining incredible viewerships since the 1970s and particularly in the 1980s. It has been painfully evident from the evaluation of the various new and older distribution and exhibition media that Moroccan filmmakers could find no really suitable options to exhibit or profit from their films.
FILMS AND FILMMAKERS The three most significant developments in terms of films and filmmakers at this time are (a) a shift away from short films being primarily documentary style and toward short fiction films, (b) along with the move to incorporate filmmakers resident abroad into the fold of “Moroccan” filmmakers, and (c) a surge in audience appreciation of several Moroccan feature films. Since the CCM and State gave money specifically to selected established filmmakers to make short films to celebrate the centenary of cinema, 5 Films for 100 Years, these films are discussed. Because the filmmakers-fromabroad135 solicited by Morocco all had produced only short films at the time of the fourth national festival of Moroccan cinema, those individuals and films are also discussed136 along with two long-time participants in the cinema domain in Morocco who were recognized for their short fiction films in that festival. Subsequently presented are several feature films and filmmakers who achieved distinction and altered the landscape of Moroccan production and reception because their films were appreciated and attended by a large Moroccan audience. One issue that influenced short films as well as features after the mid1980s was the turn of filmmakers away from the “theoretical and abstract” and more toward the explication or revelation of lived events or personal stories. Among the newer generation of filmmakers the notion gained validity that their film topics could and should only concern their own lived experiences.137 Whereas the older generation searched for topics that would convey some abstract or historical principle, the new filmmakers made films about their own times, issues relevant to their lives, and their own dreams. Thus Omar Chraibi’s films all dealt with the subject of filmmaking, because, as he once said, that was all he knew, that was his domain and lived realm. Derkaoui of the earlier generation was similar although more abstract in his films
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about making films, and Omar worked on many of Derkaoui’s films, taking up this orientation but in a less abstract style. Daoud Oulad Sayed made his films about his personal experiences: his childhood in Marrakesh, his region (Rabat) and the Bou Regreg river that divides Rabat from Salé, about people that were close to his lived experience rather than being invented. This strategy by filmmakers-living-in-Morocco also applies to the filmmakers-livingabroad, and is the reason their films were very personal: located in and concerning Norway, France, and other lands because they lived there, rather than just studying or learning or passing through temporarily. Similarly, feature films that showed a more realistic view of Morocco, that dealt with topics of import at the moment, and that showed a more diverse range of the modern population, were more accepted by the Moroccan public. It has been previously emphasized the difficulty of being a filmmaker in a country which demanded and expected that each and every film produced by a national would be a jewel in the crown of Morocco, that Moroccan films could and would undo all the harm of French/U.S. dominance, that the films could and would prove the value of the people to themselves, uphold the honor of the country, and still be entertaining and of high quality. While Moroccan filmmakers and their films could not do all the above, they did begin to reflect more lived experience, both in features and in shorts, and began to speak more closely to the Moroccan audience. Moroccan films thus gained a new appreciation and respect from audiences by the end of 1995 through 2006, although Moroccan films and filmmakers continued to be harshly criticized and hampered by the CCM, other institutions, and critics.
DOCUMENTARIES AND SHORT FILMS The late 1980s could be characterized as the “last gasp” of the Moroccan documentary tradition in short films, particularly those funded by the CCM, as Moroccan filmmakers were generally motivated by the new organizational requirements of the support fund to emphasize making short fiction films in order to eventually qualify to make a feature. One could actually divide the period 1986 to 2006 into two separate short film eras. From 1986 to 1990, the short films continued to be predominantly documentary style (actually no films are recorded for 1989 at all), while from 1990 through 2006 short fiction films predominated. The documentary-style films still promoted development issues, such as vaccinations, education, and political participation, while the fiction films were very personal and professional. Overall, however, the number of short films is not much lower than in previous eras, just their topics and orientation have changed; 104 films were made by “Moroccans-living-in-Morocco.”
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Of the twenty-five films made between 1986 and 1990, all were by Moroccans-living-in-Morocco. From 1991 to 1995, of the total number of thirty-six short films only fifteen were made by Moroccans-living-in-Morocco; of the other twenty-one films, five were commissioned by the CCM for the centenary, two were made by Moumen Smihi but concerned non-Moroccan subjects and made while he resided outside Morocco, and fourteen were by “Moroccans-living-abroad” (I repeat that this term was implemented by the CCM, since these individuals did not necessarily identify themselves as “Moroccans,” and some had been born abroad and never previously visited Morocco). From 1995 to 2006, Moroccans-living-in-Morocco and Moroccans-living-abroad mixed to produce quite a number of short films, the Moroccans-living-abroad that can be identified produced eighteen films. Of particular note among the short films made by Moroccans-living-inMorocco are the five films in the early period all concerning Hassan II, as he once again made a concerted effort to use films to improve and consolidate his image before the Moroccan people. At this time the King was shoring up his image as a democratic ruler, although many democratic institutions remained weak, and he turned again to the film medium. Some filmmakers stand out for their continuing productivity: Mustapha Derkaoui made five short films; Smihi made one film on Morocco and two films outside of Morocco on other subjects. Mohamed Laalioui continued in the CCM tradition of shorts, making seven documentary films, while Ben Barka made four films in the documentary tradition, including one detailing quite elaborately the new mosque, the largest in the Arab world, built by King Hassan II in Casablanca. Rachid Alami made three films, and Moh. Tazi B.A. made three shorts on art and artists. Three new entrants were Daoud Oulad Sayed who made three films of a very personal quality, Omar Chraibi (brother of Saad Chraibi) who after many years working in the domain finally directed three short fictions, and Mohamed Meziane who moved from a long career as one of the main film editors in Morocco to make his first short fiction.
FILMMAKERS-LIVING-ABROAD Morocco made intense efforts to win over Moroccan-filmmakers-fromabroad during and after the fourth national festival of film, even eventually funding several individuals to make films in Morocco. The organizing committee of the fourth national festival of cinema was responsible for opening Morocco to those “Moroccans” living abroad. The organizers felt that there should be a bridge between Morocco and its offspring elsewhere—whether they had been born in Morocco and emigrated, or had been born in Europe of
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Moroccan heritage (no Moroccan-Americans were solicited although Hakim Belabbes, who lives and teaches in Chicago eventually made himself known). Further, they claimed that a film would have a definite Moroccan nationality if made by a Moroccan because the filmmaker’s brain and identity would be Moroccan. Unfortunately the latter claim requires that the filmmaker actually have a Moroccan identity, which was not especially the case for those youths living abroad. Some of these filmmakers never really identified themselves as Moroccans and never identified with Morocco, or they considered themselves as being of a double culture.138 As young filmmaker Ayouch indicates: I have a double culture. It is a characteristic I cannot deny, as it is for the generation of young Moroccans who live abroad who are presented during this festival. One lives generally abroad and many of us were born abroad. We have a part of our roots there and other parts of our true roots here in Morocco. We were created here, our names are Moroccan, and when I was in Paris and asked for money to make a short film and they said, “OK, what subject?” and I said Morocco, they said “OK.” So sometimes I came back to Morocco to make the short film, as was the case for Blue Stones . . . , but for Vendeur du Silence, no. Because sometimes one has different desires because one has grown up 25 or 26 years in one environment, which is France, and there we saw things which we also need to speak about.
Thus these filmmakers have multiple alliances, within and without Morocco, and quite divergent perspectives since they feel either more competent to treat subjects only in Europe, or can equally well film in and about Europe as well as Morocco. Further, in the earlier days of Moroccan filmmaking, most of the individuals who studied cinema abroad came back and worked for the CCM or RTM or made films; the new Moroccan-directors-living-abroad differ somewhat because they move more fluidly back and forth between Morocco and the countries they have chosen to live in—they do not necessarily come “home” to Morocco definitively. They are more transnational in their orientation, not limited to space or one national identity as much as was the older generation in their habitus or identities.139 As well, most have been to film school and have gained practice in short filmmaking, have paid great attention to details, film aesthetics, and new trends in their film styles and contents. These characteristics made them desirable objects to lure into the Moroccan scene in an attempt to breathe new life and energy into the cinema sector. Below, in alphabetical order, are presented each Moroccan-living-abroad who presented a film in the fourth national festival of cinema in Tangier, along with his or her film(s) in order to provide a basic introduction to individuals who have already begun to influence the cinema sector in Morocco. Several of the persons mentioned below will make features in Morocco and further shape the development of this sector in the new millenium.
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Nabil Ayouch Ayouch is one of two Moroccans-living-abroad who came to Morocco to film before being courted by the CCM,140 but his extended family has connections to the industry. Ayouch was born in Paris in 1969 and has French nationality. Although he never attended a film school, he did study acting in the evenings while studying commerce and marketing during the day. He entered the field of directing through his experience in acting. By age twenty-five he had directed three short films in either Morocco or France, and worked in advertising films, even directing a publicity film for the Ministry of Health in 1992. Two of his three short films are briefly indicated below.141 His features Mektoub, Ali Zaoua, Prince of the Streets, and Une Minute du Silence en Moins will be partially discussed in the section on features. The Blue Stone of Sahara / Les Pierres Bleues du Desert (1992/1993, 21 mins)142 Najib, a young boy of fourteen from a small village, has one obsession, the legend of the blue stones of the desert. No one in his village or family believe that there is a place with huge blue stones, but since Najib will not give up his claim and his desire to find them, he is taunted and tortured by village children and his own family. At one point his own father calls the village council together to hear Najib’s claim, to make him prove the existence of the stones, or give up his claims, or be exiled from the village. No middle ground is permitted. Only one person supports Najib, the village Sheikh, who encourages him to pursue his dream no matter the obstacles and the cost. Thus Najib leaves the village in secret to find his dream. He wanders far, eventually reduced to crawling through the scorching desert with no food or water, only his determination. His quest pushes him physically to the extreme, yet at the most desperate of moments he finds the place of the blue stones and is uplifted, renewed, and rejoiceful. Ayouch describes the film as a small fairy tale that moves between the concrete and the real (the life in the village) and the dreamlike and magical (the search) in order to show one boy’s commitment to pursuing his ideals and thereby rendering himself a whole and complete being. The boy is searching for something that will make him feel complete, because he does not feel that he belongs in the very strict and patriarchal environment of the village. For Ayouch the film is somewhat personal because he also has been on a search for how to reconcile being split between two cultures and two civilizations, two languages, two ways of seeing and thinking, and because the distress caused by the split, even the differences themselves are not always evident, as the blue stones were not evident.143 The film is quite beautiful in image quality, editing flow, and pacing, acting, lighting, and other technical elements. Shot on location in a village,
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the realism of the place was captured very well while the earnestness of the young boy was palpable. His search through the desert was so well rendered that the spectator also felt the heat, the scorching sands, the relentless need to keep going because to stop would be fatal. Vendeur de silence / Silence Seller (1994/1995, 26 mins, 35 mm, color)144 Ayouch’s third film is a hilarious dramatic comedy about a man who sells silence in a building where there used to be a lot of noise that disturbed the inhabitants. The film opens upon a young man cooking and listening to the radio and feeling very pleased with himself. Soon, however, knocks on the door! Rather than answer the door the young man freaks and starts acting scared, desperate, and trapped. A fist smashes through the door, followed by a punk-looking fellow of very intense, dangerous, scary, and no-holds-barred violence. He trashes the kitchen, smashes the radio, and sneers in the face of the scared man. Eventually we understand that the radio was too loud, the silence contract had been violated, and the silence monitor had come to settle the matter. At first we are led to believe that the violent seller of silence is acting on his own, imposing his own rule of silence upon the hapless dweller, and only later do we learn that he has been “hired” by the patrons of the apartment building to protect the silence, since they cannot seem to control their own noise levels. But the silence-seller also terrorizes the apartment dwellers. There is a love-hate relationship. Terrorizing them is the only way to make them conform, but at the same time they hate being terrorized, and the silence-seller resents always having to be the heavy. One day a new tenant arrives, and spells doom for the silence-seller. A guitar player, the new tenant disregards all the rules of silence; he refuses to participate in the collective agreement. No matter how violent the silence-seller becomes, the guitarist will not stop. When the seller breaks the guitars into smithereens the guitarist simply goes to his magic cabinet and produces more guitars. Eventually the situation leads to chaos; the silence-seller is defeated, and all the inhabitants go wild and crazy in a carnivalesque parade of noise and insanity. The film is very funny, and very modern in terms of the music and lifestyle portrayed. Yet the drama remains an intense underlying theme, partially because the main actor, the silence-seller, was excellent, and the directing overall kept a feeling of claustrophobia, inhibition, tenseness, and impending dissolution at the forefront. The script did not give the story away immediately up front, did not “explain” the subject in dialogue, but let the story unwind along with the twisting plot. The spectator had to be very engaged to figure out the thread of the relationships between the various players, but the engagement was pleasurable rather than torturous. Ayouch presents metaphorically some events that he lived through and witnessed himself.145 Le Vendeur
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du Silence won the prize for best direction in the national festival of cinema in Tangier in 1995, as well as other national and international prizes. Miriam Bakir Born in France in 1968, Bakir studied in the Conservatoire Libre de Cinéma Français and received a diploma in directing, after which she worked in a variety of positions with Moroccan and French film directors. She presented one short film at the Tangier festival and was the only woman from abroad presented. She did solicit funds from the CCM to make a Moroccan short and was awarded 320,000 dirhams in 1997 for a proposed project entitled Lamia. Bakir is another filmmaker-living-abroad who feels more comfortable with France and French than Morocco, but was interested in learning more and working more in her ancestral country. Demain on Tourne/We Will Film Tomorrow (1993, 7 mins)146 Bakir’s film concerns a young woman in France who wants to be a filmmaker very badly; upon being accepted to make a film she is ecstatic, but soon discovers that current historical events at the time interfere with her ability to focus on and make progress on her project. She encounters several obstacles, the major one the concurrent war in Bosnia, and how it disrupts her inwardly as well as externally by hampering her ability to make a film. Bakir’s film shifts its focus from the protagonist and filmmaking to the war and man’s inhumanity against man. Bakir said she made such a film because she was surrounded by people who were totally focused on their careers but who she felt, as artists, also had a responsibility to be more aware of what was happening in the world because they were the representers of the world. Yet no one was talking about the war in Bosnia even though the French educational system had drummed into her generation the horrors of World War II. Upset by the silence on Bosnia among her milieu she felt she had to do something herself, so she wrote, directed, shot, and edited the film in two months; it was for her like a reaction, something she had to do.147 While the film was well received in France, the Moroccan reception was one of confusion rather than acceptance. Spectators were thrown off by the shift from focus on the girl wanting to make a film to the war in Bosnia, a shift from the individual to humanity, especially in such a short film.148 Rachid Boutounes Boutounes was born in Casablanca in 1970 and studied cinema and literature in France. While the short film below was shot and concerned immigrants in France, it was also awarded a postproduction award from the CCM production
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fund. Boutounes indicated that he hoped to make a film in Morocco, of medium length, about unemployed youths who spend most of their time leaning against walls and lampposts—Dos au Mur. Noces en Sursis/Marriage without Fulfillment (1993, 16mm, 18 mins)149 Omar and Nadia, two young beurs living in France, ha ve loved each other for a long time. Both were born in France but were the first generation to consider France their home and still contend with parental morals and attitudes held over from Morocco. Thus they are lovers in secret, and although they have sex and feel liberated when alone, their parents’ old ideas force the youth to dissimulate when at home. In essence, the two lead double lives. One day Omar can’t take it any more and demands that Nadia marry him. She wants to but fears her father to whom she promised that she would marry in the homeland. Nadia decides to talk to her mother about it while she helps prepare dinner for the family. Faced with marriage to Omar or a total disintegration with her ties to her family, she chooses her family. Boutounes said that he did not want to replicate the films and studies that positioned Arabs born in France as being totally marginalized. There are many who are not marginalized and who consider themselves French, and yet have to deal with the values and desires of their parents, which is as much a generational issue as it is an issue of national origins. Thus, he chose to contrast the youths outside, where they considered themselves as French youths, to them interacting with their families inside, which was more Arab. The alternate modes of interacting and self-perception did not necessarily lead to marginality, however. Boutounes himself created a similar scenario by showing his film in Morocco to an audience it was not originally intended for. Boutounes justified his movie as follows. He wrote the scenario thinking of a French public, and included scenes of lovemaking between the two youths; even juxtaposing sex to the father’s prayers. Because he was enacting his “French filmmaker” self he could include such scenes, whereas if he was enacting his “Moroccan filmmaker” self he would have used different tactics. On the other hand, he grew up in Morocco watching the multitudinous imported films which were full of scenes of sex, and could never understand why the films from elsewhere could be shown to Moroccans while Moroccan filmmakers were not allowed to include those same scenes in their own movies. And in his movie the scene was not really gratuitous, as he claimed is the case in most foreign films; he only wanted to emphasize that Nadia, just because she did not value virginity, still had other personal limits and values, so that later in the film she shows that she will not sacrifice everything for marriage or sex. Boutounes filmed a very compelling story, although the filmmaking techniques seemed slightly rough at the edges. Similar to Bakir, the two focus
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more upon the story to be told than the minute technical details which they will learn to master over time. It is already obvious that the filmmakersliving-abroad all tackle very different subjects, and for very different reasons, and all already reflect unique attributes in style and technique. While Boutounes feels no need to deny his interest particularly in Moroccans-livingabroad, the next filmmaker feels compelled to constrict his self-identity to the exclusion of family origins in Morocco—yet he, as the others, is willing to take the opportunity for funding from Morocco if available. Ismail Farroukhi Farroukhi, born in France (1962), does not consider that he has any obligation to deal with subjects or stories that have to do with Moroccan immigrants, or the land of his parents, Morocco, and he does not speak the language. He does not like to be labeled a Moroccan filmmaker, and prefers a non-national designation. Yet he was labeled as one of two “Moroccans” showing a film in the Film Engagé Festival in Clermont-Ferrand in February 1997 (considered the Cannes of short films), even though he registered as a French entry and produced with European money (a short film, L’Inconnu). In 1995 he was scheduled to start his first feature La Révolution du Doute, although he emphasized that it was very hard to find financing in France no matter what one’s nationality or topic. Despite Farroukhi’s claims to not be concerned about a particular community, his first film shown in Morocco does focus upon an immigrant Moroccan child in France while his award-winning internationally released feature film, Le Grand Voyage, also deals with immigrant families overcoming generational differences. L’Exposé/The Report (1993, 35 mm, 24 mins)150 Reda, nine years old and living in France with immigrant parents and both younger and older siblings, has been assigned by his teacher to do a report on “his country.” He is a shy child and has been assigned the report as a punishment for not participating well. The assignment distresses him, because he does not know anything about Morocco and does not know how to get the information he needs. When he talks to his mother he finds she really can offer him no information either. He asks his father to get him a book, but his father cannot fulfill the request. In despair he feels alienated from everyone in his family because they either torment him (his younger siblings) or are of no help at all (his older brother and parents). Finally his mother rescues him by saying that Morocco is not facts and figures, the name of the capital and the size of the population, Morocco is the perfume on the breeze, the palm trees waving in the wind, the sweet mint tea and cookies. The next day Reda
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arrives in class with a large box, and when called on to give his report opens the box and pulls out a Moroccan teapot (berrad), glasses, and a huge plate of cookies for the class to share and says that this is his report on Morocco, mimicking his mother’s speech. The film received massive applause and appreciation at the festival screening although some critics voiced a discomfort at having Morocco reduced to tea and cookies. One astute comment was that perhaps tea and cookies was not derogatory or negatively reductionist; rather they could represent human warmth and conversation, or a mythological vision much like the British pub. Technically, the focus was often off, the film underexposed, the framing was erratic, and canted angles were used unsystematically and not very successfully. Farroukhi claims that those issues were unimportant to him; only the story was significant. Although only the alphabetical order brings Farroukhi and Lahkhmari together here, it is quite interesting to juxtapose Farroukhi’s disinterest in telling his story through cinematic techniques with Lahkhmari’s technique which tells his story only through cinematic techniques, since there is no dialogue in his film. Nour-Eddine Lahkhmari (also Lakhmari) Lahkhmari was born in Morocco in 1964, and studied pharmacy and chemistry in France and cinema at the CNED in Paris. He lives in Norway and has Norwegian residence, but was labeled, as was Farroukhi, one of the two “Moroccan” filmmakers to present a film at the 19th annual short film festival in Clermont-Ferand, Film Engagé, even though he entered the film as Norwegian. His film, Né Sans Skis aux Pieds (Born without Skis on His Feet) (1997), is a story about an Arab émigré who celebrates his new home’s national holiday by bleaching his hair to look Norwegian; his second, Le Regard (2005), deals with a French man’s return to Morocco fifty years later to overcome his remorse about his activities during colonialism. The following film, however, was quite different both in subject and tone. Brèves Notes/Brief Remarks (1994, 16 mins)151 Lahkhmari’s very beautiful film is actually a combination of three shorter films, or perhaps given his style it would be best to say three different evocations of three different men. Lahkhmari uses no dialogue and relies only upon acting, pacing, lighting, and camera work to convey the psychologies and states-of-being of his three subjects. Each person’s vignette has a characteristic derivative from that person’s character and position. While a sad old man is shot in the mellow yellow sunlight that catches the lush detail of the various memorabilia that populates his dining room, an adventurous night janitor is filmed in the high key night atmosphere of a huge office building dimly lit,
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where pools of light and shadow render the scene and the man’s freedom to act out scenarios in whomsoever’s office he chooses. One man’s hobby is rendered in close detail of high key, but this time the pool of light captures the man’s face in bright clarity as he patiently scrutinizes his minute handiwork in a world delimited by that glaring light, hems in the too large outside world. Using only very suitable music and the pacing of his camera moves, editing, and lighting, along with the actors’ concentration upon their tasks, Lahkhmari is able to make the viewer understand an important personality trait of the character, to get to know the individual, to participate in a small way in each world. Lahkhmari jokingly said that he learned this style from spending nine months of the year indoors with nothing to do but look and watch. However, the film has a beauty beyond just the evocation through image, because it is much more sensitive than a simple portrait. His film was extremely well received by the festival audience in the fourth national festival in Morocco even though they had had little experience with his style. He was awarded the jury prize. In addition, he received a grant of 350,000 dirhams from the CCM in 1997 to film a short, Le Dernier Spectacle, while he also received a large grant from Norway to film his first feature, Un Beau Monde, scheduled for September 1997 in Oslo. Lahkhmari thus plans to continue working in the two worlds of his two homelands. Hassan Legzouli Legzouli was born in Morocco, in 1963, but went abroad to study and never returned to reside in Morocco; he studied cinema in Brussels and then moved to Lille, France, to work in cinema. He later made the short Quand le soleil fait tomber les moineaux, 1999 and a feature, Tenja, in 2004. Le Marchand de Souvenirs/The Merchant of Memories (1993, 9 mins, 35 mm, b/w)152 Legzouli’s black and white film reveals the story of a man who seems to be an immigrant in France who, after being hit on the head, becomes an amnesiac. He goes to the commissariat to lodge a complaint for his memory being stolen, but the police officer he encounters seems to have some of those missing memories—but from his own experience? In particular, some of the memories concern the colonial period, the struggle between soldiers or police and Arab people. The film creates a complex web in which one cannot be sure what is real memory, what is a part of whose memory, or exactly what the memories say about the two men involved and how much involvement they had already had to date. Legzouli also uses his sound track, a mix of ambient sounds with music and other recordings, to convey the past to those who are conversant with the origins of the music and speeches.
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This film was Legzouli’s first, an adaptation of a novel by Mohamed Afifi. Legzouli read Afifi’s book and became interested in the notion of memory and belonging. In a television interview Legzouli expressed his belief that memory is the place where you can meet with the other, and it is at the level of the memory that you can come into compromise between a host society and the society of exile or origin, and in this integration the two societies can find new points of contact. This was the point of the film for him, as well as being an opportunity for him to let his host country know something about the history of his own country. Because the film concerned memory, the subconscious, and thoughts, Legzouli chose to film in black and white to enhance the expressionistic tone of the film, to distance the viewer, to make the viewer conscious that the film had no relationship with reality.153 Even though the film was surrealistic, the point was clear—memories are fluid and permeable, not always to be trusted, but always dear to the person who loses them.
MOROCCANS-LIVING-IN-MOROCCO Most of the individuals presented above were quick to take advantage of the opportunity to apply for funding to shoot a film in Morocco. However, other individuals who had been working in the cinema domain in Morocco for a number of years also were promoted in the fourth national festival of cinema in Tangier, although the individuals presented below had been recognized at home or abroad for years already in various capacities. Selected are two individuals because they represent very divergent approaches and backgrounds and represent the new shift of Moroccan short films away from the didactic documentary tradition toward short fiction, although each is unique. Daoud Oulad Sayed makes personal films but of subjects rooted in real lived experience or daily life, while Mohamed Meziane represents a more traditional short fiction style that leans heavily on the abstract, the metaphorical, the ambiguous—a short offspring of the older trend of feature films—but with less reliance upon spoken dialogue and more reliance on the cinematic image and technique to convey the story. Daoud Oulad Sayed (also Oulad Syad, Daoud) Born in 1953 in Marrakesh, Oulad Sayed received a doctorate in physical sciences in France, and returned to Morocco where he teaches at the Faculty of Sciences in Rabat. He gained a reputation as an excellent photographer before entering into filmmaking, and has managed to maintain an overall similarity in subject matter and style in both media. His first film, in fact, was composed of still photos he had taken over several years, combined
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with other images, moving and still, to tell the story of his childhood in Marrakesh. In the film Mémoire Ochre,154 or The Generous Memory, photos from the past, interior and exterior, personal and historical, flow fluidly between fixed and moving images, a dialogue between images, black and white and color, the past and the present. He was awarded 100,000 dhs in December 1989 for the film. His second film, Entre l’Absence et L’Oubli,155 won an “appreciation award” at the second Arabic cinema festival in Paris in 1994 even though the Moroccan production fund committee, after looking at the finished film, declined to award the final portion of its production fund award in 1993, without giving the filmmaker any reason. The story is the search that a potter undertakes to find the person whose photo is in an old frame he buys in the souq. He buys the frame to put pictures of his family in it, but since the seller makes him take the photo in it also, he cannot just throw it away but has to find the person and return the photo. The potter’s journey is also the viewer’s journey to real places and persons, a chance to discover unique qualities of Salé and Rabat and their people. Similarly, his third film, Al Oued (1995, 35 mm, 20 min)156 is as much a story about the Bouregreg inlet that separates Rabat and Salé, a story about a particular fisherman who talks about the river since the 1960s, but also a story about Oulad Sayed’s long history of photographing the Bouregreg and its people, so that the fiction is also a documentary, a document is also a personal story. The black and white film won several prizes: the Prix Institut du Monde Arabe du meilleur court métrage; the only Moroccan film to win a prize during the third Biennale des Cinémas Arabes; the Prize of Image and a jury special mention at Tangier, 1995; the third category prize of the Charte du Bassin Méditerranéen in the 1996 Palermo festival for “the documentary work best expressing the Euro-Mediterranean space.” Oulad Sayed’s films maintain the quality of his still photography, which gives his films a look that is simultaneously fiction and documentary. His narrative style also borders the two genres, which makes him unique among the Moroccan filmmaking community. He received funding for a first feature length film from the CCM in 1996, Adieu Forain (1998), then went on to direct the features Le Cheval de Vent (The Wind Horse) (2001), Tarfaya (2003), and En Attendant Passolini (Waiting for Passolini) (2005). Mohamed Meziane Meziane was born in 1945 in Berkane, Morocco, and was one of the few consistently active film editors in Morocco for decades. He worked for at least twenty-five years as both editor and assistant director before directing (and starring in) his first short film in 1995.
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Noé/Noah (1995, 35 mm, color, 20 min)157 Noah is a somber philosopher who rarely, if ever, speaks. He is an enigma to the town in which he lives, which he surveys silently and thoughtfully. He also surveys and ponders the people of the town and their interrelations. Noah preoccupies himself at times with building a makeshift ark from scrap wood and cane, but like everything in the mostly silent film, the ark is only symbolic for something which no one can completely understand. The film begins with a funeral in the morning. In the middle, at a glorious rosy and long sunset, a young man waits with his elderly mother at the train station, the two standing side by side patiently, almost lovingly; the son is leaving the tiny village to find work elsewhere, and his elderly mother will be alone. At deepest night, with red lantern glow emanating from the mud house walls silhouetting the darting figures come to the event, the film ends with a baby’s birth and lusty cries of new life. The film is a journey, is about journeys, and is filled with symbols of the ebb and flow of day, of man, of events, of fortune, of youth. One element of the journey is the traveling salesman who passes through town. Another is an old man who tells tales of his youth to the men and boys of the town. A farmer works his field, which will produce and lie fallow and repeat its cycle. But no real thread links the events except one’s ability to interpret the metaphors and symbols and look at the subtext of the situations and scenes. Meziane wrote, directed, acted, and edited the film which used no more than thirty brief lines of random dialogue; most was silent and forced the spectator to look for cues in order to understand the development of the story. But there is no traditional “story” to this film, but an evocation of a day, a way of being, a place. Meziane intended for the film to be elusive, even in his choice of the name Noah. He chose the name, he said, as he would have used any name, but since everyone would automatically associate the name with the legend, he just included a boat in the film for each spectator to interpret as he or she would.158 Meziane had a more astute reason for including the boat image, and only his prepossessing and yet humorous character would have him say on national television that he just put such a loaded symbol in the film for no reason. Most of all, Meziane was proud of his musical score, written and recorded by Richard Horowitz; the images, however, were equally spectacular, although sound was often difficult to separate from the almost persistent musical background. The film was partially funded by a grant from the CCM production fund. The centenary of cinema also inspired another type of project; the CCM funded several filmmakers to make short films which would be collected as one piece equivalent to a feature length film, to circulate to commemorate the centenary specifically in Morocco.
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CINQ FILMS POUR CENT ANS In June 1994 the CCM proposed that Moroccan filmmakers would submit scripts for short films whose subject would be each filmmaker’s relationship with cinema. Five films eventually comprised the collection, although Mustapha Derkaoui was also scheduled to make a film and never did. The five producing filmmakers were Abdelkader Lagtaâ, Farida Benlyazid, Jilali Ferhati, Omar Chraibi, and Hakim Noury. Abderrahman Tazi attempted to have his film included but his script was not selected by the committee. However, since his film, as do the other five, speaks to the situation of cinema in Morocco, included is a brief description of it as well. Each film was limited to fifteen minutes, and all were produced by Mohamed Lotfi (Horizon Films), former president of the support committee, and Sarim Fassi Fihri (MPS), independent distributor and president of the cinema producers’ chamber. The production fund gave 2 million dirhams to be divided among the five filmmakers who each had their separate Moroccan actors and crews. The Derkaoui’s (uncle and nephew) did the camera work/DP, Tunisian Fawzi Thabet did sound, and Benlyazid chose Tunisian editor Kulthum Bournaz. The CCM provided the funds in advance of filming with the one stipulation that films had to be finished to circulate for the centenary. It is particularly evident that each filmmaker’s celebration of cinema was quite unique and resonant with his or her characteristic style of filmmaking— as well as being of exceptional quality. The five films thus served to provide unique insights into the way that cinema had been inserted into the lives of Moroccans, but also the entire collection served as a sampler of accomplished Moroccan directorial styles—they were exhibited on television by 2M. Sur la Terrasse/On the Roof—Farida Benlyazid In the 1950s a young girl had visions when out playing one day, and becomes quite mysteriously ill. Her mother takes her to the family home in a northern Moroccan town where the family gathers as the girl rests. When all gather at the end of the day, the women go to their roof to visit and prepare dinner, and congregate at the wrought iron railing from which they can watch the outdoor projection of a film on a nearby wall. Even the young girl is entranced and enchanted by the huge images of Egyptian stars silently looming and moving two stories high, bigger than life. Nour/Lumière (Light)—Omar Chraibi Chraibi presents a satirical comedy on the relation between filmmakers, critics, journalists, and festivals in Morocco. In this case a famous cinema critic, besieged at all turns by students and journalists for his advice, counsel, and favor is invited to jury a film festival. The vainglorious but beguiling critic/professor hatches a plot. Through a variety of machinations, slights of
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hand and disguise, the big-wig tries to turn the festival to his own advantage financially as well as to his personal glory. His antics are discovered and the festival ends in uproar. Le Mouchoir Bleu/The Blue Handkerchief—Jilali Ferhati In a poor neighborhood near the sea but distant from town, an adolescent boy and girl are close friends. The boy’s parents are loving while the girl’s father is abusive and controlling. But the two friends support each other. Their signal that the coast is clear for them to meet and talk is a blue handkerchief hung out by the girl. The boy is enamored with the cinema so much that he dreams only of going to town to the movies. The ingenious boy makes his own cinema/television out of a large box with a cut-out hole for a screen across which he unrolls the scenes he has created by cutting out comic books and pasting images onto his own scroll. He narrates the actions in his makeshift courtyard cinema to which all the neighborhood kids flock, paying a tiny sum to attend. Eventually the boy makes enough money to take his girlfriend into town to see the movies; but they stay out too late and cause a lot of worry, problems, and uproar. The parents and the entire village search for the two children, fearing that something terrible has happened to them. When the parents find out that the children have run off without permission to the town to the cinema, the father angrily destroys the lad’s theater and curses the evil influence of cinema on his son. Happy End—Abdelkader Lagtaâ A father goes to the rehearsal of his actress daughter who is fulfilling her dream of acting. But the father erupts in anxiety and refusal when he finds out that she is supposed to passionately kiss the actor in a scene. At night he talks over the situation with his wife in bed, trying to find a solution to his conflict with his daughter’s desire to play the role in spite of his opposition. Eventually his love for his daughter allows him to change and accept the situation. Cinéma Impérial—Hakim Noury Two brothers aged between six and ten outfit themselves with sheets, pieces of wood, and garbage can lids to transform themselves into young gladiators. They know their spaghetti-western-gladiator movie script very well as they battle and clash around the bedroom. Soon they run to meet their other young friends in a public garden where one tells and enacts the story of a movie recently seen. The spectator boys are enthralled and excited about the story, and about the prospect of going to the movies. But not everyone has money. Their neighborhood theater is restricted to boys who are older, and who can afford to buy the ticket as well as pay the obligatory “tip” to the doorman. So not all the youths can enter the theater, in particular the youth whose entire being is consumed by love of movies and storytelling. Finally able to enter the shabby theater with benches instead of seats, the engrossing movie is interrupted;
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actually it is curtailed because the next reel has not been delivered yet by the bicyclist. The kids erupt into revolution until the doorman, the authoritarian who controls the conduct in the theater, leaps upon the stage and takes over telling and enacting the missing parts of the film that he knows so well. He is transformed and the boys gaze in rapture, frozen, entranced. Moroccan audiences loved the collection of films which brought the centenary home to their own experiences. Tazi’s film was not included in the set that comprised Cinq Films Pour Cent Ans, although the subject matter was on the same theme. A film about remembrances of cinema from childhood, this film stars young boys of about age ten, who are enamored of the movies. Images Volées/The Stolen Photographs—Mohamed Abderrahmane Tazi159 (1995, 35 mm, color, 13 mins) (also known as L’Éducation du Regard) The old movie house in the medina neighborhood of Boujaâd advertises its films on a sandwich board that an older man drapes front and back as he traverses the old winding streets calling out the newest films: romance, gladiators, westerns, musicals, police dramas. . . . At the theater hordes of youths scramble to see the new posters and pay their piasters to enter—those youths, that is, who have money. For those who are broke, the eternal struggle is to find a way to see the film without paying. No one can open the exit door to let the others sneak in because the theater owner has demanded that the man in charge of taking tickets and keeping order among the boys blockade the door. However, every obstacle is an opportunity to find a solution; the locked exit door has a lattice open top, which looks right upon the screen. If boys climb upon garbage bins and boxes and hold each other up, one or two can see and relay the story and images to those below, who drink in hungrily all the aural information until it is their chance to climb to the top. The skill required to tell the story adequately to the others gives the kids their cinematographic education. But the cinema is a money-making machine. The projectionist makes extra money snipping significant frames from the films—portraits, close ups, or those scenes which have to be cut because they are too sexual—which he sells on the street. The doorman makes his money from the tips boys have to pay to get seated. But he soon learns to make more money when the theater owner one day notices a huge line of boys extending to the side of the building. Discovering the new strategy the boys have found to see films for free, he instructs the doorman to close the free viewing opportunity and guard the door. Instead the doorman begins collecting a small fee from the boys who want to climb up and look through the lattice. As the former short film descriptions evince, this period was a time of new creativity in short films, but also filmmakers in Morocco were sometimes forced into making short films in order to achieve necessary qualifications. Both choice and necessity influenced the body of work, which
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became more personal and yet more accessible to audiences who began to find here as well as in feature films stories and subjects which related more to their own lives and experiences. Further, the short film was again brought into some theaters as filler material, or in the case of the Cinq Films Pour Cent Ans, comprised the feature attraction in themselves. Television programmed some short films on the RTM program hosted by Ali Hassan (Le Grand Écran) but particularly in a brand new RTM program entitled Zawaya. Most of the filmmakers-living-abroad, as well as Moroccan short film directors, and of course feature film directors, were interviewed and their short films screened when possible on the Zawaya program, which also spurred new life into short filmmaking. Channel 2M as well as the Ali Hassan cinema program scheduled several Moroccan features, some of which will be presented below.
FEATURE FILMS AND FILMMAKERS: 1986–2006 One of the three significant trends between 1986 and 2006 was the move of feature films toward tackling subjects and utilizing styles that were more attractive to the Moroccan audience. The CCM was let off the hook a little and the focus of criticism turned to the filmmakers themselves and their ability or not to make films appealing to Moroccan audiences, to make more humanistic films, to use their means wisely to make an approachable cinema.160 This period, thus, could be characterized as the “move towards pleasing the Moroccan audience” phase for feature films, since several new films gained public acclaim and broke box office records. Perhaps 115 to 120 feature films were directed by Moroccans either living-in-Morocco or living-abroad, although some added explanation is required for the period. It is unclear whether Mesbahi’s Cry of Bosnia was ever completed; Smihi’s film Lady of Cairo was shot in and about Egypt; and Ben Barka’s 1990 film The Drums of Fire (The Battle of the 3 Kings) was reedited and rereleased in 1993 as The Knights of Victory/Les Cavaliers de la Gloire but was essentially the same film. Between 1986 and 1989 only nine films were made in four years, while twenty-seven films were made in the six years between 1990 and 1995 with the greatest number of films occurring in anticipation of the fourth national festival of Moroccan cinema and just before the production fund was changed yet again. The period of 1996–2001 saw thirty-four features emerge, while 2002–2007 had at least fifty features produced. As with short films, some individuals were notable for their prolific production. Derkaoui produced six features, Lagtaa five, while Benjelloun and Noury produced eight features each; Ben Barka, Benlyazid, Ferhati,
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Ismail, Lahlou, Oulad Sayed, Smihi, and Tazi produced four features each; and Saad Chraibi generated six features during this era. Subjects moved to reflect more closely the people and issues prevalent in Morocco. Some examples would be Ferhati’s Horses of Fortune, which dealt with the difficulties faced by Moroccans wishing to emigrate or even simply travel to Europe for any reason, whether for work, health, or pleasure; Lahlou’s Night of the Crime was based on true newspaper stories of a crime in Morocco; Noury’s Stolen Childhood concerned the reality of the situation of young girls brought from the countryside to work in more prosperous households in urban areas as maids or semislaves. Further, Noury claims that he makes realistic cinema, stories taken from everyday life. His is a cinema of the people, socialist realist in tone although his most popular film is a comedy.161 Benlyazid’s Door to the Sky dealt with dual identities stretched between France and Morocco; Lagtaâ’s Love in Casablanca revealed a more realistically promiscuous but also confused Moroccan youth, while Yachfine’s Khafaya expressed the continuing conflict between traditional conceptions of magic and modern notions of medicine and rationality. Ayouch’s Ali Zaoua revealed the complex and dangerous dilemmas faced by Morocco’s street children, while Marock located itself entirely in an upper-class milieu that had never been the subject of film in Morocco. Several films were particularly successful although all of the above-mentioned films were very popular: Love in Casablanca (Lagtaa), The Beach of Lost Children (Ferhati),162 Stolen Childhood and Elle est diabetique, hypertendue et elle refuse de crever (She is diabetic, hypertensive and refuses to die) (Noury), and Looking for the Husband of My Wife (M. A. Tazi), Marock (Marrakchi), Femmes . . . et Femmes (Saad Chraibi), Mille Mois (A Thousand Months) (Bensaidi), Ali Zaoua and Mektoub (Ayouch), Casablanca by Night (Derkaoui), and Les Bandits (Naciri). Overall, this particular period emphasized that commercial or successful films in Morocco did not have to automatically equate with mediocrity in story, a modeling upon Egyptian or Hollywood style, or require an exorbitant budget.163 Moroccan film directors became more in touch with their own society and their own patrimony,164 and were doing so without resorting to false stories into history or artificially separating urban and rural societies. Customs could be represented as lived experience rather than folklore,165 and representations were finally being made more to please the local spectators than foreign festivals. As local audiences began to rally behind Moroccan directors, one or two distributors and exhibitors also began to change their attitudes about national film support so that for the first time there seemed to be a glimmer, by 1995, of hope for a real progress in the development of a cinema that would be of quality, appeal to national spectators, have distribution, and perhaps allow
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films to earn some of their production costs through distribution and exhibition in a variety of venues. Yet all was not resolved. As Bennani put it once, Morocco “is a small country with a ‘personalized’ film industry, making it like a small town with intrigues, back-biting, favoritism, cronyism and other hazards to harmonious progress.”166 There were enmities abounding in the cinema field, closed circles of who could work with whom, critical relations between the CCM and filmmakers, and still much work to be done to make the sector more professional in levels other than the content and qualities of individual films. However, the films discussed were not always the most popular, such as Yachfine’s films, but the focus is primarily upon those films that were either unique to the period, or were produced by a filmmaker not already introduced in other chapters. For example, although Ferhati directed several excellent and popular films during this era, none of his films appear here since his work was already discussed previously. Farida Benlyazid (also Belyazid and Benyazid) Farida Benlyazid is one of the few women who work in cinema because it is such a difficult field that most women have not had the flexibility and family/social support to put up with the problems and demands. She expressed hopes that the new generation of women will work advantageously in cinema because they think more freely and openly.167 She began working with Jilali Ferhati on his first film Brêche dans le Mur (Hole in the Wall),168 and since then has been scriptwriter, director, production manager, assistant director, novelist, and journalist. Born in 1948, she finished studies in literature in 1970 in Casablanca, then married and lived in Tangier with two children. When she decided to pursue higher education, her husband had her passport seized and she was forbidden to travel. This was when she first realized the false restrictions that men placed over women in the name of Islam, an event that would mark her filmmaking permanently. Overcoming numerous obstacles she obtained a divorce and traveled to France, with her two small children, to work and study. She remained in France between 1971 and 1977, receiving a degree in letters in 1974 and attending ICEC cinema school in Paris between 1974 and 1976. Then she directed a TV film about Arab women, Identités de Femmes (1977, 20 min) for French TV (FR3),169 and by 1978 had returned to Morocco, founded her own production company, Kamar Film, and was working with Jilali Ferhati on his film Brêche dans le Mur (as production manager, producer, and assistant director).170 In 1978–1979 she wrote the script for Cane Dolls, and was the director of production for Ferhati. She wrote (1983–1984) and
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directed (1986–1987) her first feature, Door to the Sky/Bab Smah Maftouh/ Une Porte sur le Ciel, also wrote and directed a short film for the Cinq Films Pour Cent Ans in 1995, Sur La Terrasse, and three additional features, La Ruse des Femmes (Women’s Wiles) (1997),171 Casablanca, Casablanca, and La vida perra de Juanita Narboni (The Dog’s Life of Juanita Narboni) (2005). She wrote the scripts for Tazi’s Badis and Looking for the Husband of My Wife (with Sail), and won an award for her own script for Door to the Sky in 1991. In addition to writing and directing for cinema, she also wrote for several publications, such as Le Liberal between 1988 and 1994, Kalima, and Autrement (France), and wrote a novel, Une Journé dans la vie de Hajja Leithmath (Autrement, Paris, Sept. 1990). Her film scripts contain many autobiographical or lived components, especially when she writes about women’s lives.172 In particular, Cane Dolls was a chance for her to explore the oppression of women as well as her own oppression, and became a personal exploration as much as a script for a film.173 In a sense the film was of reminiscences because all the rituals in the film were rituals Farida had experienced herself. Even more so, her first directorial feature was very much based on her own experiences and her very personal insights into the interrelationships of women, religion, place, and space. The following analysis of this film will be particularly detailed, while subsequent descriptions of films by other directors will be much more brief. As one of only two features written and directed by a Moroccan woman, and one which created a huge hue and cry in Morocco, the film merits such close attention. Une Porte Sur le Ciel/Door to the Sky/Bab Smah Maftouh (1987–1988, 90–100 mins., 35 mm)174 Nadia, a young girl of mixed parentage (Moroccan father, French mother) grows up in Fez in an elegant old palatial house with many servants and lush gardens; she studies in French but speaks in Moroccan dialect to household help; her mother is a painter, whom the Muslim grandmother tries to convert to Islam, but the best friend is Ba Sassi, the caretaker and mystic. Nadia grows up with a vivid dream sense infused with Ba Sassi’s stories of magic. The film opens on Nadia’s return to Fez after many years’ residence and education in France, to meet her older sister and brother at the bedside of her dying father. She arrives in black jeans, leather jacket, spike bracelet, sleeves torn from her t-shirt, and hair dyed fire-engine red on top. But her return to Fez is also a return to a part of herself that had lain dormant during her years in France. Soon after her return she wanders through the house, looking again at her mother’s paintings, and recalling her past, her youth, and her friendship with the caretaker Sufi Ba Sassi. Her brother, also a French resident, has decided to cut all ties to Morocco, to become only French. Laila, the older sister, had long ago chosen Morocco
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as her home and felt comfortable as a French/Moroccan hybrid. While everyone assumed that Nadia had followed her brother’s lead and chosen France over Morocco, she blurts out that “no, she wants both identities.” Thus, a crisis erupts at her father’s death; Nadia is suddenly face to face with her “self” identity and realizes that she does not really know who she is or what she wants; what does it mean to be Moroccan or French-Moroccan, or Muslim? She sinks into a deep depression which she exacerbates with whiskey, introspection, and letter writing, cutting herself off from the family. Laila forces her to don white mourning clothes and to participate in the Koran recitation in honor of her father. Once Nadia hears Kirana (a woman) reciting the Koran, she slowly begins to transform; her punk hairdo and clothes, whiskey drinking and anger slowly give way to an interest in “things Moroccan” and, pointedly, “things Islamic.” Her French partner, Jean Philippe, a photojournalist, comes unbidden to Morocco to aid her through her father’s death and to be with her because her letters had been so full of soul-searching, confusion, and conflict. But Nadia rejects him, saying that she is no longer satisfied to display the evils of the world on television as he does; she wants something more real and personal. Further, he cannot help her because he is an outsider; to him Morocco and Islam are foreign, can only be foreign. They separate, but remain friends.175 She still closets herself in the house, absorbed in writing, learning the Koran, reading philosophy and about Islam, forgetting all else. Kirana finds her one day, hair disheveled, housedress all torn, the house in disarray, and slowly helps Nadia regain a sort of balance, a more sane way to live and learn and even practice Islam. Yet Nadia’s is not a simplistic return to Islam, a fundamentalist awakening, a rediscovery of her heritage. Nadia undergoes a deep inquiry into her beliefs about nature, people, society and social order, philosophy, religion, and her own self-being. In this process, she has a revelation about what she should do, although she is not sure she understands the revelation at first, since it comes in the form of a dream or a visitation from the deceased caretaker of her youth, Ba Sassi, an initiate of the Jillala order, who tells her she will find succor by following him and that he is the protector of the house. Nadia is terrified, but soon realizes what she should do—have her siblings cede to her the family home so she can open a zawiya, a refuge for women. The revelation is succeeded by two confirmations. Immediately a battered young girl is found huddling in terror in a crevice of the rooftop. She is adopted and her care, education, and salvation initiate the zawiya. Also, the housemaid, who has worked for the family since she was a child, is discovered to be pregnant, but she is so ignorant she does not even know how she became pregnant. Laila wants to toss her out into the street in shame, whereas
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Nadia keeps her in the house, where she continues to work but also becomes Nadia’s friend and helper. Yet Nadia must also combat her brother’s and sister’s contradictory desires for the house. The brother, who inherits the major portion of the property according to Islamic jurisprudence, wants to sell it. Laila is more ambivalent because she lives in a modern and affluent suburb; religion is the foundation of her daily life, but she sees it as a social contract rather than a personal spiritual endeavor, so is not happy that Nadia wants to open a zawiya. She believes Nadia is going too far in her spiritual pursuits. Thus Nadia has to find a lawyer and initiate a lawsuit against her brother in order to keep the house, which she finally wins. The four women (Nadia, Kirana who comes often, the little girl, and the maid) are joined soon by other women of all kinds, from an obviously upper-class, economically well-off slightly zany spiritual seeker, to a woman constantly abused by her husband who suspects her of infidelity and will never accept her protestations of innocence, continually torturing her with questions and doubts and suspicions until she runs away to the zawiya. At this moment the zawiya really gets official recognition. When the husband hammers hysterically at the door demanding his wife back, passersby tell him to let her alone for the zawiya is her refuge. But it costs money to keep the house going and most of the women seeking refuge are penniless. As Nadia delves ever more deeply into her spiritual practice and inquiries, she also becomes more psychic, sees visions, goes into trances, and eventually becomes a healer. But her first assay was to be receptive, on the Night of Destiny (Lailat al Qadr), to Ba Sassi and a guiding light pointing to a spot in the garden. Digging, she finds a little chest full of jewels and jewelry, just what would keep the zawiya operating. At a Jillala leila (evening ceremony) she falls into a trance, from which time everyone begins to realize the depth of her spiritual attainment and she becomes known as a healer. As the zawiya grows in number of women, two significant events shape Nadia’s future. Laila asks Nadia to look in on the wife of one of their father’s former partners, because the woman is in distress and needs help. She and Nadia go to the house, and the mother asks Nadia to look in on her son. The mother is distraught because her son, Abdelkrim, does nothing, takes no responsibilities for the family now that the father has died, refuses to work, acts melancholy, sick, angry, and disruptive. Nadia goes to his room, finds him ostensibly asleep, and when about to touch his forehead to investigate for fever, is shocked and flees when he lurches forward abruptly and kisses her. The boy’s image stays with her and bothers her. He soon comes to the zawiya to apologize for his despicable behavior, truly sorry, and she learns that he is melancholy because he does not believe in the world that he is supposed
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to function in; he is an artist, a philosopher, a seeker. The two have much in common and could have a long friendship except that the women in the zawiya complain that a man has come to visit and that Nadia actually received him and talked to him. Nadia, the women reprimand, should only see the young man outside—although that is also incriminating behavior. As well, the lawyer who helped her get the house brings over a troubled young woman who has just been released from prison with nowhere to go. Nadia offers her refuge in the house, but the woman, wearing short hair, jeans and a gruff demeanor, and drinking liquor, is not interested in “spiritual” life or prayer. The other women in the house complain to Nadia that the girl does not pray, she drinks, and thus does not belong with them and should not stay. Further, the girl herself does not want to stay; she wants to get high and find a man to spend the night with. Nadia is shocked into realizing that she has denied one aspect of her makeup, her sexuality and personal desire. The shock sends her into a deep depression, exacerbated by the hysterical uproar caused by the women over every deviation from the status quo of mainstream society—no manly unreligious women allowed, no men at all allowed, no blasphemy, no freedom of thought. She recognizes that she has re-created that which she sought to counter, the segregated world in which Islam and religion erect barriers between people, especially males and females, rather than uniting them. She realizes that she cannot stay in the zawiya any longer. Abdelkrim soon arrives and breaks into the house, running past all the horrified women into Nadia’s room. As the women all arrive in a huff of complaints and reprobations, Nadia bursts out that Abdelkrim has asked her to marry him, at which the women gathered utter halfhearted and confused yuu-yuus. Nadia and Abdelkrim leave to travel together, united by their spiritual search and deep insights rather than separated by specious values and gender differences. This is a film about existentialism and social philosophy, from the Arab philosophers to Marx and Angela Davis, and a film about return, duality, memory, location, and desire. Two of the more important themes are the principles of return in all possible symbolic and religious meanings, and the principle of duality in cultural and linguistic aspects. The return to the country and the house caused returns to childhood memories and personal remembrances, and even to collective memories which were Islam and the philosophers—but this return to collective memory was not easy for Nadia because she had lived in “cultural exile”; thus her immersion in Islam and the spiritual realm had to be arrived at through a kind of madness. Only Kirana was able to redirect the madness of submersion into physical action and selfdirection. The film is full of referents to duality: language, clothing, manner of eating, house decoration. The dualism, it seems, could not be overcome by
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love, since Nadia rejected her French boyfriend, saying that he saw her and her culture only as a tourist could, because he did not live it, did not have the cultural background and baggage to really understand. Yet the film overall does not want to reinforce this separation—Benlyazid’s goal was for people to get rid of duality by focusing on deep fundamentals that provide spiritual security, to establish a cultural identity of union rather than separation. That is why at first Nadia has to reject her French boyfriend, but later on can accept someone alienated from Moroccan culture, such as her lover Abdelkrim. Fez as the location is symbolic of the cultural depth of Moroccan society, the persistence of tradition in the face of the modern, the cohabitation of duality. Door to the Sky is a film of contradictions seeking harmony and understanding. Morocco is a land of contradictions, peopled by contradictions seeking harmony and understanding. Deep in the heart of Fez nestles Qarawiyyin University, the oldest religious institution of learning in the Arab world. Deep in the smog-laden deafening roar of Casablanca traffic nestles the new cyber-cafe. During the drought Tangawis must scrimpily hoard precious water brought by ship from France while plane loads of German and Swiss tourists sunbathe in the nude on the luxurious beaches of Agadir. Zagora’s women leave the comfortable bosom of satellite television to head to the river to wash clothes and visit their neighbors. Rabati women hustle from their downtown offices to grab coffee and cakes with friends in nearby cafes before returning home for the evening to watch Guadalupe176 on cable television. The city women bank workers visit their village sisters during the Eid to celebrate “en famille.” Khadija packs her shorts and tank top to return to university in the States. Rachida feeds palm fronds into the outdoor clay oven in the courtyard to prepare bread for the family’s breakfast of tea and bread before they head to the fields for the day. In Morocco, Rachida and Khadija sometimes live totally unrelated lives, but are sisters or cousins. Sometimes Rachida and Khadija are the same woman who goes to university in Europe and then goes home to visit and bakes bread in the outdoor oven. Moroccans are quite familiar, though not necessarily comfortable, with the states of duality and contradiction, with lives of duality and contradiction, with the demands of duality and contradiction. Benlyazid only personalizes this state of interwoven contradiction and duality in her film. As author and critic Belfquih summates: Whatever it may be, this film must legitimately mark an epoch for us—because to the great displeasure of the prejudiced and the gullible, it interrogates that which is sacred in us. We all have a preconceived mental space, invested with collective memory that even our education, no matter how erudite it may have been, can modify. In fact, we live a certain duality: on one hand we have our acquired culture, our intellectual knowledge, and on the other hand this socio-collective
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mental space. And Belyazid has taken up juxtaposing these two oppositions which coexist in us.177
Door to the Sky’s content of contradiction and duality was matched by the film’s reception. Some considered it a beautifully crafted inquiry into a personal dilemma of development and change. Some considered it pure folkloric depiction of backward Morocco. From the positive view, the film was an example of how the traditional and the modern could both be represented in a Moroccan film to reveal the complexities of social change and interpersonal relationships. From the negative view, the film was another example of representing only the “folkloric,” the religious, the sentimental, the magical, and the worst side of Moroccan society to pander to the voyeuristic interests of foreign film consumers. It is quite significant that the film has not had a unified reception in Morocco. The film is, par excellence, a representation—in itself and in its reception—of the dilemma and contradictions located in every facet of life in Morocco. A frequent argument against the film is that women are not oppressed in either Islam or Morocco, so why should the film create such a fiction? Morocco, being a democracy, has modern institutions to address problems of abandonment, abuse, and other problems confronting women.178 Another is that Benlyazid used French language in her film, a problematic move on her part which obviously, according to Abd Al-Rafee’a’s criticism, means that Benlyazid could not write in Arabic or felt inferior compared to the French and thus felt compelled to use their language. Of course, characters speaking French in the film also might have been a strategy on Benlyazid’s part to display the duality of life in Morocco where upbringing and education sometimes produce a small population that speaks French more fluently than Arabic? Most of the young generation of Moroccans have all learned some foreign language in school, at least those who have gone to nonreligious schools. The dominant foreign language taught is French, harking back to the French colonization of the country from 1912 to 1956. Most people speak a Moroccan or Berber dialect as a daily language. It is common for individuals of upper-class families to go to French schools and learn little or no formal Arabic; thus, they do not write in Arabic and can function generally only in the dialect. But the language of religion is Classical Arabic, which differs tremendously from the dialect and requires formal training. In the film, similar to what might occur in society at large, when elites speak to each other, and often when the two sisters speak together, they use French. Nadia also speaks French with Bahia, the lawyer, and other individuals who have had either a greater degree of foreign influence or an extended education. With the lower-class women and with Kirana, Nadia would speak Moroccan dialect. Rather than expressing Benlyazid’s
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own deficiency in language, the film expresses the reality of language use in the country. Benlyazid represents another very important element of Morocco which is the notion of the family house and inheritance. The house itself is important; it represents so much in society and in the film. According to the characterization sketch provided by Benlyazid, the house is another character: “It is, in a certain manner the principal character. It is a vestige of a civilization in the process of disappearing. It represents the cradle of the Arabo-Andalusian (Moroccan) culture of which the city of Fez has long been proud.”179 The house can be an intensely loaded symbol: as a home, hearth, heart, center. And in these cases the houses, lieu of generations and multiple family members normally, signifies a whole way of living and belonging, not just a domicile. Nadia comes from a wealthy family, and has had the opportunity to experience a freedom that comes with her class position. But in the zawiya she discovers a Morocco she had not previously identified with, that of working women, women with few opportunities, rejected and marginalized women, religious women. She has to learn more about women in her heritage, for example, learning about women singing the Koran, women who are very religious and still travel, women philosophers and healers—positions her class upbringing had not introduced her to and which she did not expect to find. Nadia tries to create a new family outside of the elite sphere in which she previously operated, a family outside of blood relations, and a family outside of class position. It is interesting that she leaves her boyfriend who is interested in making television about oppressed people, about war victims, about man’s inhumanity to man because now she wants to address those problems in a different way. But as a mixture of old and new, east and west, she is not willing to give herself over completely to the dictates of her “new family.” When the women in the zawiya become too repressive in their turn, she leaves the zawiya in search of something more personal than collective. This move on her part significantly makes this a personal rather than collective story. But Benlyazid also wants to show, through Nadia’s relationship with Abdelkrim, that a woman can be both modern and traditional at the same time; she can be modern while still nationalist and dedicated to natal culture. Nadia’s mother lived within Morocco without becoming Moroccan—her art reflects this, since nudes are not a common Moroccan painting genre. But she lives, bears children, and learns to heartily embrace certain facets of Moroccan culture. Nadia herself was born in Morocco, but did not integrate totally there, nor did she integrate into France, although she physically bore the outward trappings. Thus the individual has to go beyond just identifying with land of origins, or
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land of residence, and find the inner markers of self. Nadia, hearing Kirana chant, seeing a new Moroccan woman’s possibility, must confront a self that is happy nowhere—not France, not traditional Morocco, not even the zawiya she creates. She is always searching for her place, for her self. According to Benlyazid’s “Note d’Intention,” “The film is also about the world of women, which is cloistered rather than closed. Door to the Sky is, above all the expression of double culture which involves in one way or another every individual of our epoch, which represents the whole of a generation in the process of mutation. Nadia is a mutant—a human being who searches for her equilibrium in a universe crossed by the shocks of history.”180 In these shocks, Nadia’s “rationalist” and “materialist” education does not give her the tools to deal with the alienation she suddenly feels, thus she turns to her other side, prayer, meditation, and Sufism; this mystical path helps her to regain her sense of self and identity. Nadia represents Benlyazid herself, who draws on Al Hallaj and other mystics, and believes in a moderate Islam, which can help rid humanity of its evils. But it is primarily Benlyazid’s inclusion of Islam in her particular way that has drawn the most criticism and controversy about the film. Nadia witnesses a miracle on the night of destiny, when a door to the sky opens and shines upon a hidden treasure, which allows her to open the zawiya and eventually find a communion with a man who shares her life.181 Thus, Benlyazid emphasizes that there is room for the magic and unexplainable in life, and a limit to the explanatory and resolving power of rationality, so within Islam there is the opportunity to be spiritual without being dogmatic and rigid or enclosed in a limited world. Benlyazid said she represented Islam as she did, because she does believe in Islam profoundly, and because she is spiritual she also recognizes that there are many paths within Islam. She purposefully evokes the humanistic side of Islam in which the qualities demanded of Muslims are Charity, Generosity, and Sacrifice. However, the many critics who focused upon the treatment of Islam in the film used very personal criteria and definitions of Islam as bases for their criticisms. One criticism was that Nadia’s affair with her lover destroyed the effectiveness of the film, and in fact destroyed the moral of the whole film. Further, to some viewers the film does not show “true” Islam, or they attack the film because it encourages a return to “any” Islam as an option. Others critique the folkloric representation of Islam and beliefs such as the fact that on the night of destiny a shareefa (female descendant of the prophet) could find a treasure, and also as a shareefa, she could heal the ill.182 Other critics attack the representation of nude paintings while the Koran is being recited or criticize the use of Koranic recitation under the film credits, since it makes the recitation like music, which is forbidden.183
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Further, another author criticizes the film for not being “realistic.” According to him, because religion is more than ritual and magic, Benlyazid is very wrong to show only this type of practice of Islam, for folklorizing Islam, for making everyone think that Moroccans only practice magic and sorcery rather than strict Islamic ideology.184 While “true” (perhaps “orthodox”) Islam is not supposed to be suffused with magic and ritual, in reality “most” Moroccans still participate in the ritualistic aspects because that is what they have grown up with, that appeals to them, that satisfies their needs. Perhaps very strict observers, very devout or very educated people do not follow the uniquely Moroccan traditions but adhere to a more rigid and austere form of Islam, but “most” people practice culturalized religion, Moroccan-style Islam, which includes saint worship, belief in djin, magic, visions, the evil eye, and even zawiyas. No writers noted the progression that Nadia made from a limited understanding of Islam into the mystical form that she finally chose. She pursued a long path, over years, moved from reading the Koran and philosophers into immersion in “strict” Islam, then modification into the more “social” form of Islam which is practiced in general in Morocco. She practiced the strict form of Islam but found it unsatisfactory for her, just as she found that the form of Islam that suited her fellow zawiya women was not satisfactory for her either. So she and her lover were forced out, to find their own way together. The intolerance shown to Nadia’s desire to have a relationship, sexual or nonsexual, with a man in the zawiya is an important point because it emphasizes how social structures can replicate themselves in unexpected locations. Nadia thought she was creating a liberated space in the zawiya, but once the number of women outnumbered her and their collective perceptions and desires dominated her own, Nadia had to realize that the women were not learning a new form of interrelationship but were only replicating the same intolerance that had driven them to the zawiya in the first instance.185 Not only was Benlyazid one of the few writers and directors who could tackle the controversial subject of women and religion (which she did for Ferhati in Cane Dolls, here in Door to the Sky, for Tazi in Badis), she is one of the few Moroccan directors who used the elements of Moroccan and Islamic heritage in her stylistics as well as subject matter. Abdelkader Lagtaâ Born in Casablanca in 1948, Lagtaâ studied film directing in Poland, returning to Morocco in the early 1970s to work in cinema. After participating in the collective film Les Cendres du Clos he also directed short films such as Rabi and Chaibia in 1984, Le Devoilement in 1985, and Happy Ending in
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1995.186 But in 1991 he would be called one of the “new generation” of filmmakers who tapped in to the stories that Moroccan audiences could appreciate, with his film Love in Casablanca. After decades of Moroccan filmmakers blaming the low reception of their films upon their low technical capacities and budgets, Lagtaâ’s film is an instance in which the technical was not as important to the audience as was the subject being treated. Thus, although not one of Morocco’s best productions, his film is initial proof that Moroccan audiences are much more lenient and forgiving to Moroccan filmmakers than ever previously admitted. His second feature, La Porte Close, was coproduced with France, shot in Casablanca, Marrakesh and Ouarzazate; the film was reportedly blocked in editing because the coproduction firm Atlantis declared bankruptcy, and although the company owner was willing to bring the film to Morocco to edit at the CCM, he could not get a visa (as an Algerian)—though the film was finally finished and released in 1999.187 Lagtaâ proposed a subsequent feature film to the CCM, Les Casablancais, a Franco-Moroccan-Canadian co-production with support from the Fonds Sud Cinema, which was awarded 2,300,000 dirhams in 1997 by the CCM. He’s also directed Face a Face, and Yasmine et les Hommes. Hub Fi Dar al Beida/Love in Casablanca/Un Amour à Casablanca (1991, 100 mins, 35 mm, color)188 Selwa, a young student of eighteen still attending high school, finds herself alone at home with a distant and strict father and a stepmother she dislikes—after her mother committed suicide and her older sister left home. To retaliate against her strict and harsh father and her intrusive stepmother, Selwa seduces Jalil, a businessman aged fifty, and becomes his mistress. After school Jalil would pick her up and take her to whatever rendezvous he could conjure for their tryst. Jalil desperately needed Selwa to alleviate the anxieties he felt because his wife left him, he had to take care of his twenty-year-old son, he had been having many problems at work, and Selwa brought adventure and sexuality back into his life. But the couple began to have problems because of Jalil’s age, his status, and his need to keep their relationship a secret. Jalil always seemed to be somewhat inept. At a secret bungalow, their meeting would be interrupted by an intruder. At their “lovenest” apartment, the real owner would show up unexpectedly. Jalil was always lurking and ducking to avoid being recognized. Being stuck in outof-the-way meeting spots, never able to go out and have any fun, always having sex the only point of their meeting—these habitual relationship requirements frustrated Selwa. She began to tire of Jalil, even standing him up and refusing to talk to him on the phone. Then at a party of young people (replete with sex and drugs) she meets Najib, a young photographer who cajoles her into coming to
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his studio so he can photograph her hands. They meet, talk, do other photo sessions, attend art galleries, and fall in love over time. The two youths finally have found someone they enjoy being with, someone they can talk and share with, someone they do not have to be secretive about, and the couple do not actually have sex for a long time after they fall in love. All the time that the spectator knows that Najib is actually Jalil’s son, none of the three is aware of the triangle they form. Eventually Selwa decides to leave Jalil for good because she is really in love with Najib, but she never tells Jalil why she does not want to see him any more. Being abandoned drives Jalil insane with jealousy and worry. He starts to follow her and even goes to the school, pretending to be her uncle, in order to confront her. He only drives her further away. At one point he decides to kidnap her, but is too inept to accomplish his plan. However, he does make a secret call to Selwa’s father to let him know his daughter is no longer a virgin. Selwa’s father reacts explosively and demands that Selwa be tested by a doctor, and confined to the home. At the same time, Najib tells his father that he is in love; only when the father sees Selwa’s photo does he realize who Najib is seeing. Not the supportive father, Jalil arranges a situation whereby Najib would find out in a hurtful way that his father had already been seeing and having sex with Selwa. Cut to the core, being a very sensitive young man and very much in love, Najib commits suicide before Selwa can reach him to explain the mix-up. This melodramatic scenario was hugely popular with Moroccan youth audiences, and at the time was the “most watched film” of the Moroccan filmography. People went to see the film several times and students would go in groups. Why? Because for the first time it seemed that real situations, needs, desires, and lifestyles were being portrayed, and the film denounced the retrograde attitudes and reactions of fathers in the face of the impediments and conflicts that faced Moroccan youths—disintegrating families, untrustworthy parents, unemployment, and bleak futures, young girls being seduced by much older men, the inability for youths to marry for many years, and a diminishment of the need to remain a virgin until marriage, the influence of drugs and alcohol on youths, and even the hopelessness that many youths felt in Morocco. Further, the film was considered quite risqué, since Mouna Fettou was shown in underwear and in bed with a man, the topic of sexual intercourse and virginity were broached, and other previously censored situations and topics were included, such as youths at a party having casual sex, smoking hashish, and doing drugs. The most important part of the film was its topic, not its technical or cinematic quality. Mouna Fettou, who played Selwa, won the prize for best actress at the third national festival of cinema in Meknes in 1991, but the cinematic quality of the film overall was unpolished. Yet, in spite of the acting, lighting, camera work, and small details of plot, audiences were able to overlook
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technical aspects because they focused upon the fact that the story spoke to their times and their situations. Hakim Noury (also Nouri) Noury, born in 1952, began working in cinema in the 1970s, primarily crewing for Ben Barka and as assistant director for visiting filmmakers, producing his first short film in 1977, Sans Paroles/Bidoun Kalam (Without Words).189 Yet he is also a State employee in the Customs Department in Casablanca, and is one of the more prolific filmmakers in both shorts and features. In addition to Sans Paroles he directed several television films—Le Chauffeur de Taxi (1984), Electricien (1984), La Servante (1985, censored) and a short film for Cinq Films Pour Cent Ans, Cinéma Imperial. Noury has at least eight features to his credit: Le Facteur/The Mailman/Saa’aee alBareed (1980, 85 mins, 35 mm, b/w) (film description190); Le Marteau et L’Enclume/The Hammer and the Anvil (1989, 35 mm, 100 mins, color) (film description191); L’Enfance Volée/Stolen Childhood (1994, description below); Voleur de Rêves/Thief of Dreams (1995, 95 mins, 35 mm, color) (film description192) and Un Simple Fait Divers begun in 1997,193 though Noury continued to produce prolifically into the new millennium with Destin de Femme (Women’s Destiny), Elle est diabetique, hypertendue et elle refuse de crever, Une Histoire d’Amour (A History of Love), and a sequel Elle est diatebique, hypertendue et elle toujours refuse de crever, all quite popular. Noury has a quite unique reputation as a Moroccan filmmaker who emphasizes the melodrama genre in his films during this decade, but he also often tackles important social issues that emerge from real Moroccan events. Noury has never had a problem finding a distributor or exhibitor for his films, he claims, because he eschews intellectual approaches in favor of the melodramatic or comedic genres which are more popular with Moroccan audiences who then attend screenings of his films. In fact, rather than criticizing the audience for its tastes in films, he uses the genre to make socially conscious films which in turn do raise the consciousness of his viewers. Noury’s goal is to point a finger at, to show the ills of Moroccan society, to sensitize the Moroccan public, to make people aware of problems that can be solved194—and yet still attract spectators and entertain.195 Noury once said: I do not make films with social themes just to seduce the public, but because injustice horrifies me. As well, I am in a position to listen to people of modest means, to hear their problems and they share with me. And I think it is incumbent upon me to make those problems take shape on the screen. I do not think there is any reason for a cinema which lets sufferings pass silently. In Morocco’s short film history, the dominant theme was not to descend towards the masses,
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but to make the masses ascend towards the master filmmaker. I think that was presumptuous. I think the filmmaker should address the masses, his audience, those who fund his films! The filmmaker has the obligation to educate the eye of the spectator, but gradually.196
He claims that the intellectual style of many films made in Morocco was actually imposed by the West that did not want competition and thus encouraged third world filmmakers to make intellectual and festival films, to ghettoize them in festivals and small audiences.197 Having to choose between festivals and national audiences, he always preferred to please Moroccan audiences first and foremost. In turn, those audiences would support Moroccan films, attend the cinemas, return more money to the cinema sector, and allow more films to emerge. Yet pleasing the audience did not always mean pleasing cinema critics in Morocco, who have always been very harsh with Noury. One critic at the fourth national festival of film went so far as to call his latest endeavor, The Thief of Dreams, a “disgusting” film.198 Yet Noury is not interested in comparing himself to Western filmmakers or trying to achieve a standard set by the west; he prefers to do his best to tell a good story, that stems from Moroccan experiences and cultural values, that will speak to Moroccan audiences, and do so without denigrating his own abilities and resources. His films are not marvels of cinematic artistry, but are good stories which attract his intended public, and satisfy the director as well. One of his most popular and influential films was Stolen Childhood, which took its subject from the press and social reality and in turn influenced social reality through raising consciousness, and discussion that was in turn disseminated in the press as well as through personal discussions. L’Enfance Volée/Stolen Childhood (1994, 90 mins, 35 mm, color)199 Mbarek has passed through the countryside and convinced parents there is a lot of work for their children in Casablanca; since the families are so poor, it would be to their benefit to let their children work and help the family. Of course, the child would be well taken care of, clothed, fed, housed, educated . . . and have a profession when grown. Rkia, looking much younger than her ten years, is prepared by her family to be sold into servitude in Casablanca. Rkia runs to her favorite playing field and amidst silent tears, buries her doll and her childhood. Immediately as she arrives at Mbarek’s place (a bakery), she is picked up and taken to Assia’s affluent villa, warned to be obedient and clean, and shut away in a cell-like basement room alone. Never really rebellious, Rkia is resentful, silent, observant, critical, and persevering as she watches and educates herself about her new world of huge modern city, luxurious villa, numerous gadgets and decor never seen in the country, and strange interpersonal relations.
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Throughout her stay with this family, she is abused for not already knowing how everything works, fed only leftovers from others’ plates, forbidden to play or touch the toys of the daughter who is of the same age, forced to carry and work as hard as someone twice her age and size, even loaned out to “friends” who cram her in the back of their car with the dog when they want to go to the beach and need someone to carry all their gear while they relax and play. Rkia does not even get the consideration their dog does. He gets an umbrella and water; she gets to sit sweating in the sun, waiting. At one point Assia’s daughter has a birthday party; Rkia is enthralled at the gifts, cake, dresses, kids, decorations, and imagines it as her own birthday. But she quickly plummets to earth when Assia’s daughter decides that Rkia would make a great donkey for her and her friends to ride on. Rkia, in her nicest dress, is made to get on hands and knees and crawl around while the spoiled rich kids ride on her back, kick her in the sides, and totally neglect her humanity. Needless to say, Rkia is not educated, not treated as a human even by the other older maid of the house; she is forced to work day and night and receives no salary herself. Her father comes once, gets her salary, and leaves her sobbing; her tears only merit a beating from the mistress. Even when she begins her menstruation, all she merits from the older maid is a beating for soiling the laundry. Yet the scenario at Assia’s house actually turns out to be the high point in Rkia’s life. She goes from house to house, from abuse to abuse. By the time she is a teenager she finds herself in the employ of a mother and her young adult son who only drinks and does drugs. One evening in a drug or drink stupor the man tries to rape Rkia; she fights back and for her impudence is thrown from the house in the middle of the night. She has only Mbarek to help her, and has returned to him time and again. But she no longer wants a housekeeper job. Soon she is employed in a factory as a seamstress and finds a friend, another seamstress. Rkia moves in with the girl, who has two other roommates in a two-room dump, who supplement their pittance incomes by “dating” and hoping to find a rich husband. Rkia, rather than becoming more cynical and harsh over time, has become naiveté doubled because she has never lived a real, personal life; she has always lived under the rules and restrictions of her employers. She is a virgin, wants to wait for marriage, and has never had but one boyfriend, Jamal. But she falls so in love with Jamal that she does everything for him: paying for their drinks at a cafe, stealing a shirt from her former employer so that he could look handsome at his job interview, paying for their ice cream at another cafe, and more. Jamal, supposedly still a student, makes Rkia believe that he is on the verge of getting a great job; he just needs some money for an emergency that he could get from his family but only by going away for a while; she gladly gives
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him her gold bracelet. Further, Jamal nags and needles Rkia, finally convincing her to have sex with him because “of course they will get married as soon as he saves money from his fabulous new job.” She agrees reluctantly, soon finds out she is pregnant, and tells Jamal. He tells her he will work it all out, gets all her money to arrange an abortion, but disappears, never to be seen again. She learns that his job was a hoax and even his family and fake emergency were only scams. Once again she has only Mbarek to turn to. He forces her to keep the child and keep working at the factory until she gives birth. When she goes into labor, he makes her give birth on a pile of rags on the floor of his oven/bakery room—not even allowing her into his house—and whisks the child off instantaneously to be sold to some desiring couple. Rkia, of course, is completely ignored and abandoned, not shown an ounce of compassion. The film ends as Rkia walks a dark street, in fancy short dress, high heels, and makeup. A Mercedes slows, they negotiate, she gets in. Although the film seems perhaps excessively melodramatic, it is only too true a story and thus becomes a soap-opera-social-realism-social-commentary film. In fact, the exploitation of children is so common in Morocco that no one ever thought the situation shameful or shocking, until the film rendered the drama of these women on the big screen. In an interview Noury indicated: The film speaks of the shameful exploitation of little girls, generally brought from the countryside, uprooted from their natural environment and transplanted into the cities, in the houses of people who normally would have the means to take good care of them. Unfortunately this is not always the case; many simply exploit the young girls. It was after seeing such a case myself . . . that I decided to make this film. I was at the beach and there was a little girl serving a big family, and I was struck that such a little girl did not have the right to play or to swim. She was there just to serve the family, carrying the coolers, the chairs, the umbrellas, going back and forth over the hot sand. This profoundly shocked me, a young girl of 10 years treated like a dog. This was in 1986 before I shot The Hammer and the Anvil. I thought to make a film, but needed to know more about the subject. I then started investigating theses and dissertations done about maids, and the articles included in the press, and talked to friends. All this became the source for my script.200
Critics always denigrate Noury’s films, although in general the development of a social-oriented cinema is appreciated for reflecting reality and, in spite of criticisms from the press, the public enjoys the films. This is not a film which fascinates with its shots, its angles nor is it heady with its unique lighting or creative editing. But the actors are very convincing and dialogues are authentic, fluid, and relevant to the milieus shown.201 But for some critics,
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form supersedes content, which thus exposes Noury to their opprobrium. The following criticism of the film is standard: The characters are all, without exception, caricatures, superficial, without any authenticity, like they came from the head of the simple man on the street. They are numerous but they do not really exist. Each person incarnates, or is supposed to incarnate, the extreme—the bourgeois is totally evil and greedy, the youth is totally victim. . . . Plus, they disappear from the screen before we have even gotten a chance to know them or before they get the chance to give real depth to their character. The writer has a definite Manichean vision of the world and society: divided and oppositional—good or bad, black or white—no intermediate colors or nuances. And this is disappointing because the film does contain good, courageous and just ideas. But the direction of the actors was rigid, the camera was too heavy, and the lighting totally mediocre. The street scenes are too banal and the interiors are too bright. In summation the film takes the spectator to be a blind person who has to be led across the street by the hand, or someone to whom everything has to be explicitly, simply and heavily enumerated. Obviously Noury is more interested in sociology and psychology than in his camera and his actors.202
In spite of Noury’s less than abstruse technical and plot abilities, his films do well at the Moroccan box office, his actors often win national festival awards, and this film even represented Morocco in the second edition of the festival of Mediterranean cinema, Medfilm, in Italy the summer of 1996. Earlier in 1996, 2M purchased the TV rights to the film for 40,000 francs, and advertised this film in particular in a full-page ad in the newspaper Le Matin to encourage new subscriptions. Mohamed Abderrahman Tazi203 Tazi studied at IDHEC in Paris, from which he graduated in 1963 at the age of twenty-one. He returned to Morocco to work in both television and at the CCM, primarily as cameraman and director of photography, first in shorts and documentaries for the CCM then in features,204 before moving into film directing. He continues to alternate between directing, DP work, film, and publicity. Although Tazi is well known in the filmmaking community, he is most renowned for his feature film Looking for the Husband of My Wife/A la Recherche du Mari du ma Femme, the first intentionally comedic film made by a Moroccan, and one which really burst the box office record for audience attendance, and made many diverse Moroccans, not just youth, first reappreciate Moroccan filmmaking. Tazi had gained a great deal of experience with his previous feature films, learning from Ibn Sabeel that distribution was tortuous whether one had a distributor or did it oneself; learning from Badis
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that the film was being widely circulated on video even though he had never released it himself; and finally learning with Looking for the Husband of My Wife that even a hugely successful film in Morocco would never recuperate the majority of its production costs. Tazi has been one of the most frank about problems with distribution, by offering real figures to support his claims, and has also been one of the primary individuals to have been involved in a public conflict with one of his stars once the film became popular. Although all of Tazi’s productions have been excellent, Looking for the Husband of My Wife gained such attention and admiration that it should be discussed. Baht And Zawj Marati/A La Recherche du Mari de ma Femme/Looking for the Husband of My Wife (1993, 35 mm, 88 mins, color)205 Portly and aging Al Hajj lives an old fashioned lifestyle in a huge old house in Fez, to which he has recently added a young and attractive third wife, Houda. He wears the traditional fez, jellaba, and slippers, while his wives all wear traditional long dresses in several layers; only the children wear modern clothes. His elderly first wife, Lalla Hobby, the matriarch whose children are both grown, modern professionals, was succeeded by Lalla Rabea who has several youngsters and a baby; his third wife, young Houda helps take care of the younger children, who love her, but is still pretty childlike herself. All three women live harmoniously and help each other, although Al Hajj does have to be careful to balance fairly his nights with each wife. Houda is young, playful, and a romantic dreamer; she is only disappointed that Al Hajj does not offer her more jewels, since he makes his livelihood through his jewelry shop, and that she has not married someone more romantic and young. But she is both loving and impetuous, often scolded for staying out too long at her friend’s house visiting when she knows that it angers her husband. Al Hajj is jealous and temperamental, which often makes him seem comic, but he also likes to drink alcohol, flirt, and cavort with Houda who makes him feel young. One day, when all the women are engaged in housework, Houda has to run to answer the door quickly, so her long dress is still fixed for doing housework, thus tucked into her belt revealing her long pants underneath; the person at the door is a man delivering a sheep. Just then Al Hajj returns home and raises a fit at her indecent behavior that none of the women had thought so very wrong under the circumstance. Al Hajj loudly remonstrates Houda’s supposed flirtatiousness, stamping his feet and wagging his head comically, in the manner soon to be recognized as trademarks of his character, while the two elder wives try to keep a peace between Houda and Al Hajj. But Houda refuses to be yelled at for something so petty and, since the two have such tempers, they end up screaming insults at each other until Al Hajj furiously proclaims that he divorces Houda. Lallas Hobby and Rabea try to reason
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with him, but he is angry and stamps off. Apparently, he loses his temper irrationally often, and this is, unfortunately, the third time that he has divorced Houda—a significant fact we learn, although he does not realize it until it is too late to easily undo his deed. Houda is both sad to be leaving her two women friends, the children she loves, and the house she loves; but she is thrilled to finally be free to start a new life—like her widowed girlfriend. No one can tell her when to be home, what to do, who she can visit. After gathering all her possessions and furniture, she returns to her family home quite happily. Her mother is distraught that she has lost such a good and rich husband, because the family is very poor and the paralyzed father unable to work. Houda had met Al Hajj, it turns out, by going to his shop to try to sell a gold bracelet to pay bills. But Houda has collected some jewelry now and is sure all will work out well; she immediately rushes off to visit her widowed friend who she so envies. Now she is also free and cannot wait to enjoy the ability to do what she wants when she wants. Her first act is to have her hair cut in a more modern style, and to buy some modern clothes; when she returns home in a short skirt and pumps her mother is disappointed, but the paralyzed father understands her and loves her no matter what she does. When Al Hajj falls into depression from missing Houda, he starts thinking about taking her back. Lalla Hobby and Lalla Rabea, noticing the dejected demeanor of their husband, recognizing the mood that would only lead to taking a new wife, declare forcefully that if Al Hajj tried to marry anyone else than Houda, they would leave him and cause a scandal. Al Hajj, unable to cure his woes with a new wife, has to find a solution to getting Houda back, but learns that after three divorces he cannot remarry the same woman until she has been married to someone else and either widowed or divorced. Now the real comedy of the film begins, trying to find someone harmless to marry Houda and to divorce her quickly so that Al Hajj could remarry. In the meantime, Houda discovers that her “free” life is not so wonderful. One day she gaily meets her widowed friend in a cafe. She notices that several well-dressed young men are looking them over and making eye contact. Houda, looking for adventure, convinces her reluctant friend to have the young men come to their table to visit. Soon the men propose they all drive to another cafe, in the hills, which is quite beautiful. Houda is all for it, but her friend does not trust them and does not want to be late picking up her young daughter. Houda begs and the friend succumbs. All is fun and singing in the car on the way to the hills, but once there the young men rent room keys and reveal to the women their assumption that the rendezvous end in a pairing. Houda is surprised, but her friend is extremely angered and berates the men for debauched morals; she demands a ride back to town. The men
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laugh in their faces, asking them why they thought they had been invited up there anyway, and refuse to transport them. The women are forced to walk all the way home, the young men eventually zooming past, honking in derision. Houda learns from her friend that yes she is free to make her own decisions and lives alone with her daughter, but she still has a responsibility to act morally, responsibly, and carefully. This, coupled with her realization of her parents’ plight and their dependence upon Houda, leads her to accept Al Hajj’s proposal that she marry someone else only to divorce, then return to Al Hajj’s household. Al Hajj is not happy that everyone, including the butcher, makes fun of his “lover-boy” nature; he just cannot bear to be old and needs always a young and generous wife to keep him young too. Al Hajj and the wives let it be known they are looking for a husband for Houda. In particular, the wives approach Lalla Rkia, whose son is such a simpleton that he still plays with toys, drools, and cannot speak clearly at age thirty. Of course Lalla Rkia is greatly offended at the proposal. Several men licentiously offer to do Al Hajj the favor, but he scuttles off in embarrassed rage. Finally, a friend, a tailor, informs Al Hajj that he has found the perfect solution. A man who lives in Belgium has come home for a short visit. He is willing to marry Houda, Al Hajj paying all expenses, and divorce her since he is returning to Belgium. The wedding night cannot be a sham; the marriage must be properly conducted and consummated. Therefore, the night of the wedding party is sheer torture for Al Hajj, who has invited his close friends as well as the friends of the new groom and paid for all the arrangements, although somewhat frugal. The new groom, however, is set on having a good time, and everybody enjoys watching Al Hajj’s growing comic discomfort as the night wears on. Finally everyone is forced to leave; Al Hajj goes home and gets tearfully drunk which Lallas Hobby and Rabea respond to with little sympathy. The new groom enters his bedchamber to find Houda all decked out in her white wedding dress and posing seductively for him. In the middle of the night, the groom’s best friend rouses the house to inform that a car they had brought from Belgium and sold in Morocco was discovered to be stolen, so they have to flee immediately back to Belgium. The groom tells Houda good-bye and that he will return as soon as he can; he tells his mother not to open the door to anyone. But at the crack of dawn Al Hajj is at their door banging and calling desperately for them to open so the divorce can be done and he can get Houda back. But no one answers, so he keeps on banging until the neighbors threaten him. Finally he has to go home and wait, dragging his feet and slumping in depression. No one can help him; even his drink is not a good solution. Finally he hears that the man has fled Morocco without divorcing Houda. Al Hajj storms to the Belgian embassy expecting to simply get a passport to go
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there and find the young man. As he stands in line for the entire day he learns that he needs all kinds of documents and justification for his trip; when he gets to the window he tells the clerk that he needs to go to Belgium to look for the husband of his wife. The family is worried that Al Hajj has been gone for a very long time and did not tell them where he was going. As they fret and wonder over the events of the past days, the film ends on Al Hajj standing in the prow of a small fishing boat as it heads across the Mediterranean to Europe with its clandestine passengers. Tazi conveniently left the ending suitable for a sequel, which was much demanded by the public who found Al Hajj’s comic facial expressions and antics very amusing. In fact, Al Hajj was the comic element in the film, while Lallas Hobby and Rabea were the grounding figures and Houda was the dramatic element causing problems. Because the film was the most successful ever in Moroccan film history, Tazi believed that he had found the key to the Moroccan audience—that is humor without compromising the artistic or realistic elements or important aspects of daily, lived life, and without falling into sarcasm or heavy melodrama. He wanted a film similar to Zemmouri’s Algerian film, Les Années Folles du Twist, because it was less pontificating and more fluid, simple, and spontaneous—but definitely a caricature. He specifically critiqued the notion held by many young filmmakers influenced by French and foreign styles that humor was less of an art form than avant-gardist cinema. Humor allowed him to reach audiences jaded by the avant-gardist styles, and to use language and events very well known to audiences. But some people critiqued the film for focusing on a situation not really an issue in modern Morocco where having more than one wife was very rare, which really pertained more to the 1950s, while other issues only pertained to the 1990s, such as the amoral young men trying to seduce the young women, the long lines in front of the Belgian embassy, and Houda’s belief that she could actually live freely as a divorced woman. Tazi rebutted by saying he wanted to make a film which would touch many Moroccans who have been hammered by the evolution of urban life, in which people find themselves living in apartments which do not resonate with their own perception of their identity: Among Moroccans, the oral tradition has always had an important impact. Stories play an essential role. Today we no longer have the storytellers of yesteryear who recount in public places in the form of a series, the history of ourselves. We no longer have the means to tell ourselves these stories, because we have become receivers of images which do not belong to us or reflect us. Who other than the filmmaker can, in our current society, take the place of the storyteller? In my role of filmmaker, manipulator of images, I must approach closely the
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daily life of Moroccans, to understand their preoccupations, their desires, their fantasies and fears, their imagination and their need for identity.206
The film generated a lot of discussion about “elements of identity,” and whether the film represented a Moroccan past for primarily foreign audiences, or whether it represented a Moroccan past for what Moroccans living in the present feel that they have lost, and thus fear they have lost a part of their identity. Further, when the west or even Moroccans now think “harem” it is almost always pejorative, in the sense of sexual activities, of prison, or repression. But Tazi, who grew up in a harem, always remembers it as a time and place of great tenderness and complicity.207 In his publicity brochure for the film, Tazi wrote: My father was a bigamist (2 wives) and my grandfather was a polygamist. I spent a part of my childhood in Fez, and that city is for me the memory of a happy harem. This harem of my childhood is a sort of sacrosanct space where women, children and servants share their joys, their pains, their conflicts all together. I have tried to reconstitute this nostalgic image of my grandfather’s harem in this film. Because I am not a polygamist, I considered that the best way to undermine preconceived ideas was to tell a story, humorous and light in tone. It is my manner to denounce while amusing.
Other critics focused upon Tazi representing Al Hajj as both traditional and a Muslim, yet drinking alcohol and getting drunk. Tazi replied that it was reality that Muslims drink even though it is prohibited in Islam.208 Another critique concerned the price of tickets: tickets for this film cost more than imported films. The distributor said it cost more for him because he had to make posters and ads, so he got the CCM’s permission to raise ticket prices.209 In spite of the few criticisms noted above, most of the plethora of articles lauding the film focused their comments and recapitulation of the story line around Al Hajj and the fact that he divorced Houda and wanted her back, what he was willing to go through to get her, and his comic nature. All the reviews, written by men primarily, tended to focus on the male element and not ever on the female element. No review focused upon the women in the story nor upon how each wife was supposed to fulfill a specific role within the family structure. The oldest maintains the keys to the house and manages its functioning; the second has the children and plays the role of mother and comforter; the third is the beauty and seductress. Lalla Hobby, as the oldest wife, was the matriarch of the home, but treated as an idiot child by her husband. Lalla Rabea had her children to justify her lack of interest in Al Hajj romantically. The many scenes about Houda and her life were totally ignored by critics. The only time Houda was mentioned rather than as the pawn in Al
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Hajj’s story, was in reference to her daydream of encountering a poetic and amorous man on the roof. Her waking dream, to be free, was totally elided. And none of the reviews talked about how Houda really figured in the film as representative of a youth that wanted new things, or as representative of women seeking freedom and self-understanding on their own. Never was Houda reviewed as a character who wanted a chance to explore life and test her own boundaries. Perhaps slight attention might be paid to the fact that the two remaining wives would not let Al Hajj remarry unless he remarried Houda, but that would be all. Yet Tazi frequently mentions that he adopted the topic of polygamy only in order to talk about the condition of Muslim women in Morocco. Where Tazi may have succeeded, apparently the writers and critics about the film failed to follow suit. The success of Looking for the Husband of My Wife allowed Tazi to publicly tackle issues of distribution and remuneration. One early article indicated that more than 350,000 spectators had seen the film in Morocco. Upon release in 1994, the distributor sent four copies of the film to five cinema halls simultaneously in Casablanca (which means the theaters had to bicycle parts of it between them). At first there were 400 spectators during the week and 800 on weekends, particularly families, which was new for Moroccan movies. But the film got good word-of-mouth advertisement among the population and attendance continually increased.210 By 1996 the film had garnered 800,000 film entries. The film cost 4.5 million dirhams to produce, and only made Tazi 700,000 dirhams in returns.211 Tazi explains: If we look at the financial gains for this film that got 800,000 viewers, which is a large number, we have to remember that what comes back to the producer is 15 or 17 percent—which is not even 1/4th of the film’s budget. Even in other countries where the film comes out in a 1,000 copies and gets distributed commercially, it still does not make a profit from national distribution. So we cannot judge a film during only a 2-year period; we have to wait to see the film distributed to TV to get income. It is only after 2 years that we get an income because of the distribution to TV stations. But in Morocco, since the producer makes the film copies and does the whole advertising campaign, and yet is limited to receiving 15 to 17 percent, maybe there is a profit, but only for the theater owners. In many cinemas, each ticket has 10 percent taken out of it for the production fund. Then the owner takes 75 percent, and the 25 percent remaining is divided between director and producer. The emotional support of the film was good, but as far as getting money for another film goes, the income from Looking for the Husband of My Wife cannot enable us to go into the production of another film.212
But in addition to the 800,000 theater entries in Morocco, the film had 5 million TV spectators (including 2M), twenty weeks in theaters in Paris, and a screening on Association Relative à la Télévision Européene (ARTE), the Egyptian
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satellite channel. Besides Morocco, France, ARTE, and 2M, the film was also released in Australia, Belgium, Holland, and in several American universities. Looking for the Husband of My Wife was sold to Tunisian television and would be distributed in Tunisian theaters—the first Moroccan film ever shown there. Tazi hoped his would be the first Moroccan film to show commercially in Egypt.213 In spite of the numerous sales and exhibitions, Tazi maintained that he was not happy that he received so little return from the distribution of his film. He claimed he only received 18 percent of sales compared to 50 percent that theater owners took and 32 percent taken by the distributor.214 Thus, Tazi’s film was hugely successful and there was ongoing debate about whether Tazi would make a sequel or not, because the audience began demanding a sequel almost immediately. One problem was ongoing disagreement between Tazi and his leading actor, Skiredj. Skiredj had made a public claim that Tazi had not paid him well or billeted him well during the filming. Tazi claimed that he paid Skiredj 55,000 dirhams for his five weeks of work—even though he was an amateur in Moroccan cinema—and sent him 10,000 dirhams for travel expenses (round trip), and paid for him to stay in a four-star hotel the whole period of shooting, along with giving him pocket money.215 Skiredj said that he had written a script for a sequel that Tazi refused to accept because he did not want to pay for it; Tazi said the script was no good and that Skiredj had asked a ridiculously exorbitant sum to act in the sequel.216 In yet another development, Tazi publicly denounced a bank commercial for too closely resembling the characters in his film: Skiredj portrayed a character similar to Al Hajj, surrounded by other members of a rich Fassi family, including Mouna Fettou who had played Houda, debating the privatization of a bank. Tazi was offended that Skiredj replicated his famous film character in a commercial and thus exploited the fame of the movie for his own interests. After a lengthy to-and-fro in the press between Tazi and Skiredj, Tazi finally announced that he would indeed release a sequel, entitled Lalla Hobby, but it would not star Skiredj as Al Hajj. Tazi had originally intended to start shooting the sequel in January 1996, but Tazi had to look for another star. Soon thereafter Mouna Fettou wanted to rewrite her contract for a much higher salary and percentage. Tazi was forced to replace her too. Finally he could begin production in May 1996. Lalla Hobby was released in 1997. The script was written by Noureddine Sail, and Al Hajj was played by Hamidou Benmasoud, while Mouna Fettou was replaced by Samia Akarriou as Houda. Ahmed Tayeb Elalj, Amina Rachid, and Naima Lamsharqi all remained in their original roles. The film sequel particularly focused on Lalla Hobby who took over running the household and her husband’s business while he was on his “trek” to Belgium to find the runaway husband.217
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This film would be unique in several ways. It was a first filmed sequel in the Moroccan filmography, starred someone new in the title role, was shot partially in Europe rather than entirely in Morocco, and had a coproducer from Tunisia (Baha Eddine Attia). With the many delays and changes, the film cost approximately 5 to 6 million dirhams. Tazi received money from the French government’s Funds for the South Project in 1995 (800,000 francs), and received a Moroccan support fund award of 1,700,000 dirhams.218 Belgium would pay for expenses incurred in shooting there (about 15% of the total budget), TVM would give aid in technical materials and publicity (normally each advertisement would cost 8,000 dirhams), Canal Horizons would buy the film, and Canal Plus and ARTE, along with other satellite channels, were considering the purchase.219 Of particular interest is one result of this first experience of a Moroccan filmmaker shooting part of his film in a European country. While Moroccan filmmakers and film enthusiasts only complained about the “lacks” in production in Morocco—lack of technicians, lack of money, lack of infrastructure, lack of good actors, and others—once Tazi actually went to Belgium to film he discovered that all the “benefits” of Western production came at a cost—money. No longer aided by the CCM, he had a hard time getting authorizations to film; his personnel had to be paid overtime when working twenty hours a day rather than being glad to get any salary at all; personnel worked in film as their job rather than as a loved activity. In comparison to these differences, Morocco could be seen as a place of government cooperation, public help, cheap filmmaking, easy working conditions, friendly workers, and cooperative people.220 Perhaps Tazi’s experience and comparison will make quite a difference in the long run in how filmmakers utilize and appreciate their own system. Mohamed Asli After studying cinema in Milan, Mohamed Asli (b. 1957) was an assistant cameraman, assistant director, and then a production executive in Italy. In Morocco, Asli established (2003) a cinema school in Ouarzate, le Centre cinématographique et audiovisuel euro-méditerranéen, within Kanzaman Studios in partnership with CinéCittà and Luce Institute. Moroccans had demanded a film school for decades, and Asli’s was the first. In 2003, he wrote, directed and produced In Casablanca Angels Don’t Fly, Morocco’s first feature 35-mm film in Arabic and Berber and Asli’s directorial debut. The first Moroccan movie selected for the Week of the Critic in Cannes since 1978 (Ferhati), the film also was Carthage Film Festival in Tunisia winner of the Gold Tanit for best film, and in 2004 Alexandria Film Festival won first prize for best film. “son film, . . . sincère et touchant, est moins un discours sur
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l’humain qu’un appel à davantage de solidarité . . . le Maroc ne sort pas d’une guerre mais d’une insuffisance de justice sociale dans le développement.”221 Asli’s film is also notable for using locals from the Middle Atlas mountains, and basing his story on the realities that many poor migrant men face working in the large metropolises like Casablanca to support families in villages and rural areas. Villages and rural areas in general receive very limited state support for development and suffer from lacks of clean water, electricity, sanitation, roads, and basic infrastructure like hospitals or doctors. In Casablanca Angels Don’t Fly/A Casablanca les Anges ne Volent Pas (2003, 35-mm, 97 mins, color)222 Asli tackles the harsh lives of three men transplanted from their villages to Casablanca to work and try to support their families back home, a subject treated with humor, respect, and cinematic realism, rendering the three men as complex human beings endowed with desires that poverty makes almost impossible to realize. The three men leave their villages for Casablanca in order to work and send money home because there is little or no work within the villages to support their needs. The three men all work in the same cafe where the owner treats them contemptuously and pays them pittances, and the three share lodging in a rather run-down but affordable room, though each man has his own demons to deal with related to dreams and economics. Said has left his pregnant wife in his Middle Atlas village, and she wants him to come home with or without any money; particularly she wants him home for the birth of their child. But Said cannot get time off or a holiday to go home and wants to work to send money. Aicha has a hard time staying in touch with him—she doesn’t know how to write, and has a hard time accessing the village’s only telephone. In a remote Moroccan village, the only telephone is a mobile placed high on a hilltop, so heavily pregnant Aicha rarely gets to speak to her absent husband. By the end of the film he learns that his wife is deathly ill, so he undertakes the arduous travel home, but arrives too late and she dies for lack of access to a doctor or healthcare. Meanwhile his colleague Ottman has learned from his mother that his prize stallion might have to be sold to meet their debts. But Ottman cannot accept this, hoping against hope to earn money from the cafe to avoid the sale; in the end, he loses his horse anyway, and loses his dream. Finally, while Ismail is delivering an order one day, he sees a fine pair of new shoes in a shop window and decides he must find a way to buy them, certain that they will change his life even though the price is far outside his budget. He manages to spend all his money to buy the shoes, then must suffer agony as he tries to walk to a distant building site through dust and debris which he painstakingly tries to keep off his shoes. All three men refuse to give up on their dreams, even in the face of the harsh realities of both urban and rural life.
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Asli shows a welcome ability to move smoothly between different moods, balancing the story’s tragic elements with playful touches: for example, he takes the time to follow Ismail in his comic efforts to avoid scuffing his shoes on a long, dusty walk to a building site. A camera strapped to the top of a moving bus presents us with a fresh perspective on Casablanca, whilst a brief flashback to a communal horseback charge at a Berber wedding suggests that such traditions have become endangered by modern “progress.”223 It’s a film where the male characters are perpetually in transit—swaying between the lines of traffic to deliver their cups of tea, making the lengthy bus trips to and from the city, and stoically trudging across the snowbound fields to reach home. The result is an imaginative, credible work whose comic touches don’t obscure the suffering endured by its characters and the remote communities they’ve left behind.224 What makes this an important film to reflect upon is that Asli is the first filmmaker, outside of the Berber videomakers discussed in the introduction, who either touches upon the harsh realities of Middle Atlas village life that forces males to migrate, or uses Berber language among characters who would normally use that language. Most Moroccan films use Moroccan dialectal Arabic, though a huge percentage of the population regularly speaks in a Berber dialect, particularly those who come from the Middle Atlas as they do in this film. Further, though he uses a neorealist orientation to telling his stories, the film does include comic moments as well; the characters are not unidimensional at all. The reality that their dreams cannot come to fruition is a statement about the harshness of life in Morocco for many, which Asli does not try to overdramatize or soften, but to render humanely the diverse dreams Moroccans may have. For some it might be the basic need to sustain the family; for others it may be a pride in heritage needing sustainment; for others it may be the acquisition of material goods—but all the dreams are validated, though not of course realized in the way the protagonists hope. Nabil Ayouch Another film in which dreams figure prominently, and are mostly dashed by reality, is Nabil Ayouch’s feature Ali Zaoua: Prince of the Streets. Raised in France but resident in Morocco since the mid-1990s, Ayouch (discussed previously in short films section) made his first feature in 1997, Mektoub (Fate), a sort of detective “road movie,” that deals with taboos within Moroccan society: the abuse of power, corruption, social inequality, the hashish trade, police brutality, and other ills.225 In 1999, Ayouch’s Ali’N Production produced for several years a popular television series Lalla Fatima and hosted special cinematic venues through which Moroccan youth could direct short films in 35 mm, thus overcoming for some the lack of formal training avail-
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able in Morocco. Ayouch’s second feature, Ali Zoua: Prince of the Streets set a new box office record nationally and was a huge international success, winning several awards. Ayouch lived with the street boys who are the actors of this film for three years in order to gain their trust—a sort of “social worker with a camera.” He did not want to make a heavy “docu-drama” but provide something more uplifting which gave the boys dignity.226 Ali Zaoua, Prince of the Street (2000, 35 mm, color, 100 mins)227 Ali, Kwita, Omar, and Boubker are street urchins living in the hard streets of Casablanca who try to break away from the large gang of underage pickpockets ruled over by a Fagin-like older boy who cannot speak, Dib (Said Taghmaoui). The streets are the four boys’ home—in order to survive they create a bond of friendship and family between them. With nowhere to go, and nowhere to hide, survival is an everyday problem. Since they left Dib and his gang, they have been living on the portside of Casablanca, in constant fear of Dib’s revenge. The boys have drawn the outline of a house, each with his own “room” to sleep in, but they are constantly harrassed by the police as well as by Dib’s gang because Dib cannot accept their separation. Ali and his comrades had escaped from Dib’s gang both because they could not stand the economic and sexual exploitation or violence of Dib and his henchmen, but also because they all believed in Ali’s dream: to become a seaman and explore the world. Ali had always wanted to become a sailor—when he was living with his mother, a prostitute, he used to listen to a fairy tale about the sailor who discovered a miracle island with two suns. Ali who had a little room in his mother’s apartment tried to create another life, painted colorful chalk drawings and dreamt of being a sailor on the magical island with a beautiful girl. Ali has run away from home, but not run away from his dream, and he has convinced his three comrades to follow his lead. In a subterranean hideout he has even re-created his magical world on the walls. Instead of finding his dream island, Ali and his friends are confronted with Dib’s gang. In a skirmish with Dib and his gang who want the boys back in the fold, Ali is killed by a thrown rock. The majority and remainder of the film follows Kwita, Boubker, and Omar as they seek to evade Dib and honor Ali’s memory—his dream of becoming a sailor—by at least burying him at sea rather than reporting his death to the police, who would have buried the boy in a potter’s field. For his friends, Ali is a prince and deserves to be buried as such in order to return at last to his island with two suns. Deciding to give Ali a worthy burial, in the process they befriend an old sailor friend of Ali’s, willing to believe in them and help them overcome obstacles. The boys scramble to find the money to buy Ali a sailor suit and to build him a floating coffin. The process also brings them in contact with Ali’s mother who has obviously missed her son and regrets her life. The film ends
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with Ali outfitted in sailor garb being pushed out to sea in his little coffin boat, witnessed by Ali’s grieving mother, and Dib and his gang reconciled by the determination of Ali’s friends. Ayouch interweaves animated sequences of Ali’s dreams with harsh depictions of the struggles street children face, mixing realism with experimental fantasy. The film, starring actual street children along with veteran actors, treats the street children humanistically, relying on sympathetic personal interrogation of their lives. Bound together by their search, which occupies most of the film, they find meaning, transcendence, and a measure of peace. Despite their marginalization, the boys still long for love and tenderness, and they still dream. The chairman of the jury that selected Ali Zaoua as the number one film at Fespaco 2001, the Tunisian filmmaker Ferid Boughedir, praised Ayouch’s movie for the power of emotion, the excellence in the direction of the cast and for the sensitive description of the cruel existence of abandoned children in Africa. Boughedir said Ayouch had mastered the language of cinema and had given a continental story, and an African reality, universal appeal. With the Yennenga Stallion award comes 5 million CFA francs ($7,000).228 What is important about this film is that it does tackle a huge problem within Morocco, abandoned children throughout the country, but particularly a problem in the metropolises. Though Ayouch’s film offers no solutions, nor does it highlight any of the numerous social efforts being made to minimize the plights of street children, nor does it tackle the causes of the huge rise of numbers of abandoned children, at least the film does call attention to a social ill and some of the difficulties street children face, not least of which is a culture of violence amongst street children themselves. Street children in Morocco number between 10,000 and 14,000, showed a study by the Moroccan secretariat of state in charge of social protection, family, and childhood. Said Saadi, secretary of state in charge of social protection, family, and childhood, imputed the rise in the number of street children to poverty, ignorance, and the deterioration of family bonds.229 Ayouch’s film doesn’t question why Ali’s mother is a prostitute, nor does it question why Ali doesn’t remain with his mother—rather it shows him lying about why he’s on the streets to a television reporter making an expose about street children. Though the film doesn’t delve into many areas that could make it more critical of society, the film is touching in its humane treatment of the problems of street kids, which probably explains, along with its fantastic production quality, its huge popularity in Morocco and abroad. Laila Marrakchi The final film to be discussed was also highly popular in Morocco and shown at many festivals, but at the same time raised a hue and cry about
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denigrating Moroccan mores and customs, Laila Marrakchi’s Marock.230 Marrakchi explains that she even chose the title to call attention to the paradoxes of a youth torn between Moroccan traditions and more rock’n’roll aspirations.231 Her characters are Moroccans infused with French influences that at times cause a conflict between Moroccan traditions versus displays of French modernities. Thus the French Maroc becomes a play on words as Marock. Marrakchi re-creates the age-old teen romance, one that significantly focuses on the Moroccan upper class and its tensions and conflicts. Two main characters fall in love, but one is Muslim and the other Jewish. The film reflects memories of Marrakchi’s own school days in the late 1990s. This film was popular with youth who liked to see a more realistic rendering of the lives of Morocco’s upper-crust youth, with their parties, paternalism toward the poor and servants, car racing, sexually active relationships, and other representations of a class rarely portrayed in Moroccan film. Further, the film was popular because of its representation of modernity and change, a story of youth coming to terms with what society allows or deems taboo. Resident in France since 1993, Marrakchi studied film at the l’École supérieure de réalisation audiovisuelle, and received a DEA en Etudes cinématographiques et audiovisuelles at l’Université Paris III. Marock (2005), entirely French funded, cost 1.8 million euros, a reasonable sum for a first feature in France, but a substantial budget compared to Moroccan filmmaking. Marrakchi filmed in Morocco and Dahomey, and drew upon her friends and contacts to make the film: the main actress, Ghita, is her cousin, who also lives in France; for scenes in the various villas and nightclubs, Marrakchi sought favors from friends.232 As mentioned, she filmed a milieu and situation well-known to her, the contradictions faced by youth of a wealthy class who attend French schools, speak in French as much as Moroccan darija Arabic, and torn between societies and mores, not too sure who they really are or where they belong. Marock (2005, 35 mm, color, 100 mins)233 The opening of the film immediately encapsulates the contrasts of Moroccan life in 1997. Set in the affluent community of Casablanca’s elite, a devout man on his prayer rug is surrounded by expensive cars in a disco parking lot, where street urchins make catcalls watching wealthy teens out for the night. Headstrong seventeen-year-old Ghita (Morjana Alaoui) is first seen kissing a young man in his expensive car, until a policeman interrupts them, bringing into relief their distance from the social mores of Morocco where one should not be seen being intimate in public with someone other than a marriage partner. It is only their status and money to bribe the policeman that keeps them from being arrested. But we also see Ghita reject the policeman’s moralizing, and her
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belief that her wealthy status protects her from being bound by tradition or legal custom. Soon Ghita becomes infatuated with handsome young Youri (Tunisian Matthieu Boujenah). They’re both from the same extremely wealthy upper class and attend the same private French school and social milieu, but there’s one major difference we soon learn: he’s Jewish and she’s Muslim. As friends, there is no conflict (the movie shows close friendships between both groups), but as lovers, tradition and taboo bar cross-religion marriages. And as a young Moroccan woman about to graduate from highschool (the Bac), Ghita should be thinking of marriage, though it is not being thrust upon her by her family, which is the case of one of her primary friends. Ghita, like her boyfriend, comes from a very open-minded, nonreligious family, although there is the liberalness of the parents in contrast to the liberalness of the youth. Parents tend to follow tradition and social norms. Marrakchi shows the youth milieu, in contrast, to be quite different—youths date, drink alcohol, have sex, party in nightclubs and at home, do drugs, race cars, and engage in other teen antics. Marock puts Ghita and Youri in a rebellious romance that breaks convention. Ghita’s rich parents don’t get too involved in their children’s lives, so regardless of the potential social scandal the two young lovers continue their relationship. Ghita’s newly Islamized brother Mao (Assaad Bouab) returns from studying in England. We learn eventually that he left Morocco after killing a youth while driving drunk, only saved from prison by his family’s money. He’s remorseful and has turned to Islam despite his liberal upbringing. Disapproving of Ghita’s lacklustre dedication to her faith (she doesn’t fast during Ramadan, drinks and smokes hashish and cigarettes), Mao tries to encourage her to party less, wear less makeup, and be more concerned about dating a Jew. Most of the film, however, is very much a teen film in that nothing much happens except hanging out, partying, drag racing, drinking, and some intimation of a sexual interaction between Youri and Ghita. The only on-screen representation of sexual activity, despite the constant discourse about it, occurs when one of Youri’s friends brings over a prostitute. At one point Ghita is forbidden by her parents from seeing Youri, but more to make sure she prepares for her Bac exams than because of religious intolerance. Youri and Ghita, after the Bac, discuss what they will do, and somewhat joke about the need for one to convert to the religion of the other. Ghita adamantly declares that she doesn’t care about religion, she only wants to be able to be with Youri without problems—but it would be difficult for her to convert to Judaism because of her family. She thinks they should both go to France where they could be together without scandal. Soon thereafter, however, in the end of the film, Youri dies in a car crash while racing toward the nightclub where all the friends have congregated, and heartbroken Ghita leaves Morocco for France, which her upper-class status allows
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her to do easily. The viewer is not sure what she will do in Europe, but it is expected for the wealthy youth to leave Morocco when they can. The film challenged a number of taboos and caused lengthy debate about whether it should be censured in Morocco. “I wanted to make an ‘American Graffiti’ in Morocco, to show a certain kind of Moroccan youth who exist even if some people would like to deny it,” Marrakchi told the Associated Press. “I knew in making this film that some things were going to cause discomfort, notably the love relationship between a young Muslim and young Jew. But for me, it is a symbol of peace and tolerance in a complicated world.”234 In general, Moroccans are proud of their religious tolerance, although Jewish religious and community sites were targeted in bombing attacks in Casablanca in 2003. However, such coexistence has limits: the Arabic daily Attajdid published a communiqué from members of the committee of the Moroccan Theatre Syndicate, which denounced the screening of Marock in Morocco.235 The Secretary General of the Syndicate, Mohammed Hassan El Joundi236 stressed “this kind of production must not be screened in a country which respects its traditions . . . this communiqué is not addressed to Marock only, but to all artistic creations having the intention of blemishing the reputation of our country. Everything has a limit, including freedom.” Despite the avalanche of criticism which fell upon Leila Marrakchi, the defenders of artistic works raised their voices and said “No to the censorship of Moroccan productions” and “No to the restriction of freedom of artistic expressions.” As Marock’s opponents said that defenders of the film are inciting decadence in the name of modernity, the supporters of the young director accused them of being schizophrenic, intolerant, and accustomed to illogically prohibit everything. The discussion has spread across the blogosphere. In the beginning this debate might have been put aside as simply a clash between generations; the young versus the old. But the intervention of politicians and other groups has made it more than this. At the end of the day this issue goes to the heart of the directions that modern Morocco is heading. Under some strong leadership from HM Mohammed VI, Morocco has made very firm steps toward liberalizing the society and freeing it from the shackles of poverty and prejudice. These moves have been applauded around the world and held up as an example that other countries in the region could follow. It would be a great shame if those who oppose this direction unite around issues like that of Marock and use it to close down the shutters. A free democratic society needs a free press and freedom of expression. The Morocco shown in Marock, may not be the Morocco that some like, but to deny its reality is dangerous.237 Moroccans debated not only the amorous relationship between a Muslim and a Jew, but also Ghita’s laissez-faire attitude about being Muslim and
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following laws and traditions, such as fasting during Ramadan, not being sexually active before marriage, not drinking alcohol or smoking, and other activities rendered on the screen. The film shows a whole milieu engaged in breaking taboos, not just Ghita, and aside from the obvious love affair it is these tiny representations that have caused so much dissention about the suitability of this film to call itself “Moroccan.” Like Benlyazid’s Door to the Sky, Marock challenged the status quo of Islamic traditions and thus curried much criticism, though those criticisms did not mar the popularity of either film. Benlyazid showed both conventional Islam as well as its more liberal application, while Marrakchi showed a youth totally divorced from religion, raising conservative hackles. Both films ask the audience to question the roles that France and French influences play in social development and modernity. The same question applies to tradition and the role of religion for certain classes within Morocco. But no one asked to censure Benlyazid, they only criticized the film, whereas the situation within Morocco has changed enough with the rise of the Islamic party, the Justice and Development Party (PJD), that calls could actually be made for the government to prohibit Marock’s release. The government declined to censure the film, which bodes well for future experimentation with storytelling by Moroccan filmmakers.
CONCLUSION Stories and fables told in oral tradition had hidden agendas and subtextual meanings, but could also be enjoyed as stories accessible to those with or without deeper understanding. In relation to the films discussed above, some filmmakers were able to tackle in a very accessible manner the realm of the religious, the spiritual and the transcendental, the magic and mystical; for some filmmakers who found it necessary to work more in the vein of the rational and the mental, the eschewed realm of the spirit and magic had to be transformed into modern abstract intellectualism due to the influence from Western culture which abjured the base, the human realm, and the spiritual, but reified the mental and the unconscious. But with the transformation of stories into intellectual and metaphysical concepts, the general people of Morocco no longer could enjoy the stories because they lacked the education and cultural referents that would enable them to interpret and understand. Yet the general people still wanted stories, but stories that spoke to their own lives, traditions, environments, and lived realities—which were not homogenous throughout Morocco. Thus the Moroccan people, as a general group, enjoyed those stories which critics abhorred for containing “folklore.” Baths, incense, religious ceremonies, visions, trance, jellabas and takshitas, and other out-
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ward expressions of Moroccan culture were not folkloric unless their representation was solely intended for spectacle rather than imbued with meanings pertinent to the stories and lives represented in text and screen. Several films from the 1985–2006 were well received by Moroccan audiences because the stories were fathomable and imbued with lived representations and experiences, cultural capital available to all Moroccans although rejected by some. Yet, for a change, a rejection was not due to an inability to interpret and understand, but because the story itself was not appreciated. Further, during this period it became evident that the key reason that Moroccan audiences did not like Moroccan films in the past had nothing to do with technology or means, excuses which most filmmakers used to defend their films in the early years. Rather, audiences interested and captivated by relevant and timely stories, such as Love in Casablanca or Marock, would forgive technical weaknesses. As well, Tazi’s experience with Lalla Hobby lent insight into the difficulties that working in other environments posed for Moroccan filmmakers, who might have reconsidered their disapproval of the way their own system and society functioned in comparison. When Moroccan films and filmmakers have chosen to emphasize the good story and the Moroccan audience over their own need to prove themselves or invent a unique and notable style, many previous problems with public appreciation, public access through distribution and exhibition, and public support began to be resolved. When filmmakers stopped blaming the Moroccan audience and instead made films attractive to that audience, the audience attended the films. Yet some issues emphasized by filmmakers would have little to do, really, with Moroccan audiences, because no matter how popular the film, its distribution in Morocco alone, whether in cinema or also in television, could not recuperate its costs. Therefore, Moroccan filmmakers and administrators, looking more toward international coproductions, sales to satellite stations, sales to TV and other cable, tried to remedy the lack of funds from Moroccan exhibition, and their inability to release on video. While advances in new media technologies had opened new exhibition and sales opportunities, such as demonstrated with 2M, they also posed challenges as Moroccan audiences had more entertainment options to choose from, and fewer Moroccan cinemas to attend. Filmmakers still searched to find the middle ground between funding every proposed film a small sum and funding only a few films per year with large grants. Young filmmakers wanted more opportunity to enter the system, but without taking funds from the more experienced generation with several feature films already accomplished. With the increasing popularity of the short film form, and more potential avenues for exhibition of short films, younger filmmakers could train and prepare for features—if more funding was available. But since new filmmakers had also been recruited from abroad, the
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procedure for funding seemed yet more problematic. In particular, there were no means by which interested Moroccan youths could enter the system as outsiders; there were no training programs, no mentorships, nor even university study options. In spite of the numerous suggestions for improvement, few had been implemented. The quality and performance of the CCM continued to influence those filmmakers forced to produce and postproduce their films through that institution, and continuing pressure was levied by filmmakers and technicians upon government and the CCM administration to ensure better technical training and professional practices. However, it seemed the CCM was more interested in encouraging Moroccan filmmakers to turn to coproductions and technical support from elsewhere rather than encouraging national operations. As the situation with Lahlou and his petition effort signed only by Benlyazid attested, no real changes could be manifest in the cinema sector in Morocco, particularly any changes to the CCM, unless filmmakers put individual competition and differences aside to work cohesively for change. As long as the CCM administration could divide filmmakers one against the other and keep filmmakers competing for ever more selective aid, and thus in perpetual rivalry, the CCM would never be required to meet the expectations and needs of Moroccan filmmakers; instead, the CCM would continue to ensure that it met its own needs alone. In final comment, it is during the next era that the efforts expended by the CCM and Moroccan filmmakers to incorporate filmmakers-from-abroad will be matched by similar efforts to develop filmmakers-from-within. The cinema clubs for decades have infused Moroccan youths with an appreciation of cinema and a desire to tell stories, but that desire had no outlet in production or participation in the industry which remained relatively closed and insular. Numerous filmmakers have evinced a desire for a cinema institute, but the State could not always be turned to as the resolver of all dreams and dilemmas so it remained to private individuals to open film institutes in Morocco. In particular, although it is a difficult point to emphasize, Moroccan filmmakers and CCM administrators have begun to realistically evaluate and understand the position and condition of the country as a whole and recognize that their particular form of cultural production would not be a source of great financial return. Therefore, neither films nor filmmakers could really be critiqued for the lack of return on investment; more energy had to be expended in developing new avenues of distribution to make the films and filmmakers more well-known and available, but even new avenues would not and could not remunerate the producers. Remuneration simply could not be a realistic motivation for producing Moroccan films or an excuse for the State to limit the number or types of films made by Moroccans.238
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NOTES 1. Si tout a été chamboulé pour le 7ème Art en moins d’un quart de siècle, le nôtre n’a connu aucune modification, aucun progrès significatif. La presse marocaine avait beaucoup aidé à la promotion et la vulgarisation des films marocains. Le public a toujours répondu présent, ne serait ce que pour démontrer son véritable soutien à un secteur dont il attendait meilleur sort. Malheureusement, le film marocain n’a rien prouvé et n’a pas répondu comme il fallait aux aspirations de ses admirateurs. . . . Si ailleurs leur cinéma nourrissait leurs espoirs dans différents modes de vie et dans différentes façons de percevoir leur culture, leur Histoire, le nôtre a totalement déçu! (Baba, “Cinéma-Nostalgie: Les films marocains,” L’Opinion, June 29, 1996, p. 5.) 2. L’affirmation de la personnalité culturelle du Maroc est une nécessité historique. Elle passe nécessairement par une production nationale de qualité, sachant qu’elle constitue un formidable moyen de création, d’éducation et de divertissement en même temps qu’une importante activité économique devant s’insérer pleinement dans les politiques de développement à l’échelle nationale et régionale. (Le Centre Cinématographique Marocain et le Comité du Suivi des Recommandations du 1er Colloque sur le Cinema, Pour Une Promotion du Cinema National. Propositions et Mesures. Presented after the Third National Festival of Cinema, Meknes, Oct.-Nov. 1991.) 3. 1. Le cinema . . . est probablement un des faits les plus marquants de nôtre temps. Par ses moyens techniques qui lui assurent une très large diffusion, son esthétique et son aptitude à intégrer les autres arts ou formes d’expression et de création tels que le roman, le théâtre, les arts plastiques et la musique, il continue d’avoir un impact considérable malgré la concurrence des autres grands supports audiovisuels que sont la télévision et la vidéo. 2. Pour plusieurs pays, le cinéma a été et reste toujours un formidable moyen de se faire connaître au-delà de leurs frontières: c’est le cas de l’Egypte, des Etats-Unis, de la France, de l’Angleterre, de l’Allemagne, de l’Italie, du Japon, de l’Inde, de l’URSS, etc. Au moment où le Maroc cherche à diffuser à travers le monde une image qui le fasse apprécier à sa juste valeur, il serait extrêmement utile de développer une production cinématographique nationale de qualité. 3. Partant de l’idée que tout développement véritable doit prendre en compte d’abord l’élément humain, le cinéma demeure un des meilleurs moyens pour la diffusion d’une culture nationale de masse d’autant que dans notre pays l’institution scolaire ne peut pas à elle seule, remplir cette mission. 4. Considérant que le cinéma est une composante culturelle, les participants au colloque estiment que sa promotion contribuera inévitablement à l’affirmation de l’identité culturelle nationale. 5. . . . le cinéma est une industrie qui a la particularité de faire appel à plusieurs industries auxiliaires et de ce fait favoriser la création d’emplois. Là encore, au moment où le C.N.J.A. [(government agency)] réfléchit aux moyens de développer une politique de résorption du chômage des diplômés, il s’avère plus que nécessaire d’encourager la production cinématogaphique nationale et de faciliter le tournage des productions internationales. Cette action contribuera à créer une dynamique apte à réanimer plusiers secteurs vitaux de l’économie de notre pays, à permettre à nos techniciens de se recycler périodiquement et d’acquérir une véritable formation professionnelle. (Pour Une Promotion du Cinema National.)
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4. Fourth National Festival of Cinema press conferences: The CCM claims to give out over 500 authorizations per year for foreign companies to shoot in Morocco around the year 1995. This is just for foreign productions. The authorization is a symbolic fee rather than a substantial fee which would/could be used to aid the national cinema as it is in other countries. 5. Marie-Claude Arbaudie, “La Grande réforme du cinéma marocain,” Le Film Français #2175 (January 8, 1988), pp. 52–53. In 1987, fifteen features, twenty-five shorts and thirty-three commercials were shot in Morocco-all by foreign companies. The CCM only requires foreign companies to use a Moroccan production company licensed by the CCM, which was an effort to redirect some income toward the cinema sector in ways other than salaries for production team positions. As a result of the CCM’s policy, numerous production companies were immediately formed, but soon gained a bad reputation for only being interested in reaping some of the profits of the foreign companies, while often they don’t really know anything about filmmaking and end up hampering the foreign teams. 6. Amidou Gaye, “Entretien avec Mohamed Abderrahmane Tazi,” Al Maghreb, January 17, 1994, pp. 2–3. 7. Ahmed Araib, “Entretien avec Mohamed Abderrahman Tazi,” Al Maghrib, April 28–29, 1991, pp. 8–9. One of the problems of cinema rests with the organization of the industry, particularly in the professional cards given by CCM. Tazi says that CCM will give a professional card to anyone who has worked in any capacity on a foreign film, even if they are not capable or have very limited experience in their field. This particularly applies to cards for technicians, but occurs in all the fields such as director, manager, cameraman, etc. Further, technicians are well paid on the foreign films so that they are not eager to work on Moroccan films which can’t offer them but a pittance in salary—so they are either busy when asked to work on Moroccan films or ask an exorbitant salary. 8. Et-Tayeb Houdaifa, “Moulay Driss Alaoui Mdaghri prône de changement dans la continuité,” Teleplus #63, May 1995, pp. 62-67. 9. Pour Une Promotion du Cinema National. 10. One long-term issue for foreign films and making more realistic Moroccan films is that it has been prohibited to use any kinds of guns, artillery, or military arms in filming in Morocco. That prohibition was finally removed in August 1995. 11. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, nd, on the problems of Moroccan film distribution and financing, Arousi offers: “I think if the advertisers or the institution has invested in a work, he shouldn’t expect that this investment will generate income/profits. Film is not a cafe. Film is done for posterity/history, for culture, for our children, for art so that culture will progress. . . . We should not compare ourselves with Hollywood or the United States, we are far from this. What I want to say is that people should contribute to Moroccan cinema so that in ten or twenty years we can say that those people are great for helping us. We need to help cinema as a cultural tool.” 12. Abdessalam Ben Issa, “Interview with Mohamed Abderraham Tazi,” Al Ittihad, May 30, 1994, np. 13. Arab Cinema Roundtable, Oudayas, Rabat Festival, July 1995. Moufida Tlatli: “Can an Arab cinema exist financially by itself? Can we not go to European countries
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for financial help? I think that the answer is simply NO. Can I tomorrow, for instance, go to Egypt, present my project to get the financial help to do this? I don’t think so yet! I have tried myself to make a ‘Maghrebian financial montage’; I knocked at the doors of Algeria, of Morocco and Morocco answered me nicely and what it proposed to me was exactly what I could get from Tunis and so it was only doubling my budget while I needed more, so I had to go to ‘beg’ in other European countries for grants to make this movie. This then forces us to make certain compromises such as having the subtitles in French or English, which can be shocking for some people. It is not as such for me because I think that the art of cinema is, first of all, a universal art that addresses the whole world; cinema needs to generate money so that one can make more cinema and this is the main goal of our work and that there is no need to get involved into constraining specifics (that there should not be any foreign subventions and subtitles and so on).” Nourredine Sail: “I don’t understand then how people can ask why is Tunisian cinema working with funds from France or Germany, or why is Abderahman Tazi working with the French Ministry of Exterior? We have to understand that 95% of African cinema and 80% of Maghrebi cinema is through a French production. Either we feel completely ashamed of this situation and give up cinema production altogether, or we try to include this phenomenon in a way that does not engender a master-slave relationship, but a necessary step in the trajectory of an artistic creation. Whether the state can be a film producer while it is at the same time one that controls is also nonsense. If the state were to get out of the game of cinema and film production in France where the current production has an average of a 100 films per year, this French production will go down to what would be no more than 10 films per year. But France and the French culture consider this a primordial issue that may counter American cinema. There are states that say cinema and production are private spheres, like England where 93% of the income from the movie theaters is all American, 95% of the income from German movie theaters is all American, and when you look at all of the average in Europe, despite France that has the lowest income on American movies, it is 60%. I will here speak of the model of French cinema where the state is supporting cinema so that it survives. It is true that of these films produced in France there is an average of 30% that are called ‘des films d’auteurs’ which are understood solely by the producer and the filmmaker, but they still have the right to exist. We have, in the Arab world and in the Maghreb, also to ask the state to be part of cinema not only as a controlling institution, but as one that guarantees the existence of cinema. If the state does not stand by the side of cinema in Morocco, in Algeria, in Tunis, in Lebanon, or in Syria, there will be no BEING for cinema in our countries. . . . In other words, if we do not require some guarantees from the state here in Morocco, in Syria, in Lebanon etc. for the state to support, protect and provide the means for the survival of cinema, for the state to come up with objective decrees that can be understood by everyone for the protection and safeguard of cinema and truly the best example and model that can be followed at this moment is the French example. If the state does not interfere what will happen is what is happening now which is the complete invasion of one style, one aesthetics, and one kind of movie which is American cinema.
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audience: “When you speak about the interference of the state in this production, I think personally that in the Arab world, and in Morocco as a more specific example, there are a lot of more important problems in economics, in everyday life of the people, for the state to be interested in a question and issue like this. The best solution seems to me that all Arab countries need to find some sort of a cooperation to create a fund for cinema production and the summit that was suggested could look into the creation of this fund.” 14. Et-Tayeb Houdaifa, “Le cinéma arabe jugé par les cinéastes,” Teleplus #63, May 1995, pp. 34–36. There are 800 theaters across North Africa, which would mean some good income for a pan-national distribution arrangement. 15. In July 1993, the filmmakers created the heart of the Union des Cinéastes Maghrébins and called on the responsible parties of the region to move forward on exchange agreements of films between UMA countries and to take up measures to incite Maghrebin distributors to carry UMA films. 16. Souiba and Alaoui, p. 115. Cinema cooperation agreement signed by the managers of the cinema organizations in the pays of the Union Maghreb Arabe, on October 31, 1991, in Meknes during the Third National Festival of Film (Mauritania did not sign because there was no representative present). The agreement concerned the multilateral cooperation in terms of the coproduction of films of short and long form, the assistance rendered to producers wanting to distribute their films in the region in the form of facilitating their circulation, their stay, and the transfer of income relative to the work/services. The agreement also stipulated the removal of all sorts of import and taxation restrictions on the films, the creation of a support fund for Maghrebi coproduction, and the organization of a festival consecrated exclusively to the UMA country films. 17. Behi, “Produire, coproduire . . . Et si les Arabes soutenaient les films arabes?” p. 97. The most cruel lack that we face is the lack of a structure of distribution which would permit each Arabic film to be diffused in the Arab world. To get out of this rut, the Maghrebi filmmakers must constitute a lobby to oblige the institutions concerned of each country to exchange systematically the productions of their respective countries. Egyptian television can also diffuse films at regular intervals, or Iraqi films or others, for the end goal of familiarizing spectators with the cinemas that they are totally ignorant of. 18. No Moroccan filmmakers would or would need to admit to racism as a personal influence on their relations with sub-Saharan filmmakers, but in Morocco as in Egypt there is a general cultural notion of peoples being distinctly different and ranked hierarchically based on skin color. 19. “Cinema National: le réveil n’a pas encore sonné!” Femmes du Maroc No. 30 (June 1998), p. 36. 20. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, Round table about Moroccan cinema and production fund. 21. Fouad Souiba, “Tayeb Seddikki: Plus on a de Fous, plus on s’amuse,” Cinemasrah, Magazine des Arts du Spectacle No. 6 (Rabat, Morocco, March-April 1997), pp. 9–11, when asked when he would go back to cinema, he says “When cinema is no longer exhibited only to select and limited audiences. I do not want to make films just to show them at Ouagadougou.”
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22. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, Nov. 25, 1993, with Hakim Noury and the film The Hammer and the Anvil. 23. Souiba and Alaoui, p. 17. Beginning in the early 1990s, the CCM was let off the hook a little and the focus of criticism turned to the filmmakers themselves and their ability or not to make films appealing to the Moroccan audiences, to use the means wisely to make an approachable cinema. The filmmakers considered to have taken the humanistic stance to make more readily accessible films are Tazi, Ferhati, Lahlou (with La Nuit du Crime), Benlyazid, Ben Barka, Chraibi, and Benjelloun. The huge successes with audiences after this period were Nouri’s Marteau et l’Enclume, Lagtaâ’s Un Amour à Casablanca, and Tazi’s Recherche du mari. . . . 24. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, December 16, 1993, with Mohamed Dirham, Tayeb Seddikki, and Abdelkrim Derkaoui. 25. “Rencontre Georges Lautner: Septième art ou septième ciel?” Al Maghrib, November 29, 1993, p. 5. 26. Zawaya, with Hakim Nouri and Rachid al-Wali, and film Vendeur du Silence. 27. Interview with Bennani. Bennani on training people in film: “There is a problem getting training abroad and there is no training in Morocco. So a filmmaker is always using the best trained people possible and does not want to take on the job of training new people. Sometimes the CCM gives filmmakers trainees, which is a problem for filmmaker because trainees don’t have already a good training ‘in the field’ if they come from a film school or training. Or they come and think they are so hot because they came from school, but they don’t have any real experience. So it is a problem for filmmakers to have to do all to produce and film and also to train people.” Other: “He was making fun also of the training of people on foreign films, because only filler positions are available and agreed that no one can learn from just hanging on the edges and watching what is going on without having a position of responsibility.” 28. Chouika, “Entretien avec S. Ben Barka.” 29. Souiba and Alaoui, p. 109. 30. Lahlou, “Lettre Ouverte au Directeur Général du CCM.” 31. Mounir Rahmouni, “Un Petit Mot,” L’Opinion, March 11, 1989, p. 7. 32. Recordings of Fourth National Festival of Cinema in Tangier, 1995. 33. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, Roundtable about Moroccan cinema and production fund. 34. Hachim. 35. Souiba and Alaoui, p. 57. 36. “Souhail Ben Barka Interview,” Maghreb Arab Press, December 5, 1987, np. 37. “Zoom,” Le Matin, December 22, 1987, np. 38. Arbaudie. 39. Kerdellant. 40. Yves Teuret, “Un Cinéma en devenir,” Al Maghib, May 4, 1988, np. 41. Bouzekri, p. 169. 42. Araib, “Le Métier de tous les défis.” 43. The CCM hosted a film series at 7ème Art theater in Rabat, from June 13–18, September 5–10, September 26–October 1, October 17–22 and November 7–12, in-
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cluding Moroccan shorts, Moroccan features, and many international films. Cost was 5 dirhams each ticket or if bought in bulk, 20 dirhams for 20 tickets, or 1 dirhams each entry! There were five (5) programs (note five dates above), which meant that the films in one program, presented one of the weeks, traveled throughout Morocco to the following cities: Agadir, al Hoceima, Casablanca, El Jadida, Fes, Kenitra, Khouribga, Marrakech, Meknes, Oujda, Rabat, Safi, Settat, Tanger, and Tetouan. 44. L. Boufous, “Maman, j’ai raté mon cinéma,” L’Opinion, June 16, 1995, p. 1. From June 13 to the end of year, Morocco celebrates the centenary of cinema with a group of films that will travel to Oujda, al-Hoceima, Tetouan, Marrakech, Agadir, Safi, Fes, Meknes, Khouribga, Rabat, Casablanca, Settat, Tanger, Kenitra, and el Jadida. Besides the theaters in the cities, there are also two cinema caravans traveling starting July 10, with a specific program for the caravans that will go to souqs and vacation centers such as Saidia, Asilah, Moulay Bousselham, Ifrane, Immouzzer, Sidi Bouzid, Oualidia, Essaouira, Tan Tan, Laayoune, Boujdour, and Dakhla. This operation costs 1.4 million dirhams. This is one of the rare instances when events aren’t held only in Casablanca and Rabat or the five major large cities! Usually the souqs and distant areas, such as Dakhla, are totally ignored! 45. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, nd., with Rafaif, Bayahia, and a theater owner. 46. The Cinémathèque Marocaine is 2,500 meters square, two levels, with a projection hall, climatized, with 317 seats, a screen of 11 meters, and good sound system; two theaters with 17 seats each for video projection; a library; a media library; a film depository (underground); and a cinema museum. Construction cost 4,500,000 dirhams and outfitting cost 5,500,000 dirhams. Inaugurated in July was set only to correspond to the Fête de la Jeunesse. 47. The screenings started in January 1996 and programs were photocopied pages in Arabic and French Screenings were at 7:30 p.m., cost 12 dirhams normal and 7 dirhams for students/reduced. 48. Even though the cinémathèque tried to announce the film screenings in the news, and to have some publicity on the TV news, few people attended the screenings because of its newness and location. The CCM complex, the location of the cinémathèque, is in a lower middle-class neighborhood, and few residents knew the theater showed movies, while the location was quite distant for anyone from other parts of town. 49. Marie-thérèse Delboulbes, “S.O.S. de Frédéric Mitterrand pour les cinémas du Sud,” Al Maghrib, May 18, 1996, p. 8. Fonds Sud Cinéma is financed by the French ministers of foreign affairs, cooperation and culture via the Centre National de la Cinématographie; gives 12 million francs (2.4 millions of dollars) in aid each year to support the production films with strong cultural identity from countries of the South (Africa, Latin America, Middle East, Asia, Caribbean). 50. Hassan Megri, “Fonds Sud Cinema,” Le Matin, August 10, 1995, p. 11; “L’Aide a la Production Cinématogaphique des Pays en Developpement,” Le Guide du Producteur 6: Les Aides au Financement Cinéma-audiovisuel (Paris: DIXIT, 1988), pp. 109–110. One of the main restraints on creativity of southern filmmakers is that they can’t envision any costly effects or ideas. They always have to be lowbudget, which means there are many things they can’t accomplish—no big crowds,
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no construction, no effects or animation, etc., all the things which mark even TV in northern countries or in the United States. The Fonds Sud Cinéma funds only features made by filmmakers from “developing” countries. The subvention is in the amount between 100,000 francs and 1 million francs, depending upon each film selected by a commission of French cinema professionals. The aid must be managed by a French production company, registered as such at the Centre National de la Cinematographie, and the funds must be spent in France, primarily on postproduction (laboratory, editing, mixing, special effects) up to funding the negative costs and final prints, as well as covering the salaries and benefits of the French technicians hired to shoot, be sound engineer, decorator, etc., during filming process. The aid is dispensed in batches. The first, which is less than 50 percent, is given at the beginning of principal photography, and the second at the end of postproduction activities when the final product is presented. Several factors determine a film’s suitability for aid, such as it must be shot in a national language of the developing country or in French, shot in a developing country, be a feature of at least 1 hour, and be suitable or oriented toward theatrical release. 51. The Fonds Sud Cinéma was created in 1984 by the Centre National de la Cinématographie et les Ministères Français de la Coopération et des Affaires Etrangères to aid filmmaking in southern countries in terms of postproduction services such as editing, mixing, etc. In 1995 the fund dispensed 800,000 French francs each to twenty-eight features, including Lalla Hobby by Tazi. 52. Le Guide du Producteur 6, pp. 109–110. This guide seems to cover all kinds of approaches to financing film from conception to video release. Some parts refer to what I heard in the Tetuouan colloquium on financing. Organization: L’aide a la production cinématographique des pays en developpement; association du ministère de la culture et de la communication, au côté du ministère des affaires etrangères, ministère de la cooperation. Goal: to aid production of films by filmmakers coming from countries with insufficient cinema infrastructure. Type of Aid: between 150,000 and 600,000 francs per project, in form of avance sur recettes, paid out to cover expenses incurred in France for postproduction (lab, auditorium . . .) upon submission of receipts. In 1986–1987, eighteen projects from twelve countries received aid, including Egypt and Tunisia but not Morocco. Morocco got aid in other years. 53. Badis (Tazi) got a 400,000 franc subvention from France for his scenario, while the overall cost of the film was 3 million francs. 54. Souiba and Alaoui, p. 56. 55. “Frédéric Mitterrand braque les projecteurs sur le sud,” Libération, May 18, 1996, p. 8. Once produced with Fonds Sud Cinéma, the films are rarely distributed or not distributed well. Exceptions are CANAL+ and ARTE which diffuse seven or eight films a year. 56. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, October 31, 1991, with Saad Chraibi. 57. Grand Ecran #20, March 28, 1989. Mohamed Dahane with Abdelkrim Derqaoui, Mustapha Derqaoui. Mustapha says: “There is no place cheaper than Morocco to make films, yet people take the same money used to make Bicycle Thief and turn out something mediocre and weak.” 58. “The Position of Cinema in Moroccan Cultural Discourse,” January 7, 1996.
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59. Arbaudie. 60. Grand Ecran #14, Aug 29, 1990, interviews with filmmakers. 61. Supported by a special tax on screenings, of which 40 percent went to the state, 25 percent to CCM, 35 percent to a special account in CCM of which 5 percent went to manage the account and the other 95 percent divided between exhibition and production aid. The award started out as 180,000 dirhams which could be supplemented by an award after completion of work not to exceed 300,000 dirhams. In eight years, thirty features were made, and twenty shorts; 19 filmmakers made their first fiction films. 62. Centre Cinématographique Marocain. “Fonds d’Aide a la Production Cinématographique Nationale. Note d’information sur le soutien financier à la production cinématographique.” Decret No 2.87.749 of December 30, 1987, modified by Decret No. 2.93.963 of June 6, 1994, issued by the Ministry of Communication and Ministry of Finances and External Investments institute a parafiscal tax on film screenings to go to the CCM. 46.5 percent is for production of films; 46.5 percent is for exhibition; 7 percent goes to the management of the Fonds, and for organizing national film festivals. The latter is budgeted by the director of the CCM and is included in a special account managed by the CCM. The other sums can be accumulated for succeeding years if not spent. Sums must be transferred by cinema halls every four weeks, as follows: the 46.5 percent for production and 7 percent for festivals goes into a special bank account under the name of the CCM, and the 46.5 percent for exhibition goes into a special bank account opened in the name of the theater. 63. Oudghiri. 64. “Road to Morocco Passes through MFC.” 65. Souiba and Alaoui, p. 57. 66. Zawaya, March 22, 1996, on production fund, filmmakers, and film Dollar. 67. Ait Omar El Mokhtar, “The Sustainment of Cinematic Production in Morocco. Primary Remarks,” Dirassat Cinimaiya, Etudes Cinématographiques, Revue de la Fédération National des Ciné-Clubs du Maroc, no. 12 (Sept./Oct. 1990), pp. 8–13. 68. Mokhtar. A representative would be elected for a term of one year (which could be renewed once), and each year would vote in two sessions (June and December). Representatives 1-4 would be chosen by the members of the respective chambers, along with two substitutes, while the national organization of cinema clubs would chose its representative. However, the CCM was allowed to chose representatives 6 and 7. The CCM would additionally be involved by providing a secretary, who would not vote or otherwise participate in the decisions of the committee and an additional “observer” to the committee. 69. Arbaudie. 70. Kerdellant. 71. Another source, the CCM, indicates award could be as follows: each case of aid varied between 500,000 dirhams to 2,500,000 dirhams for features and 100,000 to 450,000 dirhams for shorts. 72. “Local Film Production Requires Lotsa $ and Guts,” Variety, May 9, 1990, p. 52. 73. Mokhtar.
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74. CCM official document, modification by Decret No. 2-93-963 on June 18, 1994, concerning the Repartition des Dotations Affectees aux longs et courts metrages sur dossier et aprés production. 75. CCM official document, modification by Decret No. 2-93-963 on June 18, 1994. This last portion is given to the producer only after presentation of the final copy, which is ready for screening, with the agreement of the committee that the work fulfills the expectations of the submitted script, and the quality of the work is sufficiently professional. 76. Centre Cinématographique Marocain. “Fonds d’Aide a la Production Cinématographique Nationale. Note d’information sur le soutien financier à la production cinématographique.” 77. Zawaya, nd, with actors from Noury film and film Moins Une. 78. Zawaya, March 22, 1996, on production fund, filmmakers, and film Dollar. 79. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, May 7, 1991, on cinema in Morocco with Farida Benlyazid (journalist, scriptwriter, and since two years director); Habib Belqadi (owner of cinema theaters); Hamid Marrakshi (distributor of films); Noureddine Afaya (teacher and critic and member of the committee of the production fund); Najib Refaif (journalist who will here represent the audience); Mohamed Abd. Tazi (director); Mohamed Masallo (rep. of the Moroccan chamber of the owners of cinemas); Abdellah Bayahia (cameraman and for some years now he has become an administrator within the CCM). 80. Chouika, “Entretien avec S. Ben Barka.” 81. Zawaya, March 22, 1996, on production fund, filmmakers, and film Dollar. 82. Interview with Bennani. 83. Sarim Fassi-Fihri, “Une production en chute accélérée,” Teleplus, December 1995, p. 15–16. A medium-length Moroccan film costs 3 million dirhams. It would normally be funded by the production fund, theatrical release, TV, and video. Yet out of the four only two are relatively significant in Morocco, and often only one is counted upon regularly—production aid and exhibition. The tax on tickets that goes to the cinema fund for film production is 4.75 percent of ticket cost, but it is not paid by all theaters, remember. The theaters are either exempt for being new or renovating, or they simply cheat and don’t report accurate ticket sales. As a result, the production fund has little money after five years! It has lost 60 percent of its revenues since 1991. In 1995 the two sessions of aid distribution had only 4 million dirhams, to which for exceptional reasons the Minister of Communication added 5 million dirhams. This is for five features and fifteen shorts. Thus, each feature gets a million and half dirhams. For the producer, the theatrical receipts vary between 50,000 and 500,000 dirhams. As for television, they are not obliged to buy or coproduce Moroccan films. The standard price they propose to pay for a feature is 25,000 dirhams for one diffusion for RTM and 25,000 francs for the private channel for 3 or 4 diffusions in 2 years exclusive rights. 84. Nabyl Lahlou, “Est-ce une tempête dans un verre?” Al Bayane, September 5, 1992, np. 85. Interview with Bennani. 86. Souiba and Alaoui; As of January 1988, the following taxation: Taxe communale: weekly gross receipts, from 3 percent on 2,000 dirhams to 20 percent on more than 16,000 dirhams; taxe parafiscale au profit to CCM: weekly gross receipts, from 1
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percent on up to 2,000 to 6 percent on 16,000 dirhams or more; as well, 10 percent of the price of ticket is sent each week to support the Fonds d’aide (5% to production and 5% for theater renovation); taxe parafiscale au profit de l’entraide nationale (ministry of social affairs): on weekly gross receipts, from 1 percent up to 2,000 to 6 percent on 16,000 dirhams or more; 20 centimes per ticket sold, each week, goes to support Palestine; 1.5 percent of the theater’s receipts each week goes to Droit d’auteur. 87. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, May 7, 1991. 88. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, May 7, 1991 89. Arbaudie. 90. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, May 7, 1991. 91. Charlot, “Entretien avec le distributeur de films Mohamed el Harrak,” L’Opinion, December 30, 1995, p. 5. 92. “Cinéma et Entreprise, entretien avec Abderrahman Tazi,” Tijari, 10, 47. 93. Araib, “Entretien avec Mohamed Abderrahman Tazi.” 94. Mohamed Behjaji, “Mohamed Abderahman Tazi Talks to Ittihad al Ishtiraki on the Second Part of Looking for the Husband of My Wife,” Ittihad al Ishtiraki, January 21, 1996, p. 9. 95. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, nd, with the brothers Derqaoui and Rashid Sbaghi and film First Story. 96. Hassan Saidi, “Le Look du Lynx,” L’Opinion, December 30, 1995, p. 5. 97. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, May 7, 1991. 98. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, May 7, 1991. 99. Souiba and Alaoui, p. 28. 100. Souiba and Alaoui, p. 26. 101. Karim Boukhari, “Revons de distribution,” Al Bayane, June 29, 1996, p. 10. 102. Mohammed Bakrim, “Le Cinéma est-il mort?” Libération, May 11–12, 1995, p. 10. 103. Interview with Souhel Ben Barka, réalisé par Monique Carcaud-Macaire, Jean Guillien, Françoise Haffner, Robert Perz et Benoite Pitiot, November 3, 1991. Ben Barka’s private unpublished copy with editorial marks. 104. Taleb, p. 35. 105. Interview with Souhel Ben Barka, réalisé par. . . . 106. Souiba and Alaoui, p. 26. 107. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, January 1996, with Abd Tazi, Sandra Carter, Najeeb Rifaif (Journalist), and Amina Rachid (actress) and film Looking for the Husband of My Wife. 108. Hachim. 109. Zawaya, with Hakim Nouri, Rachid al-Wali, and film Vendeur du Silence. 110. “How Did Cinema Audience in Casablanca Receive the Last Film of M.A. Tazi ‘Looking for the Husband of my Wife’?” Al Alam, January 9, 1994. 111. Mohamed Bahjaji, “Mohamed Abderrahman Tazi, the Director of Looking for the Husband of My Wife,” Al Ittihad, March 21, 1995, np. 112. Recordings of Fourth National Festival of Cinema in Tangier, 1995. 113. Kerdellant. 114. Article 19. 115. “Morocco,” Introductory Country Survey, p. 1982.
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116. Soumaya Derhourhi, “le comité de vigilance sort do son sommeil,” Teleplus, No. 94 (29 March–4 April). 117. Chouika, “Entretien avec S. Ben Barka.” When criticized for not aiding the only cinema publication that had ever persisted in Morocco, Ben Barka retaliated by claiming that the cinema club leadership had never come forward to seek the aid of the CCM since he became director, and that it was he who had to seek out the cinema club organizers to see how the CCM could help. I mark this dialectic for two reasons: It indicated the persistence of cinema club focus and dedication to produce an excellent journal for so many years, and because it reflected a dominant pattern of defense against complaining individuals or organizations. Rather than addressing the complaints, additional accusations are lobbed back and a stasis is maintained. 118. “Editorial,” Dirassat Cinimaiya, Etudes Cinématographiques, Revue de la Fédération National des Ciné-Clubs du Maroc No. 7 (Kenitra, Morocco, Septembre 1987). 119. “Remarks and Propositions. . . .” In the following cities/towns: Rabat, Sale, Kenitra, Ksar Kbir, Chaouen, Tanger, Rabat again, Rabat again, Sidi Slimane, Assila, Tetouan, Errachidia, Meknes, Taza, Agadir, Ouarzazat,Taroudant, Enzigane, Fqih Ben Salleh, Goulmim, Khorigba, Oulad Tayma, Al Jadida, Benguerir, Tiznit, Zawouiya al Sheikh, and Youssouffia. 120. Gaye, “Le Public du Cinema a Rabat.” 121. Gaye, “Le Public du Cinema a Rabat.” 122. Laoufi, p. 69. Culture centers would even collaborate, such as the French cultural center and the German cultural center collaborating to put on a series of films celebrating Volker Schlondorff at Cinema Royal in downtown Rabat. The different cultural centers’ films and events would reiterate their overall objectives, such as the French celebrating French culture and relations with Morocco, the Russian celebrating the formation of the Soviet Union and the benefits of communism, the Egyptian emphasizing their unique films and film masters such as Chahine, and the Iraqi center emphasizing Iraq’s importance in the Arab world through the ideological and celebratory films shown about the country’s culture, heritage, political leader, etc. 123. Interview with Bennani. 124. Interview with Sijilmassi, 1996. He told Driss that he thought the CCM was going to cut the aid to the Federation of Cinema Clubs to 20,000 dirhams. 125. Araib, “FNCCM La Riposte,” p. 4. 126. The Rabat cinema club in 1991–1992 season showed Chraibi’s Chronicle of a Normal Life, Ferhati’s Beach of the Lost Children, and Daoud Oulad Said’s The Generous Memory. Totally, showed seven Italian, five Egyptian, four German, three Moroccan, three American, two French and one Japanese, one Chinese, and one Russian film—27 films. 127. Entrance by presentation of membership card in French cultural center or Cineclub Action. Films: Le Grand Voyage of Tazi. Mille et une Mains de Ben Barka. Cauchemar de Ahmed Yachfine. Mirage de Ahmed Bouanani. Poupees de Roseau de Jilali Ferhati. Titre Provisoire de Mustapha Derkaoui. Shorts: 1ère Class de Mehdi El Glaoui, Agregats de Nourredine Gounajjar, and Absence de Saad Chraibi. 128. Souiba and Alaoui, pp. 44–45.
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129. Souiba and Alaoui, p. 40. 130. Sijilmasi. 131. Haffner, “Le Sens de Khouribga: Les cinémas africains et le rôle du Maroc.” 132. “Colloque à Tétouan sur ‘Le cinéma et l’immigration,’” al Bayane, April 8, 1997. 133. Arab Cinema Roundtable, Oudayas, Rabat Festival, July 1995. 134. Driss Ksikes, “Interview with Khaled Alioua (president of the Festival of Rabat),” Libération, June 13, 1996, pp. 1 and 12. 135. A distinction which only really becomes important because of the ambiguity of how to define films made by Moroccans born and living and working in Morocco and those Moroccans who were either living abroad or were born abroad of Moroccan ancestry, but which the CCM and filmmaking community wanted to incorporate into the Moroccan filmography. Since individuals living abroad did not face the same contraints and forces that shaped their films as did the filmmakers living in Morocco, I feel strongly that a distinction must be drawn, and I constructed the terms Moroccans/filmmakers-living-in-Morocco versus Moroccans/filmmakers-living-abroad to distinguish the two sectors. 136. I included those films into the filmography of short films. 137. Tangier recordings. 138. Zawaya, nd, with Hakim Nouri and Rachid Al-Wali, and film Vendeur du Silence. 139. Tangier recordings. 140. The other is Mohamed Oulad Mohand. 141. He also made a feature in Morocco that was distributed in 1998, Mektoub, which I will not address at this time. 142. Image: Vincent Jeannot; music: Jean Philippe Rykiel; editing: Albert Coporossi; actors Jamal Debbouze, Benbrahim, Naima Lemcharqui, Souad Saber—in twenty or so festivals, but given a prize in the Festival de Bastia in France. 143. Zawaya, 1996, with Bachir Skirej, Nabil Ayouch and two critics Mohamed Bouallam and Amido Gaye on the films of Nabyl Ayouch. 144. Image: Pierre Novion, sound: Francois Guillaume; music: Alex Blue and Marc Marion; editing: David Danesi with Pascal Demelon, Frederic Cuif, and Maurice Band. 145. Zawaya, 1996, with Bachir Skirej, Nabil Ayouch and two critics Mohamed Bouallam and Amido Gaye on the films of Nabyl Ayouch. 146. Image: Benedicte Martin; music: Slim; editing: Michel Bouchot; actors: Francois Paul Doussot and Audrey Laforce. 147. Zawaya, 1996, on cinema producers and with Miriem Bakir and her film. 148. Further, the film was marred in the festival screening because of technical difficulties with the projector and the sound. 149. Image: Marc le Bihand; editing: Antoine le Poivre, with Rachid Benbouchta, Salah Teskouk, Anouche Setbon, and Fatiha Cherigan—won the Prize of the Arab Cinema Festival in Paris and in the Alexandria Festival won a prize of praise. 150. Scenario: Ismail Ferroukhi and Camille Broites; image: Jean Philippe Bouyer; sound: Emmanuel Rouleau; music: Fairouz and Desmond Dekker; editing: Cedric Khan, with Hakim Lahouiri, Catherine Corsini, Fatima Belhimeur, and Abid Bourabous.
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151. Music: Preben Plathe, Jens Sarum; image: Nils Petter Lotherington, with Leif Dubard, Reza Zaki, Pelle Madsen, Odd Benestao. 152. Image: Yves Boutry; sound: Marc Lacroix; editing: Jean Luc Desbonne and Hassan Legzouli, with Simon El Baz, Didier Cousin. 153. Zawaya, nd, with Hassan Lagzouli and Moroccan critic Mohammed Boualam. 154. 20 mins, color, images: Thierry Lebigre; editing: Ahmed Bouanani. 155. 1993, 35 mm, b/w, script: Ahmed Bouanani; image: Thierry Le Bigre; sound: Najim Chlih; editing: Nathalie Perrey, 22 mins; with Mustapha Mounir. 156. Scenario: Youssef Fadel, image: Thierry Lebigre, sound: Najib Chlih, editing: Ahmed Bouanani. 157. Written, directed, edited by Meziane; dialogue: Driss Korri; image: Jean Claude Nickelbrouck; sound: Najib Chlih; music: Richard Horowitz; actors: Mohamed Meziane, Salah Eddine Ben Moussa, Aziz Ben Moumen, Mustapha Salamat, Sam Mohamed, Yamna Lakhal. 158. Zawaya, July 17, 1996, with Meziane, his film, and Hafid Assaioui (member and leader of the Cineclub Raid in Rabat); interview with Rachid Fekkak. 159. Scenario: Najib Refaif and Tazi; image: Thierry Lebigre; sound: Youssef El Manjra; editing: Ahmed Bouanani, with Mohamed Afifi, Mostapha Munir, Abdellah Toukouna; entered in shorts out of competition in fourth National Festival of Tangier in 1995. 160. Souiba and Alaoui, p. 17. 161. Said Taghlibi “De l’assainissement par le cinema, une rencontre avec le cineaste Hakim Noury,” (no publication given), June 14, 1996, p. 6. 162. Mohammed Bakuri, “The Power of Heritage in The Beach of the Lost Children,” Al Ittihad, February 16, 1992, np. 163. Et-Tayeb, “Le cinéma arabe jugé par les cinéastes.” 164. Souiba, “Tayeb Seddiki: Plus on a de Fous, plus on s’amuse,” p. 10. Seddiki mentions that he hates the notion that when one works on Moroccan patrimony, one is working on the past. He feels that’s not true. 165. “The Position of Cinema in Moroccan Cultural Discourse,” January 7, 1996: Another cited problem with Moroccan films is that they folklorize Moroccan society and customs. This is never very clearly discussed, but here is a translated quote: “. . . cinematically reviving the cultural forgotten—especially popular culture—is often done to please the foreigner. . . . Many films have presented the constituents of our identity: behavior, clothing, action, creation, rituals, and culture—on the basis that they are strange things and folklore. For example, take the clothing in films such as Wedding of Blood, Kaftan of Love, and Door to the Sky, etc. Mohamed Reggab said, ‘many of our films have become valid to be sent abroad as postcards and not for interior consumption.’” In my opinion: What is interesting about these quotes, married with my notion that Moroccan cinema pretty much ignores rural audiences, is that activities which are still prevalent and dominant, clothing which is still dominant, etc., is considered folkloric compared to the Western dominated cultural styles which have only limited circulation and primarily is an urban phenomenon. Even upperclass women wear traditional clothing for wedding celebrations and eat traditional
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Morocan foods. Why is it folkloric in films, then? It is folklore from whose point of view? Can the few elites in the big cities speak for all Moroccan audiences? 166. Interview with Bennani. 167. “Farida Belyazid: L’Identite a travers l’objectif d’une camera.” 168. Produced Brèches dans le Mur with money she gained from selling all her jewelry. 169. The stories of Arab women immigrants. Four portraits of women. Two adults of the first generation who arrived in France and two young girls of the second generation who were brought up in France. Their problems are totally different. 170. Akharbach, p. 90. 171. Keltoum Ghazali, “La ruse des femmes,” Citadine #32, July-August 1998, p. 22. La Ruse des Femmes, 1999, Kied Ensa; Lalla Aicha is the daughter of a rich merchant who has always had whatever she wanted. Her mother dead, her father has given in to all her whims. One day the son of the king sees her on a terrace and falls immediately in love, but their love is one of struggles for power one over the other. Neither will give in easily to the other. The prince is Rachid El Ouali and Lalla Aicha is Samira Akariou. The question posed by the film is whether or not this relationship is love. This is an Andalusian story on the battle of the sexes. The prince will marry Aicha if she agrees that men are more clever than women, but she disagrees and proves the opposite. “C’est un conte que les femmes racontent à leurs enfants depuis des generations” says Belyazid. “Je l’ai écouté dans mon enfance et il a fasciné la petite fille que j’étais d’un émerveillement qui dure toujours.” The interior scenes are shot in Tangier and the exteriors in Chaouen, Ifrane, and Merzouga. 172. Abdesalam Bouzekar, “A Door on the Sky: The Identity as Cinema,” Al Itihad al Ichtiraki, April 14, 1991, p. 6. 173. “Farida Belyazid: L’Identite a travers l’objectif d’une camera.” 174. Moroccan, Tunisian (Hassan Daldoul), and French coproduction. France Media SA, Satpec SA (Tunis), Interfilms (Casablanca) with participation of Ministère Français des Relations Exterieures, Ministère Français de la Culture, and the CCM. Director and Script: Farida Benlyazid. Music: Anouar Brahim (other music by Bach [The Passion of Saint Mathew]—Farid el Atrach and Bazaza Tali reading the Koran). During the scene in which the woman is escaping from her abusive husband, the music used is Najat Atabu (Berber singer). Decor: Khadija Lhmam and Latifa Omar. Actress: Zakia Tahiri (Nadia), Shaabia Elaadraoui (Kirana), Eva Saint Paul (Laila). The father is veteran filmmaker Ahmed el Bouanani. Mother is Latifa Amor. Souad Ferhati is Tsi Tsi (longtime servant). Bayga plays Ba Sassi. Mourad Gamra is Abdelkrim. Jean Loup Woolf is Jean Philippe. Laila Benkirane is the lawyer. Little found girl: Naima Saoudi. Musicians are Le Groupe des Aissaouas de Fes. DP: Georges Barsky. Sound: Fawzi Thabet. Technical direction: Ahmed Bouanani. 1st AD: Naima Saoudi. Editor: Moufida Tlatli. Laboratory for sound and montage—SATPEC in Tunisia. The film was scheduled to show in the Festival Cinématographique d’Alexandrie in September 1989 (or 99), but was lost on the plane. The film did show at the Neuvieme Mostra du Cinema Mediterraneen in Valencia Spain in October 1988. The film won a bronze “Annab” at the Journées du Cineéma Méditerranéen in Annaba, Algeria in 1988. The first exhibition of the film was in Rabat in 1988 at the occasion of the festival of Women’s films about Women,
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then also in Casablanca, then to international events. It showed in Fez in 1989 to commemorate the subject “Women’s Creativity”; then in Tetouan to participate in the 5th Mediterranean Cinema Festival, and it had a special exhibition during the Francophone conference in Tangiers in 1989, and the International Film Festival in Rabat in 1989. It also was shown in the Fifth Festival of African Cinema in Canada. In April 1989, it also showed at a university in North Carolina. It should have showed at Cannes and at Ouagadougou but arrived late at both places (thanks to the CCM). It was exhibited at the Fifth International Film Festival in Washington, D.C. in 1991. The film also opened the International Women’s Cinema Festival in late February 1991. 175. Bakrim, “Filmer la tolérance,” Libération, March 15, 1991. Bakrim criticizes the film’s intolerance of Jean Philippe, but I, on the other hand, emphasize how Nadia continues to write to him and express her continuing revelations and ideas, so that she doesn’t reject him totally, but rejects his ability to understand the conflict that she was suffering at the moment. 176. A Mexican soap opera produced in Miami, translated into Arabic and hugely popular in Morocco in 1995. 177. Quoi qu’il en soit, ce film doit légitiment faire date quelque part en nous— parce que . . . il interroge ce qu’il y a de sacré en nous. Nous avons tous, un espace mental préconçu, investi de la mémoire collective que même notre instruction, aussi érudite soit-elle ne peut modifier. En fait nous vivons une certaine dualité: d’un coté nous avons notre culture acquise, notre savoir intellectuel, et de l’autre cet espace mental socio-collectif. Et Belyazid a tenu à faire affronter ces deux instances qui coexistent en nous (Belfquih). 178. Abd Al-Rafee’a, “Farida Benlyazid Loses Her Way to God Even if the Door of the Sky Was Open!” Al Itihad al Ichtiraki, April 27, 1992. 179. “Elle est d’une certaine façon le personnage principal. Elle est un vestige d’une civilisation en voie de disparition. Elle représent le berceau de la culture araboandalouse (marocaine) dont la ville de Fès a été longtemps très fière.” (Document in Benlyazid’s file in CCM, characterization sketch.) 180. “Note d’Intention,” document in Benlyazid’s file in CCM, proposal for film. 181. Souiba and Alaoui, p. 88. 182. Which means the family was descended from the Prophet Mohamed. Nadia’s father was a shareef (chorf), which itself lends some causality to the spiritual “return” that Nadia undergoes upon her return from years in France. Although only males are supposed to be able to inherit spiritual grace from the father, Nadia takes on that role since her brother has rejected Morocco and its traditions. Later in the film Nadia becomes a healer, which is a characteristic that can develop for women descendants of shareefian families. 183. S.L., “Tolérance de Femme,” La Presse, Tunis, October 29, 1988. 184. Abd Al-Rafee’a. 185. Bakrim, “Filmer la tolérance.” 186. Cowrote and codirected shorts, La Femme Rural, 1987. 187. “Confidences,” Teleplus #78, August 1996, p. 8. 188. Script, dialogue, editing, and direction: Abdelkader Lagtaa; image: Abdelkrim Derkaoui; music: Abdelouahab Doukkali, 90 mins, 35 mm, color with
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Ahmed Naji, Mouna Fettou, and Mohamed Fouzi; the film received 600,000 dirhams from the CCM production fund. 189. Won the prize of best image at the Festival of Rabat; tells the story of an adolescent who is rejected by his social environment, so one day he leaves to search for a new destiny. 190. “Regard sur le film Marocain: Les raisons de la colère,” Le Message de la Nation No. 78. Script, dialogue, and direction by Noury; image by Ibrahim Chamat; editing by Allal Sahbi; Music by Luis Enriquez Bacalov; actors: Saadallah Aziz as Ali the mailman, Mia Remmal as the other, Rami Latif as the father, Majdouline Remmal as Nadia the daughter, Mohamed Tsouli is the postal chief. CCM records budget as 289,000 dirhams; received a fonds de soutien grant of 150,000 dirhams in January 1980; the film is considered a social commentary. Story retraces the miserable life of a postman/government employee and the drudgery of his days working for stingy embezzling supervisors; he dreams of a more exciting life and suddenly one day he quits the postal work to become the chauffeur for a rich family of leisure. The French woman of the house looks at him with langorous eyes while their little six-year-old girl, frustrated by lack of paternal love creates a tender and affectionate relationship with him; but the Moroccan husband doesn’t like him or the world and drinks himself silly. One day the chauffeur and girl are kidnapped. As the chauffeur escapes from the hideout, he is tragically killed by a reckless driver; the girl is returned to her parents by one of the criminals. The first part of the film is much in the style of neorealism while the second half becomes more sensationalistic and action oriented. 191. Script, dialogue and direction: Hakim Noury; image: Abdelkrim Derkaoui; editing: Abdessalam Agnaw; main character is Tahar played by Aid Mouhoub; also stars Rabah/Abderazzak Maras, Madi/Mohamed Khiari, Tamou/Fatima Ouachay, Planton/Ahmed Saari, and Mohamed Mrani. This film is also considered a social commentary film; it was awarded 700,000 dirhams by 1988 production fund, and 2M purchased TV rights for 40,000 francs. Noury’s own synopsis: Tahar, fifty-five years old, conscientious, honest, and punctual in his daily routine work, is the archetype of the model functionary. He lives a tranquil life in spite of the problems that go with his life as a functionary and head of a family with rebellious teenage children. Suddenly one day his supervisor tells him he is going to be prematurely retired. For Tahar, this is a situation he has not prepared for, and he has to face totally new problems. Preparing his retirement file, moving out of his administrative housing, looking for new and cheap housing, selling everything he owns to try to get by while waiting for his pension. In a word, one sees his gradual degradation on the material level as well as the psychological level of someone whose life, or what is left of it, is totally left up in the air. Tahar not only loses his apartment and furnishings, having to find a very impoverished cramped old room to live in, he loses his hope and faith. Although he was retired quite efficiently, somehow the State could never get his pension paperwork organized, so over time his family sank further and further into poverty, waiting. Tahar’s only solace was his love of fishing, which also helped feed the family. And although times were very rough, the family rallied. In particular Tahar was able to establish a more loving and understanding relationship with his teenage daughter. One day she comes to his fishing spot to bring him lunch, and finds he had died ear-
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lier, sitting and fishing; Ahmed Araib, “L’Auteur n’a pas perdu la main,” Almaghrib, May 12–13, 1991, p. 13; Ali Hassan, Cinéma, Nov. 25, 1993: The film was very well received by the public and is really considered one of those films which began to turn Moroccan audiences more favorably toward Moroccan films. Mouhoub received prize for best actor in the third National Festival of Cinema in Meknes in 1991, even though the film was panned by critics. The production fund promised Noury 700,000 dirhams for this film, but they cut the last 25 percent of the award so it equalled 525,000 only, because they said the technical quality of the film was too low. Actually a public debate occurred between Noury and the production fund committee over this issue. Noury claims he was told by the committee that they were denying his last aid portion in order to punish the CCM, make the CCM pay attention, to make the CCM more determined to improve their operations. Noury’s film was all processed, edited, and printed at the CCM; Abdelaziz Mouride, “Hakim Noury: Nous sommes une génération de cinéastes sacrifiée,” Le Matin Magazine, May 19–26, 1991, np; The committee, however, denies Noury’s explanation and claim instead that they only denied the aid because of the film’s technical quality, not to punish the CCM; Mohamed Lotfi, “La ‘Commission’ a encore raison . . .” L’Opinion, May 31, 1991, np; The commission said they had asked Noury to make some changes and justify his claimed budget expenses, which he did not do. They broadcast the suspicion that Noury, who had claimed his budget would be 1,700,000 dirhams, had inflated his budget in order to get a bigger grant from the committee, but then cut expenses to make the film for only the production fund award amount of 700,000 dirhams, which meant that a bad film resulted. 192. Written by Noury in collaboration with Farida Benlyazid and then Driss Tahiri; Image: Girolamo Larosa; sound: Fawzi Thabet; music: Moncef Adyel; editing: Allal Sahbi; Sarim Fassi-Fihri is producer. Actors: Fatima Kheir (Naima), Rachid el Ouali, Rachid el Fekkak, Aid Mouhoub. Mehdi is imprisoned for five years and emerges sombre and melancholy at age forty with one desire—to emigrate to Canada to reconstruct his life. But in the meantime he must find odd jobs and a cheap place to live. He meets Driss, an unemployed young rascal who scams, tricks, and cons in order to nourish and take care of his bedridden mother. The two men, in spite of totally opposite temperaments, needs, and goals, become friends. The film takes its special quality from the marked contrast between Mehdi, taciturn and somewhat defeated man, and Driss, bad boy, seductive, exuberant, and devilish. The film investigates friendship in modernizing society where relationships are becoming tenuous. Noury explains that “. . .the film concerns two beings, opposites, whose loneliness and solitude actually bring them together. I make realistic cinema, cinema of the street and of social reality, which is not always pretty. My other films have been pamphlets which denounce directly the problems of society. This film puts social problems in the background, and is above all the story of friendship and human relations”; “Voleur de Reves de Hakim Noury en première,” Campus, no 1, April 7, 1996, p. 11. Noury further claims: “Love can finish one day, but the strong friendship can last until death. When I was a kid, I remember in the 1960s there used to be a relationship between the people who lived in one building or one neighborhood, but now starting from the 1980s materialism has killed that kind of relationship between people. Whereas our cultural morals are friendship, hospitality,
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and solidarity and confidence, now relationships are built on profits”; Zawaya, nd. with Hakim Noury and Rachid Al-Wali and film Vendeur du Silence. Several scriptwriters added unique elements to the film. While Noury wrote the original script, the producer hired Benlyazid to do a rewrite. She introduced the character of Naima, an intermediary between Driss and Mehdi, and as someone to take care of Driss’s mother while he is out galavanting around. Naima became one of the most endearing characters of the film. A third rewrite was done by Driss Tahiri. The producer, Sarim Hassi-Fihri, provided around 3 million dirhams to supplement the Fall 1993 CCM award of 1,200,000 dirhams. Although the film did not do well when first released, it was quite successful when the producer arranged a second release in autumn; “Confidences,” Teleplus #76, June 1996, p. 6 ; The Thief of Dreams won three prizes at the Fourth National Festival of Film in Tangier in December 1995: prize for best direction, prize for best male acting, and prize for original music. The film was also selected by the CCM to represent Morocco in the Twelfth Journées du cinéma africain et créole in Montreal. 193. Scenario by Hakim Noury, produced by Prod-Action; starring Rachid Ouali in the role of a journalist who is undeceived and at a crossroads in his life. The film is a diatribe against powerful people, through the investigation led by a journalist in order to expose the abuses committed by a high functionary. Also stars Hamid Zoughi. This film, which required period costumes, decor, and ambient decorations of the 1970s, was very warmly received by Moroccan public on commercial release. Noury and producer Fassi-Fihri declined the production grant of 1,280,000 offered because it was too minimal to even bother using it as a basis for seeking other monies; Driss Ksikes, “Hakim Noury rend la monnaie,” Libération, July 6–7, 1996, p. 1. 194. Abdelaziz Mouride, “Le monde vu d’en-bas,” Le Matin Magazine, February 13–20, 1994, p. 7. 195. Mouride, “Hakim Noury: Nous sommes une génération de cinéastes sacrifiée.” 196. Houdaifa Et-Tayeb. “Hakim Noury Prêche un cinéma social,” Teleplus, nd, 1996, pp. 13–14. 197. Ali Hassan, Cinéma, November 25, 1993, with Hakim Noury and his film The Hammer and the Anvil. 198. Dahane. 199. Script, dialogue, and direction: Hakim Noury; translated by Sarim Fassi Fihri, the producer; image: Girolamo Larosa; sound: Fawzi Thabet; music: Moncef Adel; editing Allal Sahbi; actors: Fadila Masrour (Rkia child), Touria Alaoui (Rkia adult), Zhor Slimani (Hlima), Ahmed Sari, Mustapha Zaari, Fairouz (Assia the rich mistress), and Naoufel Berraoui (Jamal). Oudghiri: Having benefited from insufficient aid from the CCM production fund, of 1 million dirhams, Hakim Noury appealed to MPS to produce the film. MPS provided the rest of the financing necessary, for a total budget of 3 million dirhams. Some actors agreed to act for free, and others worked for low salaries—for example, what a foreign actor would get for one day, they would get for the whole film. MPS was created in 1987 with 2 million dirhams capital and specializes in the production of foreign films in Morocco. Acting as executive producer for foreign films shot in Morocco, MPS signs contracts as coproducer, and furnishes all the infrascture necessary in Morocco in terms of lighting, material, catering, on-set housing,
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casting—everything but the camera. MPS produces two to three features a year, and in 1992 their capital increased to 7.5 million dirhams. 200. “La Societe a l’Ecran,” Al Maghrib, nd, np. 201. Ahmed Araib, “L’enfance Volée,” Al Maghrib, May 1–2, 1994, p. 5. 202. “L’enfance Volée,” Al Bayane, April 30, 1994, np. 203. For an intensive reflection on Tazi’s life and work, as well as his influence on the cinema industry in Morocco, see Kevin Dwyer’s book Beyond Casablanca: M. A. Tazi and the Adventure of Moroccan Cinema, Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 2004. 204. “Cinema et Entreprise, entretien avec Abderrahman Tazi.” 205. Producer/director: Tazi; DP: Federico Ribes; editor: Kahena Attia; sound: Christian Baldos and Thierry Ferreux; music: Abdelwahab Doukkali. Actors: Hadj Ben Moussa—Bachir Skirej; Houda—Mouna Fettou; Lalla Rabea—Naima Lemcherki; Lalla Hobbi—Amina Rachid; Tamo—Fatima Moustaid; Houda’s mother— Lalla Mamma; Houda’s father—Mohamed Afifi; jeweler—Ahmed Taib Lalj; tailor— Abderrahim Bargach; second husband—Mehdi Kotbi; Lalla Rkia—Fatima Mernissi. Film produced with the aid of: Fonds d’Aide à la Production Nationale (1,700,000 dirhams in aid), Ministère des Affaires Etrangères (France; 700,000 French francs), Ministère de la Culture (France), Agence de Coopération Culturelle et Technique, Festival International Cinéma Méditerranéen-Montpellier, 2M International (TV rights in Morocco purchased for 100,000 francs [A. Boukhezzar, Interview with the director of Badis. Al Ittihad 20/9/1993]), Ecrans du Sud, Fondation Hassan II pour les Marocains Résident à l’Etranger, Centro Orientamento Educativo (C.O.E.), and Royal Air Maroc. Distributor is Naji Benkirane, same as for Love in Casablanca. Festivals and screening history: Festival International d’Amiens, November 1993; Festival des 3 Continents, Nantes, November 1993; Festival International des Films d’Amour a Mons, Belgium, February 1994; Festival International des Films d’Humour a Chamrousse, March 1994; Festival du Cinema Africain de Milan, March 1994; Rencontres du Cinema Africain de Khouribga; African and Creole film festival, Montreal, April-May 1994 (Skiredj won best actor); festival du Cinema Africain de Bruxelles, June 1994; Second Biennale of Cinema Arabe a Paris organized by the Institute du Monde Arab (IMA), June 1994 (won prize for best film); Fourteenth Festival of African Cinema at FESPACO, 1995 (won special jury prize); fifteenthth round of Carthage Film Festival (Skiredj won best actor); Festival of Mediterranean Film in Montpelier (prize of the public); International Cinema Festival in Washington, Filmfest D.C., 1995; Eighth International Cinema Festival, Cairo; the Cinema Club Arraid in Rabat premiered the film on November 22, 1993 at 7eme Art; the film was exhibited on 2M in early 1994. 206. Hachim, p. 62. 207. Elisabeth Lequeret, “Une fable légère sur la vie de harem,” L’Opinion, January 4, 1944, np. 208. Gaye, “Entretien avec Mohamed Abderrahmane Tazi,” p. 2. 209. “How Did Cinema Audience in Casablanca Receive the Last Film of M. A. Tazi Looking for the Husband of My Wife?” Al Alam, January 9, 1994. 210. “How Did Cinema Audience in Casablanca . . .?”
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211. Houdaifa Et-Tayeb, “Genèse de ‘Lalla Hobby’: Désamour, discorde et peaux de banane,” Teleplus, No. 78, August 1996, pp. 12–17. 212. Tangier tapes, day 1. 213. Tangier tapes, day 1. 214. Said Taghlibi, “M.A. Tazi: ‘le milieu sent les coups-bas!’” L’Opinion, March 22, 1996, p. 7. 215. Ben Issa, “Interview with Mohamed Abderraham Tazi.” 216. Taghlibi. 217. Et-Tayeb, “Genèse de Lalla Hobby: Désamour . . . ,” p. 16. 218. Teleplus #71, January 1996, p. 6. 219. Et-Tayeb, “Genèse de Lalla Hobby: Désamour . . . ,” p. 16. 220. Ahmed Belhaloumi, “Après son expérience belge, Mohamed Abderrahmane Tazi ne tournera plus de films en Europe,” Libération, July 4, 1996, p. 6. 221. Olivier Barlet, Africultures, 2004. 222. Scénario: Mohamed Asli, Image: Roberto Meddi, Montage: Raimondo Aiello; Son: Mauro Lazzaro; Music: Stephan Micus, Interprètes: Abdessamad Miftah Kheir, Rachid El Hazmir, Abderrazak El Badaoui, Leila El Ahiani; Production: Dagham Film (Maroc)/Gam Film (Italie). 223. http://www.bbc.co.uk/films/2004/08/12/in_casablanca_angels_dont_fly_ 2004_review.shtml 224. http://memriarabmovies.blogspot.com/2007/10/perspective-on-casablanca.html 225. A young woman attending a conference in Tangiers with her husband is kidnapped and raped by powerful men, but rebuilds her relationship with her husband as they escape to the south with an incriminating videotape. Hugely popular at the Moroccan box office and in France, Mektoub represented Morocco at the 1999 Oscars. 226. http://www.filmfestivals.com/servlet/JSCRun?obj=FicheFilmus&CfgPath=f fs/filmweb&id=1776 227. Réalisation: Nabil Ayouch, Scénario: Nabil Ayouch, Nathalie Saugeon; Photographie: Vincent Mathias; Music: Krishna Levy; Interprètes: Mounïm Kbab, Mustapha Hansali, Hicham Moussoune, Abdelhak Zhayra, Saïd Taghmaoui, Amal Ayouch, Distribution: Océan Films. 228. http://allafrica.com/stories/200103040001.html 229. http://gvnet.com/streetchildren/Morocco.htm 230. For an excellent article on this film, see Brian Edwards. “Marock in Morocco: Reading Moroccan Films in the Age of Circulation,” Journal of North African Studies 12, 3 (2007): 287–307. Special issue on North African cinema. 231. http://www.telquel-online.com/223/couverture_223_1.shtml 232. http://www.telquel-online.com/223/couverture_223_1.shtml 233. Réalisation: Laila Marrakchi; Scénario: Laila Marrakchi; Image: Maxime Alexandre; Montage: Pascale Fenouillet; Son: Pierre André; Interprètes: Morjana Alaoui, Matthieu Boujenah, Assad Bouab, Fatima Layachi, Rachid Benassain, Khalid Maadour. 234. www.jewish-theatre.com/visitor/article_display.aspx?articleID=1841 235. http://arabist.net/archives/2006/06/04/film-review-marock/ 236. all quotes from http://riadzany.blogspot.com/2006/01/marock-debate.html
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237. http://riadzany.blogspot.com/2006/01/marock-debate.html 238. Zawaya, nd, on cinema producers, and with Miriem Bakir and her short film Today We Shoot; Arousi: I think if the advertisers or the institution has invested in a work, he shouldn’t expect that this investment will generate income/profits. Film is not a cafe. There is a big difference. A film is done for posterity/history, for culture, for our children, for art so that culture will progress, and it is not done—especially in countries like ours—we should not compare ourselves with Hollywood or the United States, we are far from this—we need to help cinema as a cultural tool. Hamid Zoghi, director: There are no sponsors. There are only sponsors for TV. Private producers, there are none. What is their gain? Are they crazy people to invest their money in a domain that will have no income for them. I should be crazy to do this. And you want us to go and tell people “come and invest with us in cinema because you will lose your money for nothing.” Impossible. There is no good cinema theaters for showing films; there are no films which make good profits for the owner. The film Looking for the Husband, which had the largest number of receipts, did not make more than 50 million. And you want to go and ask a person for 200 or 300 million to bring him back 50 million? We should have a little bit of mind.
Chapter Four
Policies, Recent Developments, Themes, and Conclusions
This final chapter offers very brief conclusions to the history and analysis of films discussed previously, and particularly addresses the issue of how Moroccan films represent the nation. The past decades have seen a major shift in the discourse about Moroccan cinema, as well as in the ability of films to resonate with audience desires and expectations. Several films have been exceedingly popular, and a number of new faces have appeared on the scene either from within Morocco (filmmakers who succeed in directing their first features), or from those Moroccans residing abroad who undertake CCM funding or coproductions to make features in Morocco. Presented here is a summation of some initial questions about film in Morocco, the CCM, and exhibition and distribution, as well as a look at Moroccan filmmakers, and how Moroccan films, a few of which have been previously described, might share some common themes and subjects as representative of the nation of Morocco. There is really no conclusion to offer to a process in continual mutation; one can only pause here and wait to see what the filmmakers, society, and institutions will produce in the near future.
WHAT FUTURE, WHAT CONCLUSION FOR MOROCCAN CINEMA? The Context and the Institutions Many factors have contributed to the shift of Moroccan filmmaking from being primarily a State activity designed to reify the State and nation, into being a personal activity of artistic expression and entertainment. Radio and television removed the burden from cinema to speak to and of the nation, but also 301
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removed much of the financial support from the cinema sector. The past five decades from 1956 to 2006 were a time of experimentation and exploration both in terms of film content and in terms of how to structure and organize the industry in Morocco. While many incriminations and recriminations have been bounced between filmmakers and other institutions such as the CCM, exhibitors, and distributors, and other media such as television, cable, and video sectors, the primary characteristic of the history of Moroccan cinema has been experimentation. No one sector had answers to how to manage the cinema sector. Each sector had its own theories that had to be tested; through continual testing and then modification of the theory and retesting, over time the cinema sector has undergone tremendous change. The overarching notion is that cooperation in such an environment as Morocco is the only solution to overcoming the disparity in aims of the various factors (State, individual, public, media institutions). It is important to impress that Morocco is not and will never be France nor the United States, nor Egypt, nor Mexico, nor any of the countries which benefited from a unique time, place, economic position, or political power to elevate their film industry into a highly profitable internationally recognized force. The State’s energy put into building the infrastructure of the CCM and laboratories and other facilities was not matched by utilitarian regional accords to support and sustain the initial investments. While Morocco is uniquely suited to be the gateway between Europe and Africa and the Maghreb, Morocco utilized its position in such a way that it became isolated and unique from rather than really linked to or integral to the three regions (speaking of cinema/media). The film industry is not able to contribute to the economy but is rather a drain on the State which needs also to address multiple areas: education, health care, sanitation, employment, environment. . . . While people do like to see their own life experiences and culture rendered on the screen, other quality of life factors are equally if not more important. And while it is difficult to have a first world education and orientation yet to live in a third world country, Moroccan filmmakers can neither expect nor demand the same lifestyle, glamour, budget, and support that filmmakers find in the first world. Very few countries have been able to offer carte blanche to their filmmakers, and Morocco, in spite of its unique status in the region and its unique history, is really no different than most of the developing world in this respect. Yet, in spite of the constraints, Moroccan filmmakers have received a great deal of support from the State, have managed to produce an increasing quality and quantity of films, and will over time most likely have the benefit of ever greater quality of production facilities and support. Moroccan audiences are becoming more aware of and appreciative of Moroccan films, and many
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changes are being effected both through persistence of effort by the filmmakers and the CCM, and because of the passage of time. In only fifty years of film production and only forty years of feature film production, Morocco has undergone significant changes at all levels. The past fifty years have been a time during which the nation has really had to construct itself from a concept to a lived reality. While the referents for Moroccan filmmakers have been countries with extended film production histories, the Moroccan nation, filmmakers, and film institutions have accomplished major transformations in so few active filmmaking years. Rather than to distressingly compare themselves to countries with more resources and a longer period of filmmaking, Moroccan film professionals should congratulatorily look at what they have created with few resources in very little time. CCM and Sustainment Funds Although the CCM is still being pushed to find the means to send its technicians for proper training in new techniques, and do so every time it upgrades its facilities, the institution has been loaded with an immense task by the State which it continually tries to manage. The filmmaking operation includes an archive and storage facility that must be managed, editing rooms, developing and printing laboratories, a sound recording and mixing auditorium, equipment repair and equipment rental. In addition to facilitating Moroccan filmmaking, the CCM must manage the receipts from theater ticket sales, manage the operations and oversight of cinema theaters throughout the country, license and record professional activity in the cinema domain, process and account for ticket taxation, oversee production and exhibition fund distribution, distribute permits and facilitate foreign filmmaking in the country, create national film festivals, oversee import and exhibition businesses, oversee video businesses, and control pirating, among a host of similar duties. The newest task is to manage and encourage the Cinémathèque from the shell it started as into the fully functioning facility it was planned to be. Overall, however, the CCM is a State agency and its employees do function under both the protective umbrella of State employ as well as under the system that typifies many institutions in the country. That is, the institution exists without having to be competitive or meet any quotas, which does not necessarily lend itself to meeting some of the demands for change and professionalism made by filmmakers. Yet changes have been made, the CCM’s obligations have expanded, new facilities have been generated, new activities undertaken. The institution may be slow to change but it does eventually. New employee positions have been created to develop information archives
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and records about Moroccan filmmakers and filmmaking. The national festival organized by the CCM progresses. And the Cinémathèque did start showing films even to minuscule audiences. While some new policies created by the CCM seemed more designed to hamper Moroccans while protecting foreign film crews, that is somewhat to be expected since foreign films expend a great deal of money in the Moroccan economy—even if none is specifically targeted to supporting Moroccan films. However, the CCM seemed to have overreacted when it set such bureaucratic requirements upon Moroccan individuals wishing to make films in the country. Filmmakers and other professionals call for some freedoms of expression in the domains of filmmaking and public expression, some more fluid manner in which newcomers can participate, and a more personal arena of responsibility, especially if filmmakers do not wish to receive money from the Sustainment Fund. Finally, the Sustainment Fund has had both successes and failures. Perhaps a few badly made films resulted from the initial movement to fund all filmmakers in the 1970s, but at the same time new members were able to enter the otherwise closed field, some of whom produced excellent films. And while the revision to the Sustainment Fund, making it more selectively applied, has enabled a few high quality films to emerge, it has also stifled others that might have been equally well received and well made. Since the Sustainment Fund organized its own demise by curtailing its own source of funding (exonerating theaters from tax), the film community demands that it truly is time to find other sources to supplement the aid to filmmakers and theaters. While the increased tax on electricity bills might slightly alleviate some funding problems, the burden of support is again being put upon the shoulders of many poor Moroccans who cannot bear the added expense. Furthermore, the Sustainment Fund for theaters has not encouraged any theater building in rural and underserved areas. Yet again the center has taken care of only its needs and further marginalized the periphery, especially since cinema caravans were curtailed. The process of building the CCM’s operations and defining the procedures and objectives of the Sustainment Fund have been experimental thus far. The results simply indicate at this time that more experimentation is necessary to find the middle ground that satisfies State needs as well as filmmaker needs as well as public needs. Exhibition and Distribution As have other sectors, exhibition and distribution have been slow to change and adapt, but those changes are finally beginning to emerge. A newer generation of exhibitors is more willing to accommodate higher quality
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foreign films as well as support Moroccan films. Profit-making, though still important, is beginning to cede a small space to the need to support national endeavors and artists and to improve the national cultural base. Yet, as some exhibitors become more open and amenable in their viewpoints, other exhibitors have closed their theaters and gone out of the business. A few distributors finally were willing to have the long-term view that support of Moroccan filmmakers in the present may not be very remunerative, but would be good for the country, good for the sector, and perhaps eventually also more profitable. Since some distributors were also exhibitors, the quality of imported films remained tied to their personal conceptions of audience desires and preferences. Larger and more integrated distribution/exhibition firms made survival increasingly difficult for smaller companies limited to distribution, but also homogenized to an extent the film fare in the nation. Yet theaters and importers had to accommodate their population which increasingly turned to video, cable and satellite alternatives, thus forcing the cinemas to offer more alluring and commensurate fare. Other Institutions and Media As has become increasingly evident throughout the chapters, cinema lost its dominant position for speaking to or of the nation, yet was not totally replaced by other media such as television or video. Film still remained the primary arena for discussion of certain issues and topics of the nation, but the multiple media interrelated, rather, and depended upon each other to reach multiple audiences. Films had to move toward distribution on television, satellite and video in order to reach the widest audience and maximum earnings. And television, satellite channels and video in turn needed the content which films and filmmakers helped supply. Yet more support could be possible in Morocco. For example, it is incredible that huge sums of money are expended on the national festival every so often, in which only filmmakers and very local audiences could participate. Why are national films not screened on national television during the festival as well? Why is national dissemination on Moroccan television not a part of the funding package offered Moroccan filmmakers? At some point more attention needs to be paid to making films available to the nation rather than focusing entirely and obsessively over how much money a film can earn in exhibition and sales. Since it is well known that a Moroccan film will not be able to pay for its own production, why has the concept therefore not been dropped as a measure of film quality and filmmaker success (a measure which only a small percentage of international films can even achieve) and let the level of national awareness of the film replace the level of monetary
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income? If Moroccan exhibitors cannot be forced to screen Moroccan films, why can Moroccan television not do so, particularly when cinema exhibitors only reach a small audience compared to television.
FILMS AND FILMMAKERS While previous chapters discussed in detail how the cinema as industry helped shape film content in Morocco, the following sections discuss content in terms of “what Morocco” is being represented, how film represents the nation and the people, and what might be missing from the representation. As well, who is doing the representation, and for whom? Filmmakers Moroccan filmmakers have come from a variety of backgrounds and preparations since 1956, and many of those who began to work in the latter 1960s as young filmmakers continue to work and progress in the 2000s. Again, the time frame of the history of Moroccan cinema is such that it fits loosely into one generation. A new generation of filmmakers is just beginning to emerge since the mid-1990s, and some of those individuals come from an already long history of working in the domain in positions other than directing. Yet in spite of the limited number of individuals and the short time span since Moroccan independence, a huge variety of films have been produced in terms of genre and style, content, quality, and objective. Some filmmakers continue to experiment with their craft, such as Mohamed Abderrahman Tazi, to make their films more aesthetically sound but also more entertaining and pleasing to the national audience, while other filmmakers continue to experiment with their craft to hone their unique aesthetics and abstract experimental style, such as Nabil Lahlou. The one arena which has not received continuing support is the documentary, which should not be neglected or solely relegated to State agencies but should be pursued more as a unique form in its own right. From the initial period of experimentation to develop their unique talents, styles, and perspectives, many of the first generation of filmmakers have moved into the stage of honing their craft and experimenting more with the Moroccan audience in mind. Some of the first generation filmmakers always had the audience in mind, an audience they knew enjoyed and were entertained by genres such as musical1 and melodrama. While those filmmakers were very capable in their films, which audiences did indeed enjoy and watch, the critics, cinema club adherents, and film elitists were highly critical of such endeavors and drove those filmmakers to the margins of the industry.
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Yet in later years melodrama emerged again as the popular form that attracted audiences, especially in films more closely related to the Moroccan reality, such as Nouri’s The Hammer and the Anvil, and Enfance Volée, Ferhati’s La Plage des Enfants Perdus and Chevaux du Fortune, Tazi’s Badis, Lagtaâ’s Love in Casablanca, Marrakchi’s Marock, and others. In fact, while a comedy was by far one of the most appreciated films in recent years, all others were generally divided between drama and melodrama. At the same time, the system allowed the more experimental filmmakers to continue even though their films attract very small audiences. New filmmakers are coming into the sector from two directions: from the bottom (Moroccans who have to work up the ladder) and from abroad (recuperating immigrants). Although it seems that new Sustainment Fund regulations limiting the number of short and feature films that will be funded each year might deter new entrants into filmmaking, several individuals have moved from behind-the-scenes into directing in recent years, and new individuals are making forays into short film production as their first step to acquiring CCM requisites for professional cards. The cinema industry is virtually male-dominated; no new filmmaker by 1996 was female although two to four Moroccans from abroad emerged by 2006, and almost all new male entrants had been working in various aspects of the film industry for years. Therefore, the sector appears to remain somewhat circumscribed, close-knit, and insular. While new blood from within the nation finds it near impossible to enter into filmmaking, both the CCM and filmmakers have cultivated, encouraged, and embraced individuals from Europe of Moroccan descent. While the newly admitted filmmakers will no doubt benefit the Moroccan filmmaking community, concern rests with the necessity to open the filmmaking field within Morocco first and foremost. Young Moroccans living in Europe may offer insights, techniques, and knowledge from their work in film abroad, but young Moroccans living in Morocco will offer content, perspectives, and stories more relevant to their peers and communities. With the opening of several film institutes in recent years, it remains to be seen what new blood enters the field and what influences emerge.
MOROCCAN CINEMA REPRESENTS THE NATION AND PEOPLE Whether Moroccan filmmakers employ melodrama,2 social realist cinema,3 auteurist abstract intellectualist style, comedy or action-adventure, their films express something about the people and nation of Morocco. Many critics and analysts in Morocco have tried to categorize and sort Moroccan films, in or-
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der to uncover patterns and themes, but no attempts were successful enough to warrant replicating such an endeavor here.4 The most basic division of films has been used throughout the book, the two-part division of intellectualist abstract films versus more popular or narrative-style film, as such a binary is the only suitable method for distinguishing the two main tendencies pursued by Moroccan filmmakers. More appropriate than style or categorizing films, at this point, is to discuss topics and important issues in significant films. Moroccan films would have themes reflective of the indigenous circumstances shaping society and social concerns or would incorporate thematics from the international arena. Themes should reflect the world at large yet replicate some signs specific to Moroccan culture. It has been posited that films that often reflect recurrent themes, situations, and characters represent significant attitudes held by that culture—that films hold a mirror to society. But themes can also resonate due to outside influences or structural influences on the filmmakers and film community. The first level of influence arises from the internationally circulating films from the United States, France, and Egypt5 in particular. Other significant influences arise, through the operations of cinema clubs, from various orientations to filmmaking such as Italian neorealism and Latin American Third Cinema as well as new African filmmaking aesthetics. The second level of influence arises from the process of funding, distributing, and exhibiting films, but primarily from the state and coproduction funding process. There are no political films (except those which safely criticize Morocco’s years of lead) or films which critique the government, unless the topic is abstractly represented in the extreme or the character is a failed social misfit; there are no religious films due to the State’s fear of inciting or alienating Muslim activists; and there are no war films, which might remind the populace of one option of national determination. Many subjects have been taboo or constrained by policies, such as a prohibition against drug films, guns in films, or portrayals of military actions or revolution (some of these began changing in 1995). Yet government taboos are matched in part by the censorship imposed by other cultural taboos, such as an inability to criticize the Moroccan self or to stray outside of the intellectualism which is valued in French cinema and literature. True fantasy which is evident in Moroccan literature has often been replaced by awkward abstraction and intellectualism in cinema. Crucially, the subject position of women in Moroccan society has had a determining influence on the number of women filmmakers in Morocco and the representation of women’s issues in films. As would have been surmised from the films described in the chapters, one primary topic has been the condition of Moroccan women, while another has been the influence from France
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and French colonialism upon the Moroccan imaginary and Moroccan life, and another would be emigration. Less often represented yet still significant issues are government bureaucracy/the exercise of power, and the transition from tradition to modernity.
WOMEN One witnesses today the changing position of women in Morocco, both due to society’s changes which required more freedom of movement for women, and due to women’s activism to improve their lives. However, while Moroccan films show women in more traditional roles and even adapting to more modern social requirements, no film shows a true liberation for women in Morocco. On one hand this is due to an issue addressed at the end of this section, which is the overall negativity and defeatism which most characterizes the conclusion to Moroccan films. On the other hand it is also reality that only some liberties and changes have been achieved by women while the overall society remains patriarchal and dominating. Films discussed previously, such as Door to the Sky, Cane Dolls, Enfance Volée, Les Beaux Jours de Shaharazade, Cauchemar, Khafaya, Looking for the Husband of My Wife, and Love in Casablanca, along with Badis and Ibn Sabeel, all clearly represent the variety of difficult situations and subjugations that face women in Morocco, whether the women are rich, poor, young, old, modern, or traditional. Other films not discussed are also important carriers of information about women at different times and in different circumstances. (Films not described here but concerning women are: Amina, First Story, Shams, Chergui, The Kaftan of Love, La Nuit du Crime, Yarit, Hadda, Destin de Femme, Femmes . . . et Femmes, Tresses, Jugement d’une femme, L’Histoire d’une rose, Les Yeux Secs, and L’enfant endormi.)6 Films whose subject specifically concerns the problems of women or in which women’s problems significantly prevail in the Moroccan filmography, even though few films have been directed by women. Several films portray women in former eras at which time their options and freedom of action were more socially constricted. Ben Barka’s Blood Wedding represents a woman abducted from her own wedding by a man who could not marry her legally but whose desire for her led him to the rash action of abducting her, which would render her outcast to family and tribe. Only his own desire and pleasure were important, and he felt it insignificant that his actions would destroy his love/the bride as well as his abandoned wife. Bamou, set during the final years of colonialism, represents a woman very much in love with her husband but subject to the desires and whims of
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the French-protected village overseer who has her abducted, imprisoned in his house, and who rapes her when she remains unwilling to capitulate to his desires. In Lalla Chafia, a headstrong young girl, Fatima, must be dominated and subjugated by her father, who beats her for not conforming to social mores and then finally marries her off for his own gain to an elder but rich neighboring farmer. Her plight is contrasted to that of her own obedient and subjugated mother, but compared to Lalla Chafia, a historical or mythological figure whose father tried to force her into marriage with one of his students. Unable to change her father’s mind, Lalla Chafia ran away at night and fell to her death in a pit, to which women now go to unburden themselves of complaints, problems, and fears in hopes that Lalla Chafia can help them. Fatima, however, does not wait for help, especially from a girl who fell in a pit and died, but runs away alone and eight months pregnant to the city where her resoluteness will enable her to survive. Other films emphasize more modern-day situations in which women still face numerous forms of discrimination and subjugation. In Al Warta, innocent girls from the countryside who travel to the city to find work as maids and servants are easy prey to corrupt men who woo them, seduce them, then turn them to prostitution and drugs. These rural women are faced with new freedoms, visions of potential wealth compared to their own subservience, and succumb to the advances of men who know just how to lure them, and when to abandon them. The Beach of Lost Children again represents the naive village girl who believes the man from the city intends to marry her and allows herself to be seduced; rejected by her lover when she becomes pregnant, the girl retaliates and accidentally kills the errant man. In most traditional stories, she would be killed by her father when he discovered that she lost her virginity and became pregnant as well, but her father in this instance is more understanding. Yet because sexual intercourse outside the sanctions of marriage is shameful and illegitimate children ostracized, the girl has to keep her pregnancy secret from the village. Women in La Fête des Autres and La Compromission are urban and more liberated and savvy, but nonetheless victims of patriarchal society. The lead in La Fête des Autres is not allowed by her employers to get pregnant, because that would affect her work as a maid; later in the film she forces herself to leave her husband. Even though they love each other and married for love, her departure is supposed to ease her husband’s burden because it was too hard for them to make a living while together. The lead in La Compromission is a liberated well-to-do bourgeois woman who works and lives a life so free that she can have a relationship and live with her lover without being married, yet she focuses upon and knows only her own psychological problems and fears. Through the development of the film the character also develops consciousness of the world around her;
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she moves from her isolated and personal world into the wider Moroccan social world where she learns about the lives and plights of most women, the urban and rural working poor, whose problems are so much more complex and whose opportunities so much more obstructed than her own. While several films permitted women to challenge the status quo and strike out on their own (Door to the Sky, La Plage des Enfants Perdus, Lalla Chafia), most Moroccan films reflected a more pessimistic viewpoint about the changes available to women. If not death, then divorce, insanity, abject misery, despair, or prostitution seemed to be the primary options offered to film women by male filmmakers. Perhaps more nuanced options might become available when more women participate in the filmmaking community as writers or directors in the future.
EMIGRATION, DISPLACEMENT, ALIENATION The second most dominant topic of Moroccan films has been emigration, travel, displacement, and alienation, which all seem to be linked to Moroccan society in transition. The subject of clandestine emigration has become very significant in recent decades; thus it is not surprising that the subject should receive attention and at least mention in numerous films. In addition to emigration specifically from Morocco to Europe, the movement of a large population from Morocco’s rural to urban areas has also generated a great deal of attention since this population change has meant an increase in urban poverty, displacement, and lessening of traditionally strong family and village ties and traditional mores and ceremonies—leading sometimes to alienation. The travelers are primarily men, with just the occasional woman marginally involved in the upheavals that result from change. The early film Soleil du Printemps offers a disheartening perspective on the alienation that displacement causes to a young man who eventually no longer belongs either in the city or in the country. In Wechma the orphan feels eternally displaced and thus remains constantly adrift, in flux, and on the move, alienated no matter where he moves in the country, because he has no feeling of physical or spiritual home or belonging. Vaincre pour Vivre, along with Lalla Chafia, indicate that the only opportunities for rural folk are to escape to the city to find their fortunes or liberation, while in contradiction Enfance Volée presents the very bleak picture of opportunities for urban transplants from the countryside. Two films present displacement and alienation that occur from Moroccan tradition. In Zeft, a man is stripped of home and land—forced to live in a gypsy wagon traveling up and down the same road that used to be his
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home—because half of his land was taken by the village to house a saint’s tomb, and the other half of his land was taken by the government to build a totally unnecessary road leading nowhere. Faced with an intractable religious institution on one side and intractable government power on the other, the man has no option but to succumb and live out his days in the no-man’s-land of the road. In The Prayer of the Absent, a young man descends into the alienation and displacement of madness as a result of the pressures of traditional society and mores upon a fragile and poetic psyche; he is transformed into a wanderer who finds no home, no place of belonging or identification. Particularly significant are endings adopted by Tazi and Ferhati in several of their films. Tazi’s films Looking for the Husband of My Wife and Ibn Sabeel end with the male lead in a small boat in the Mediterranean heading for the coast of Europe, an image which signifies no hope for success but the ultimate dissolution of hope forcing a clandestine and dangerous hegira. Ibn Sabeel is a film only about transition, location change coupled with revelations of social change that spell only misfortune for the innocent and trusting. Ferhati’s Chevaux du Fortune ends with real dissolution of hope, as a crashed little paddle-boat is displayed washed up on shore alleging that two men died in their desperate flight from Morocco. Ferhati’s film topic entirely concerns emigration and the problems that Moroccans from all walks of life face in trying to ameliorate their situations or even just to fulfill their dreams of moving freely from place to place. At the time this film was released, 1,500 Moroccans had been caught over a five-month period attempting to emigrate by fishing boat, five had drowned and fifty had disappeared in the Mediterranean and feared drowned.7 Finally, Door to the Sky also tackles the topic of emigration, displacement, and alienation; even though Nadia is free to move and comfortable in several environments, the mere necessity of integrating forces and influences from abroad into life in Morocco requires a concerted effort to allay the accompanying feelings of alienation that result. (Other films that incorporate the topic are: Badis, Si Moh, Al Naoura, L’Autre Côté du Fleuve, L’enfant endormi, Et Apres, A Casablanca les anges ne volent pas, Ici et la, and Lalla Hobby.) While these films are all very different in the way that alienation, displacement and emigration are handled, the overall unifying force is that social change disrupts established ways of doing and being, and that sometimes fluidity is a difficult state to inhabit, especially when change is imposed rapidly. Morocco began experiencing widespread social changes when the French entered in the 1920s, but social change emerged as an overwhelming problem in the 1950s with the independence movement and more widespread dissemination of the concept of people of belonging to a nation rather than to a region or smaller community. But at the same time alienation has a histori-
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cal character when the issue is personal inability to adapt to circumstances or to abide by social restrictions. One long practiced response to alienation has been displacement, wandering, emigration, and movement.
TRADITION VERSUS MODERNITY Many films have multiple topics and can be found in several categories because the topics are interrelated. For example, of course the topic of women’s oppression would perhaps also be a topic of tradition challenged by modernizing society. Therefore, several films pertain both to women and the challenges they face from tradition or modernity, such as Al Warta, Door to the Sky, Enfance Volée, Cauchemar, and Lalla Chafia. Two films also reflect difficulties with modernization for women. In Hadda, a young man inured to the new advancements of city life, modern warfare, technical gadgetry and irresponsibility cannot reintegrate into his village of origin; while there, he rapes a young woman whose life he thus destroys, but feels absolutely nothing either for her plight or about his act. In Khafaya, the young woman becomes a doctor primarily to fight what she considers the ignorant and dangerous practices of traditional magic and sorcery, but she finds that she must still face the ignorant and dangerous practices of traditional male domination and authority even in the supposedly modern and rational world of medicine. In Zeft tradition calls for a village to build a saint’s tomb for a local man recently deceased. Yet the keeper of the tomb wheels and deals on his cell phone. As well, modernity means roads, and those roads must be built according to the plans drawn up by city engineers, even when a very slight modification might preserve someone’s home or farm or town. But modernizing State activities occur blindly, erratically, but surely, no matter who or what is destroyed in the process. Love in Casablanca broke new ground in Morocco by talking for the first time about the problems that youths, teenagers, and young adults face in urban environments; their problems are entirely new and generated solely by the process of rapid modernization and change that has no concomitant values and mores that seem to apply. Rhesus, the Blood of the Other8 was specifically meant to speak about the taboo topic of AIDS that had always been characterized in Morocco as afflicting only foreigners, while huge numbers of Moroccans have been diagnosed with the disease. The director also included issues very evidently practiced in Moroccan society but never revealed in cinema, such as sex before marriage, drinking alcohol and doing drugs, and adultery. Marock also broke new ground by talking about conflicts between traditions and occidental modernity. Thus, while some new films are
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finally talking about issues that have long been recognized as problems in modern Morocco, other new filmmakers are forging new ground and talking about subjects which many Moroccans do not want to admit exist, or find shameful, or find distressful because they conflict with traditional mores and beliefs, or because they are considered backward in the already modernized occident.
THE COLONIAL EXPERIENCE Considering that Morocco was a French protectorate from 1920 to 1956, and influenced by the French activities in the region for a much longer previous period, it is surprising that few films directly treat the colonial experience, although several films do include the colonial period and relatively short independence movement in their stories in minor manners. Neighboring Algeria, in which the independence movement was much more violent, protracted and influential, produced primarily films designed to support Statebuilding goals—films concerning the colonial and independence movement periods—soon after their film infrastructure was organized. But Morocco had something that Algeria did not. Morocco had an ongoing rulership by a powerful central authority, the king, who was on friendly terms with France, while Algeria was involved in a socialist and renovatory movement based on, theoretically, a more sweeping overhaul of social structures. Therefore, in Morocco the independence movement was significant, but not as intense nor well known as in Algeria, and did not create an immediate and overwhelming change in the country as it did in neighboring Algeria. Two films concern the independence movement specifically. Bamou, as mentioned in relationship to its female lead character, was a melodrama that revealed how the French occupation and its support of the evil Qaid of the village led to the deaths of a loving married couple. Colonialism in this film was expressed in an interpersonal relationship level rather than more broadly social. Bamou’s husband was imprisoned for suspected resistance activities at the time that Bamou was abducted and raped. The husband was killed in a resistance rally as Bamou dies from her rape and suffering. L’âme Qui Brait concerns an old resistance fighter sure that he spots an old traitor; he dreams of killing the man in revenge. While this film also treats colonialism at a personal level, the fact that few others are interested in punishing the traitor reveal that, on the broad social level, colonialism ceased to be a problematic historical moment. Two films by Moumen Smihi take place during the colonial era, Chergui telling a woman’s story during the final years of the protectorate, and 44 ou
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Les Récits de la Nuit telling the story of two families over the forty-four years of the protectorate and revealing many of the influences and changes that French occupation engendered. Film historian Souiba offers: The film describes the resistance of Moh ou Hammou Zayani and his repression (1918), the victory of Ben Abdelkrim Hattabi and the repression of the Rifian resistance (1921), the repression of the resistance of Sargho and the end of the armed anti-colonial struggle (1934), the birth of the nationalist movement (1930), its evolution (1944), and its triumph (1956). These stories are related through the ambitions dreams, desires and crises of two families. In this way, Smihi gives back to Moroccans their own history, patrimony and culture that the French maintained did not exist before they came to control the people.9
While Cauchemar, discussed previously, is primarily set during the colonial period the film also makes a comparison between the modern and colonial eras. Further, the film references the “Am al-boon” or years of rationing and drought that were very difficult for rural Moroccans. Rationing during the colonial era figures as the initial plot point in Mirage, when the protagonist finds a lot of paper money in the sack of flour that he struggles with for miles getting it from the distribution point to his rural home. Later in the film the protagonist must flee from French soldiers routing suspected revolutionaries from the old city. Al Hal, also formerly discussed, includes a lengthy historical segment including newsreel footage from the colonial era of independence activities and repression of the Moroccan population, as a means to emphasize that Nass al Ghiwane’s “return” to traditional music is a continuing combat against colonial repression of Moroccan culture. The recent film Chronicle of an Ordinary Life also provides some enacted scenes set during the colonial era, and includes many (documentary and enacted) images of the resistance struggle, in particular the moment when father and son listen to Mohamed V speaking on the radio on his return from exile, reclamation of the throne and independence. The father hugs his son joyfully and repeats the king’s message that the youth will be the future of the country. Yet twenty years later Omar is not living the realized dream, nor are many others who still meet with oppression by government, businessmen who put profits over people, and a continuing social hierarchy that discriminates against individuals based on family and status. Chronicle . . . is also noteworthy for being only one of two films that included scenes of “workers” battling “corporate bosses” (Compromission is the other film); in both films the State supports the corporate bosses and often authorizes police and the military forces to put down strikes or suspected revolutionary activity. As I discuss in the following paragraphs, a Moroccan film incriminating the State for repressive tactics is quite unusual even when treated lightly.
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STATE BUREAUCRACY AND POWER PLAYS Two topics which the various discussions on censorship have clearly revealed as relatively taboo are government and politics. Several films, however, have managed to insert some incriminating content about politics, State bureaucracy, and the use of power in Morocco. Ben Barka’s early film Mille et une Mains is a political look at class relations, how the majority of Moroccans are poor workers exploited by the rich merchants and businessmen—the two depend upon each other, but only one profits while the other struggles each day to survive. In this early film the oppressed do not revolt—just one man does, and he is hauled away by police as a troublemaker—as they try to do in other films mentioned (Compromission and Chronicle . . .); that would be unthinkable for a Moroccan filmmaker in the early 1970s. In a similar film, The Hairdresser of the Poor Quarter, such class relations again motivate the plot, but in this latter instance the poor man does try to revolt, only to find himself persecuted on all sides because the State always sides with the rich and powerful, even if they are only rich and powerful in comparison to the most poor in the neighborhood they rule. Two additional films reveal the more oblique nature and negative repercussions of State bureaucracy. Zeft, as discussed, reveals a farmer dispossessed of home and land because the State will not stop the construction of a saint’s tomb on the man’s land, and because the State will not reconsider its arbitrary decision to put a highway-to-nowhere through the man’s house and remaining land. Furthermore, at the time that the State pumps millions of dirhams into building the highway, the State offers only a pittance to the man in recompense, and totally ignores the horrendous drought sweeping the region that Seddikki reveals in a quite hilarious manner. Individuals going to the outdoor market to shop for food find tomatoes changing price from dirhams to thousands of dirhams per kilo, while lentils are sold by the “each” and weighed out like diamonds. At times Zeft seems less oblique in its critique than others, especially when the government authority likes to dress up in a platinum blond woman’s wig. In The Hammer and the Anvil, a long-time State employee finds himself the recipient of State bureaucratic disorder and confusion when he is suddenly and forcibly retired early and forced out of his subsidized housing. Unable to ever get his pension and retirement processed through the bureaucracy, he and family are quickly driven to the lowest ranks of poverty and despair. Brahim, Yach? presents a man driven to his death in the frantic search to rectify bureaucratic obstacles caused by mismanagement and pure stupidity when his name is misspelled to that of a dead man, and he tries to get the
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problem fixed and his pension continued. But while other filmmakers focused more on the plight of the individuals, Lahlou has no qualms about displaying caricatures of State bureaucrats and ideologues; the director of social security is a tiny man smoking a huge cigar who is carried around in a hammock by two slaves and who illegally skims State money to invest in a huge but shoddily built luxury resort. In the recent film Chevaux du Fortune, several men are driven to their deaths because they cannot overcome the obstacles set by State bureaucracy to obtain permits to travel abroad and instead are forced to try clandestine methods. A series of films emerged in the 2000s that deal with Morocco’s years of lead under King Hassan II, years when unions and group dissent was dealt with harshly; years of many arrests, imprisonments, and torture or exile; years when even the average Moroccan hesitated to mention any complaints against the government for fear of secret police everywhere. The films mentioned below were all made possible by the ascension to the throne of Mohamed VI, who has made efforts to democratize the country, lessen political repression (unless you are an Islamicist calling to overthrow the throne), and allow freedom of expression. Though the picture is not entirely rosy, as previously indicated, at least a few films have come out that use as their premise the problems of those years: Hakim Noury’s Un simple fait diverse, Nabil Ayouch’s Mektoub, Ahmed Boulane’s Ali, Rabia et les autres, Nabil Lahlou’s Les Annees de l’exil, Saâd Chraïbi’s Jawhara: Fille de Prison, Faouzi Bensaidi’s Mille mois, Hassan Benjelloun’s La chamber noire/Derb Moulay Cherif, Jilali Ferhati’s Mémoire en détention, Abdelmajid R’chich’s Les Ailes brisées, Saïd Smihi/Serge le Peron’s J’ai vu tuer Ben Barka, and Nabil Lahlou’s Tabet or not Tabet. In Ali, Rabia et les autres, Ali goes to prison for twenty years or so for being part of a group distributing flyers calling for social change. In Mille mois, the protagonist’s husband, a teacher, is arrested for trying to promote social change. Jawhara: fille de prison is about a girl who grows up in prison with her mother, who was arrested and then raped and unsure if her child is by her husband or the rapist; the woman is arrested for acting in a theater group, again, calling for social change. The powerless are victimized and nothing politically or socially ever seems to change or be shown changing for the better. Most of the previous films do overlap in terms of content and topic, since films about women’s oppression often include topics of colonialism or conflicts with tradition and power. But many Moroccan films share two additional traits that have little to do with their topic but are very significant markers anyway. The endings and results of Moroccan films are so often indicators of pessimism and failure that they must be included in these as topics by default of their persistent presence in film.
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PESSIMISM AND FAILURE Two dominant topics in Moroccan films are almost so interrelated that they could be the same, but one may distinguish the slight differences. One topic is “going . . . going . . . going . . . nowhere” found in films such as Ibn Sabeel, Al Naoura, Chevaux du Fortune, Looking for the Husband of My Wife, The Other Side of the River, The Hammer and the Anvil, Derkaoui’s films, and Brahim, Yach?. The protagonists of these films move and move, but go nowhere, and never achieve their end. The fact that the sought after ending is never realized, never achieved, never possible, is the topic of many other films, called the topic of “failure.” But the aforementioned films also have no real end, no firm closure, and some even close with the protagonist in a boat, in the midst of movement, but really a movement nowhere. The second topic is incapacity, inability to achieve, insanity, lack of control over self and others, failure to reach a goal, victimization, and pessimism; many films can be particularly noted for their ending that is also characterized by hysteric failure, death, suicide, madness, or loss. Many films treating this topic utilize an insane character, either one who begins insane or ends up insane—because the psyche is too fragile to handle the lack of personal power, the inability to effect change. Boughedir characterizes this theme to be “the unfortunate hero who cannot handle the weight of tradition and who lives a Kafka-esque nightmare which ends undeniably by his defeat or death.”10 Characters being sane or insane, the primary topic of the films is the insurmountable obstacle that is life for Moroccans. Such films include El Chergui, Mille et Une Mains, Ibn Sabeel, Blood Wedding, La Fête des Autres, Wechma, Hadda, Mirage, Chronicle of an Ordinary Life, Break in the Wall, Cane Dolls, The Beach of Lost Children, Al Warta, Love in Casablanca, Spring Sun, Al Kanfoudi, Bamou, The Mailman, The Hammer and the Anvil, Enfance Volée, The Hairdresser of the Poor Quarter, Zeft, Badis, First Story, Si Moh Pas de Chance, Le Guerre du Petrole n’aura pas Lieu, Alyam Alyam, and The Prayer of the Absent and all the films indicated in the previous section on state bureaucracy. The sociologist Edgar Morin proposes that in industrialized societies it is the identification with the hero of a show that guarantees the final victory; in the less developed societies, it is on the contrary his sacrificial death that provokes catharsis: the Moroccan filmmakers are in this case “the mediums through which the hero, eternal phoenix, sacrifices himself for the awakening and consciousness raising of their society.”11
One could add to Morin’s perception that Moroccans also find themselves in environments in which effecting any change or achieving any goal are dif-
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ficult activities because there are so many obstacles, so little personal power, so little personal effect on institutions which shape individual lives. While the films may have the sacrificial hero’s death prick the consciousness of spectators, all spectators would encounter the same situations of lack of power and lack of possibility on a daily basis. Moroccans are subordinate to the larger dominating forces of the State, religion, and authoritarian power which are extremely hegemonic. The question, however, is whether the Moroccan filmmakers are truthful to reality when they render the Moroccan incompetent, insane, or unable to achieve a goal, or are the filmmakers out of touch with the adaptive and coping strategies of many Moroccans who thus do not see themselves in these renderings? Lamalif magazine journalist Benhima questions this situation.12 Do Moroccan filmmakers construct heros of films to offer solutions to viewers? Or is it that Moroccan filmmakers simply do not see a way out of the morass of Moroccan social problems and convey their feeling by ascribing it to the population at large? Benhima takes a more harshly critical view: Our authors, products of their generation, torn between different facets of their identities, refuse to invent complex characters with multiple sides in their own image and of our intellectuals. Our intelligentsia is fascinated with the construction of a model of man who is “authentic,” arising from popular culture which can be put in a film in opposition to the filmmaker’s own personality. This tentative is destroyed by the profound ignorance of our cultural roots, of our society, and the means by which our society allows man to resist the aggressions of modern society. The heros of our cinema fail because one is incapable, once created as authentic, to find and utilize the elements of popular culture which can help this “authentic” man survive. One does not reveal the personages of our times with their contradictions, but also with their vitality—which means that our intellectuals cannot even bear themselves, and prefer alienation to an impossible return to a traditional culture, mirage of the soul, the acceptance of their melting pot spirit—they remain, like their heros, pathetic, weak, incapable and paralyzed.
However, with new generations entering into filmmaking and new democratic movements occurring in Morocco, some of the pessimism is giving way to activism and persistence to effect change.
WHAT FUTURE FOR MOROCCAN CINEMA? It appears from recent trends in Moroccan filmmaking that Moroccan filmmakers are pursuing similar paths to Berber video makers. Films draw more upon lived reality and popular histories/stories than abstract theoretical and
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alien philosophies. The more that Moroccan filmmakers focus upon reifying their own culture(s) rather than focusing on proving themselves to the world at large (Europe and festivals), the more that Moroccan audiences support their endeavors and forgive problems of quality and technical mastery. The less that Moroccan filmmakers focus upon the elusive “big money” that only Hollywood blockbuster films generate, the more they focus upon giving attention to pertinent issues and problems that Moroccans want to see. As Tazi indicated in a newspaper interview, Moroccan filmmakers should hark back to the stories told by their grandparents, which can be suspenseful or comic, with a beginning, middle, and end, but which reflect Moroccan culture and collective memory without being didactic or mystificatory or too political.13 But Moroccan cinema needs more than just good stories and less dogmatic filmmakers; the cinema sector needs at least some shared vision that will allow the various components to support the others and function as a system rather than parts in conflict. While more popular films are indeed motivating distributors and exhibitors to more energetically support Moroccan films, another good indication of hope for the future is found in the new collective formed at the Fourth National Festival of Cinema in 1995. Several organizations (Chambre Marocaine des Salles de Cinéma, La Chambre Marocaine des Techniciens de Films, and the Syndicat des Professionels du Theatre, La Chambre Marocaine des Distributeurs de Films, and La Chambre Marocaine des Producteurs de Films) joined forces to create a larger Fédération Marocaine des Chambres Professionnelles du Cinéma et de L’Audio-Visuel which will allow the various sectors to work together to create some changes in the Moroccan cinema sphere that will benefit everyone.14 Once sectors begin to cooperate rather than compete for resources and attention, perhaps more coordinated endeavors can ease Moroccan cinema into a more filmmaker- and public-friendly space. Since Morocco will not suddenly have more millions to spend on making films in the near future, cooperation and collaboration can reduce the costs and perceived need to generate huge income; instead focus can be shifted toward making the films and products truly available throughout the nation rather than only to urban and festival audiences. As Moroccan television stations take more supportive roles toward Moroccan films, more public will be reached both in Morocco and abroad and filmmakers will begin to gain their reputations outside of the festival circuits. If this move toward national cooperation could also lead toward regional and continental cooperation, Morocco would benefit by having more use made of CCM facilities, and by having more distribution and exhibition venues for Moroccan films. But such coordinated interrelationships regionally and continentally can really only occur when Moroccan filmmakers accept that they live in an economically depressed region surrounded by economi-
Policies, Recent Developments, Themes, and Conclusions
321
cally depressed countries, and that again competition amidst a continent of economically depressed countries will not elevate cinemas of those countries to the standards, economic levels, and distribution circuits of Europe which are held up as the lofty ideal. Rather than looking toward France or Egypt, India or Hong Kong, as models and standards, Moroccan filmmakers and film professionals would better look to their roots, look to their colleagues in Africa and the Middle East, and look to their own publics. When Moroccan critics stop crucifying Moroccan filmmakers for living within the reality of the economic and production environment of Morocco, perhaps they will be able to see the forest as well as the trees. Then perhaps critics can be more informative and supportive, turning the term “critic” toward its positive meaning of analysis, research, and enquiry rather than the negative meaning of criticism. Critics can help Moroccans in general learn more about cinemas from neighboring regions and compare Moroccan films less to those from developed nations or from more developed film industries. A final beneficial future for Moroccan cinema could result from a change in CCM policies to professionalize the CCM along the same lines that the CCM has tried to professionalize filmmakers, including training technical personnel and hiring qualified staff rather than friends and relations. If the CCM does not make changes and continues to only persecute filmmakers and create obstacles and hurdles, continues to support theaters to the detriment of filmmakers, continues to permit shoddy workmanship in technical support, then all the changes made by other sectors will have less influence and effect. A continuation of current CCM policies and filmmaker rivalries and competitions will keep Moroccan cinema at a minimal level, secluded in the occasional screening here and there in the country, cloistered in the unadvertised and unpublicized festival now and again, and I will still receive quizzical looks and the response “What Moroccan cinema?” when I mention that I study Moroccan cinema. As an outsider to the filmmaking community in Morocco I can only say that the points and analyses I have made are my own interpretations of events and research I have done. Many Moroccan films pleased and amazed me, and I hope that in the future Moroccan filmmakers will have the opportunity to screen their films more widely so that the films themselves can, more effectively than I, answer the question “What Moroccan cinema?”
NOTES 1. Musicals have only been via Egypt style melos because of their overwhelming influence (Yarit, Vaincre pour Vivre); other music/dance interludes become folklore
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(Wedding of Blood) or documentary (Al Hal) because of the way that Moroccans perceive representation of traditional cultural practices. Music is still regional OR is, as industry, very modelled after Egyptian style. 2. Melodrama is characterized by rapid and exciting physical action, sharply contrasted and simplified characters, and colorful alternation of violence, pathos, and humor. The central situation is the victimization of helpless innocence by powerful evil forces. Four basic characters: hero, heroine, comic ally, villain. Melodrama uses coincidence and suprise to keep action constantly at high tension, striving for powerful emotional shocks, scenes of confrontation, pursuit and escape, forceful and empassioned acting. 3. Realism is too dangerous, so it is rare unless it is socially irrelevant or turns all social ills back on to the people—rare case is Zeft and Lahlou—no self-critique is part of mentality nor permitted by state structures—closest would be Ferhati films—he can use realism because it is OTHERS being critiqued or women—nonthreateningly real. 4. Souiba and Alaoui; Dahane, “The Trends of the Moroccan Cinema (1959– 1986)”; Akharbach, CinémAction, #14, Spring 1981; Farid Boughedir had stopped in his analysis of the Moroccan films’ subjects at delineating four major trends which are: The commercial trend—the sociological trend (the new realism)—the educative trend—the political trend; whereas Mohamed Dahane has limited those trends to three only: the new realist trend—the expressive trend (the auteur cinema)—the commercial trend. Mohamed Dahane, “The Three Paths of Moroccan Cinema,” Arts and Traditions, Pt. 2 The Great Encyclopedia of Morocco, 6, 1988. 5. Characteristics of Egyptian films—persons coming from middle classes, secretaries, judges, young engineers, of a quality of life superior, very comfortable apartments if not luxurious, sports cars and high quality clothing. 6. Again, I have not been able to reference all the films of the Moroccan filmography that pertain to women because I was not able to see all the films and can therefore only reference those whose topics I can ascertain from viewing or other reliable sources. Thus many of Mesbahi’s films have not been included and surely many others have been elided. 7. A. Jamali. “Emigration clandestine: allechante mais fort perilleuse,” Al Bayane, June 14, 1996, p. 1; En 5 mois, 1500 marocains interceptés, 5 morts et 50 disparus en mer. Between January and June 1996, 1,500 persons have illegally crossed the straits of Gibraltar and been intercepted by Spanish authorities. The emigrants pay about 7,000 dirhams to be smuggled in small boats by a mafia-like group of smugglers who don’t care that fifty have disappeared feared dead and five have been found drowned in these six months. 8.
[email protected], Rhesus Film about Aids, Moroccan director breaks taboos over sex. 9. Souiba and Alaoui, p. 83. 10. Boughedir, “Panorama des cinémas maghrébins,” pp. 59–71. 11. Le sociologue Edgar Morin avance que si dans les sociétés industrialisées, c’est l’identification au Héros d’un spectacle qui garantit la victoire finale; dans les sociétés moins dévelopées, c’est au contraire sa mort sacrificielle qui provoque la catharsis: les cinéastes marocains seraient en ce cas “des médiums dont les héros, éternels phenix,
Policies, Recent Developments, Themes, and Conclusions
323
se sacrifieraient pour le réveil et la prise de conscience de leur société. . .” (Mohamed El Hajji, “Des Cultures et des Médias—Confrontation Théorique” (Mémoire de Fin d’Etudes, Institut Supérieur de Journalisme, Rabat, 1985–1986), pp. 101–102.) 12. D. Benhima, “Un siecle de fer et des heros impuissants,” Lamalif #159, Oct. 1984, pp. 54–55. 13. Araib, “Entretien avec Mohamed Abderrahman Tazi,” p. 9. 14. “Enfin, une fédération de professionnels du l’audio-visuel,” Le Matin, December 10, 1995, p. 16.
Appendix
SHORTS AND DOCUMENTARIES LISTED BY FILMMAKER Aboulouakar, Mohamed
Achouba, Abdou Afifi, Mohamed
Ait Youssef, Mohamed Alami, Rachid
Alaoui, Hassan Alioui, Mohamed or Laalioui, Mohamed Ayouch, Nabil
Bakir, Merriam
Exposition Agricole Le Poisson Dore Aicha Composition Musicale Les Tueuers Visage de Marrakech Kan li Ma Kan Sadati Aissawa De chair et d’acier Hygiène Publique Images d’orient Fleur d’artifice Retour en Agadir Nostalgie de Naif The Match The Casablanca Express Mirage Aidi (Ayidi) Je reve donc j’existe The Report of the General’s Night
1967 1968 1969 1970 1971 1977 nd. 1981 1959 1959 1960 1962 1967 1980 1990 1990 1990 1993 1998–2001 1992
Les Pierres Bleus du Sahara The Silence Seller The Network of Communication On Tourne Demain
1993 1994 1994 1993
325
326
Bayahia, Abdellah Belabass, Hakim Belmajdoub, Jamal (Majdoub) Benbarka, Souheil
Benchekroun, Abdellatif Benchekroun, Larbi
Benlyazid, Farida Bennani, Karim Bennani, Kouider
Bennani, Larbi
Appendix
Samia Sentiers Perdus Khouribga Murmures Un nid dans la chaleur The Innocent/Moins Une L’homme de paille Sacré soirée Ya Bonei Mon Journal de Chasse au Maroc Maroc-Seville-Morocco Mosqué Hassan II Operation Urostomie Notre Amie l’ecole L’Armee Royale Periple de l’Unite Un An d’indépendance Lutte Contre l’analphabetisme Retour Triomphal Souvenirs d’exil Le Rocher Les Metiers du Cuir au Maroc L’olivier de Toujours Richesse Miniere du Maroc Casablanca, Porte de l’Afrique Maroc, Pays des Phosphates Phosphate—Ville de Khouribga L’OCP une Grande Famille L’OCE Le Confort par l’electricite Ass. Mondiale des Producteurs des Phosphates De M’hamid a Tanger Sur le Balcon Mekki Meghara Miloud Le Sahara Marocain a Travers les Siecles Sa Majeste Mohamed V SAR Moulay Hassan Pour une Bouchée de Pain
1995–1998 1970 1992 1998–2001 2001–2003 1994–1995 1995–1998 1995–1998 1986 1988 1992 1993 1984 1956 1956 1956 1956 1956 1956 1957 1958 1959 1962 1962 1963 1964 1964 1964 1964 1965 1965 1970 1995 nd. nd. 1985 1986 1986 1960
327
Appendix
A l’Heure de l’Afrique La Fête de la Jeunnesse Un Troubadour a Marrakech La Marche du Temps Debut d’un Regne Conference Africaine au Sommet à Casa Nuits Andalouses Le Logis des Hommes La Route des Vacances Les Chemins du Rif La Quaraouyine De Tanger à Nador Rif, Terre de Legende et de Detente Keilaz Ma Commune Fes, Cité des Hommes Bennis , Amine Casa by Love Bensaid, Hamid Maarouf N’tamjlocht (le Rite du Ligote) Bensaidi, Faouzi La falaise Le mur Trajets Bensaoud, Hlimi 9eme Jeux Mediterranéens Bensouda, Mohamed Ahed Le silence violee Bouanani, Ahmed Tarfaya, ou la Marche d’un Poete Memoire 14 La Fantasia du Siecle Les Quatres Sources Carte de Visite Sidi Kacem, le Rameau d’Olivier Complexe Sportif de Casablanca L’Enfant, la Torture et l’Ordinateur Boulane, Ahmed Unfinished Crime Ideal Plateau Voyage Dans le Passé Boutounes, Rachid Marriage without Fulfillment Chaer, Ahmed Airforce Jets Chouika, Fadil C’est deja trop tarde Chraibi, Omar Jeu Fatale/The Game of Fate Lumiére/Nour
1960 1960 1961 1962 1962 1962 1963 1964 1964 1967 1967 1967 1968 1969 1976 2003–2005 1980 1995–1998 1998–2001 1998–2001 1983 2001–2003 1966 1971 1971 1978 1981 1982 1984 1984 1990 1990 1995–1998 1993 nd. 1998–2001 1994 1995
328
Appendix
Fabula la Vie d’un village Paroles et Expressions Absence Derkaoui, Mustapha Les Quatre Murs Les Cent Jours de la Mamounia Temoignages Silence The Day When Gods Were Frightened The Blast of Wind after the Storm The Great Metaphor Drissi, Abdellah Festival d’Essaouira Hassan II le Leader Arabe El Glaoui, Mehdi 1ère Classe Fakhir, Mohamed Le temps d’un reve Rabha Falah, Hicham L’attention Faroukhi, Ismail The Exposé Ferhati, Jilali Le Mouchoir Bleu Ghannam, Omar Voyage de S.M Mohamed V au Moyen-Orient Maroc 70 Gounajjar, Nourredine Agregats Hajji, Abdelaziz Sans Issue Hamman, Rachid Weekend Hassini, Mohamed La Lettre du Vendredi Himi, Mohamed L’eternal garcon Idrissi, Abdellah The Essaouira Festival Idrissi, Ahmed Tahiri Etat de siege Kacem Aqdi, Ahmed Le Rocher Situations Karim, Idriss & Paul Moty Un Foyer Menacé Karim, Idriss Les Enfants du Haouz Transtherapia Kettani, Driss El Khaoudi, Mourad Le caporal Laalioui, Mohamed HôpitalHassan II Forces Royales Air Colonies de Vacances La Bataille d’Anoual Une Journee au Maroc
Chraibi, Saad
1996 1978 1980 1981–1982 1964 1978 1986 1991 1992 1992 1995 1980 1986 1984 1998–2001 2001–2003 1995–1998 1993 1995 1960 1970 1984–1985 nd. 2003–2005 1993 2001–2003 1980–1981 1998–2001 1987 1993 1964 1970 1986 2001–2003 1969 1971 1972 1980 1982
329
Appendix
Laalioui, Mohamed or Alioui, Mohamed Labdaoui, Mohamed Lagtaâ, Abdelkader
Lahkhmari, Noureddine
Lahlali, Khnata Lahlou, Latif
Lakhdar, A. Laraki, Abdelhai Lasri, Hicham Legzouli, Hassan
Lotfi, Mohamed
Maroc, Sourire Eternal L’Enseignement L’Agriculture Port Mohammedia Journees Nationales de vaccination Tafilalet Raconte-moi Meknes The Report of the General’s Night
1984 1986 1986 1987 1987
Nazwa Hamassat Rabi Chaibia Le Devoilement Happy Ending Breves Notes Né sans ski aux pieds Le livreur de journaux Le dernier spectacle Dans les griffes de la nuit Image refusee Cultivez la Betterave! Fourrage Les Mines et l’Industrie Sin Agafaye Du Coté de la Tassaout Maroc Terre des Hommes Le Loukkos La Bettrave Sucriere dans le Loukkos Le Gharb, pt. 1 Le Gharb, pt. 2 La Route de l’Unité Cheikh al-Kamel Les quatre cents et un coups Geometrie des remords The Seller of Memories Quand le soleil fait tomber les moineaux Au Rythme des Machines
1995–1998 1998–2001 1984 1984 1985 1995 1994 1995–1998 1995–1998 1995–1998 1998–2001 2001–2003 1962–1963 1966 1967 1967 1968 1972 1974
1988 1991 1992
1974 1976 1980 1957 nd. 1995–1998 2001–2003 1993 1998–2001 1962
330
Maanouni, Ahmed Majdoub, Jamal Marrakchi, Leila
Mesnaoui, Ahmed
Meziane, Mohamed Minkar, Mohamed Mouftakir, Mohamed
Appendix
Al Koum Al Maghariba The Innocent/Moins Une L’horizon perdu 200 dirhams Momo Mambo La Source d’l’Art Maghrebin Le Messager de la Liberte Le Barbier de Seville Source de Lumiere Question Mauritanienne Journée de la Jeunesse Pelerinage a la Mecque La Fête de la Jeunesse La Peinture Marocaine La Rose du Sud Agadir la Blanche Visite du President Jamal Abdelnasser Chemin de la Reeducation L’Amite Maroc-Amerique Hommes et Palmerais Silhouettes aux Fils d’Or Renaissance d’Agadir Ceramique de Safi Galops au Soleil Le Pont d’Oum Rabii Printemps Eternel Pages d’Histoire du Sahara Hommes de Demain Fittarik Achour Part a la Guerre Ben Msik et Borj Moulay Omar Casablanca, Bilan et Perspectives Le Petit Omar al Mokhtar Complexe Sportif de Rabat Noah Houria Dollar Blé L’ombre de la mort La Danse du Fœtus
1992 1994–1995 1998–2001 2001–2003 2001–2003 1949 1951 1955 1962 1962 1964 1964 1964 1964 1964 1965 1965 1966 1966 1967 1967 1969 1969 1970 1970 1971–1978 1975 1982 1982 1983 1984 1984 1984 1984–1985 1995 1995–1998 1995 1995–1998 2001–2003 2003–2005
331
Appendix
Mouline, Abderrahmane Mrini, Driss
Naqrachi, Amin Nesrate, Mohamed Noury/Nouri, Hakim Noury, Imad Osfour, Mohamed Oulad M’hand, Mohamed
Oulad Sayed, Daoud
Ouriachi, Sanaa Ramdani, Abdelaziz
R’chiche, Abdelmajid, & Tazi, Abderrahmane, & Bouanani, A. Rechich/R’chich, Majid (Abdelmajid)
Appel a la liberte Chiraa Chellah Addahia Amalgame Drole de journee dans le desert Sans Paroles (Bidoun Kalam) Cinéma Imperial Coupable Bojo le Menuisier La Route de l’Espoir An American in Tangier Lost Childhood The House of Power Gyatuour City Lenin Street Le café de la plage A travers le miroir Overwhelmed Memory/Memoire Ochre Entre l’Absence et l’Oublie Le Oued Mounika La Nuit des Bêtes Les élections Le Grand Jour a Imilchil En Passant par Erfoud Ames et Rythmes Retour aux Sources Les Pecheurs d’Assafi Naissance d’un Village Maroc Terre de Civilization et de Progress La Vallee du Ziz Fes, Miroir de l’Histoire L’Attente Six et Douze
Forêt The Shining/al-Baraaq/Al Boraq
2001–2003 1982 1983 1986 1995–1998 1998–2001 1977–1982 1995 1998–2001 1956 1962 1993 1993 1993 1993 1994 1995–1998 1998–2001 1991 1993 1995 2001–2003 1960 1960 1961 1961 1960–1962 1963 1964 1966 1967 1967 1967 1970 1968
1970 1971
332
Appendix
La Marche Verte 1975 Le Maroc Rêve des Investisseurs 1982 Les Nomades 1991 Les Merveilles de Sale 1994 R’mili, Abdellah La Democratie Hassanienne 1986 Les Barrages 1986 Salmy, Aziz Deja vu 1998–2001 Un voyage de trop 2001–2003 Sefrioui, Mohamed Najib Les Enfants de Ben Barka 1980–1981 Sekkat, Mohamed Tanger a l’Heure du Festival nd. Semlali, Hamid Mohamed V: The First Resistant 1993 Didi La Poule nd. Smihi, Moumen Si Moh, Pas de Chance 1969–1971 Couleurs Aux corps 1972 Hist. of Arab Cinema, Egyptian Cinema, 1991 Matisse in Tangier 1992 Brief Reports on Egyptian Cinema 1993 Souissi, Jamal Et si Fes m’etait Contée 1992 Tahiri, Ali Cimetiere de misericorde 1998–2001 Tahiri, Driss Son of the Sun 1990 Tazi, Mohamed B.A. L’Architecture Marocaine 1962 Rendez-vous a Casa 1964 La Peste du Siecle 1964 Lalla Mimouna 1964 Escale a Rabat 1964 La Mosque de Tinmel 1966 La Peinture sur Toile 1988 Cherkaoui l’Abstrait 1988 Yad el Meyite 1988 Tazis in the following could be Mohamed B.A. or Mohamed Abderrahmane, don’t know. Tazi, M. Sucrerie National du Beht 1964 Tazi, M. El Jadida 1964 Tazi, M. Les Forces Armees Royales 1966 Tazi, M. La Reforme Agraire 1966 Tazi, M. Un Bon Voyage 1967 Tazi, M. Abderrahmane 6 et 12 (see R’chich) 1968 The Stolen Photographs 1995 Tribak, Mohamed Cherif Nassima 1995–1998 w/Hicham Falah Balcon Atlantico 2001–2003
333
Appendix
Triqui/Triqi/Triki, Laila Uld Mohand, Al Hadi Zerouali, Abdellah
Ziani, Mohamed
Zinoun, Lahcen
Chapelet Sang d’Ancre Un plan simple Flash Folklore Marocain Les Chemins de la Cooperation Groupement Motoculture La Dernière Chance Al Bsat Ih Ya Zamane Assamt Le Piano Faux Pas
2001–2003 2003–2005 1998–2001 1962 1970 1971 1962 1968 1972 2001–2003 2001–2003 2003–2005
FEATURE FILMS LISTED BY FILMMAKER Abbassi/Abbazi, Mohamed
1981–1982 1996
Aboulouakar, Mohammed Achouba/Ashouba, Abdou
1984 1980 1981
Asli, Mohamed
2003
Ayouch, Nabil
1998 1999 2002
Belakaf, Laarbi & Reggab, Muhammad; Chraibi, Saad; Gounejjar, Noureddine; Lagtaa, Abdelkader; Derkaoui, Mustapha; Derkaoui, Abdelkrim Belabbes, Hakim
1975–1978
2001–2003
Belhashmi, Ahmed
1959
Beyond the River/ De l’Autre Cote du Fleuve Treasures of the Atlas/Tresors du Atlas Hadda/Haddah Taghunja/Taghunja/Taghounja Sadati Aissawa (feature documentary) In Casablanca Angels Don’t Fly/ A Casablanca les Anges ne volent pas Mektoub Ali Zaoua Une Minute de Silence de Moins/ A Minute of Silence at Least les Cendres du Clos/ The Ash of the Barn/ Ramaad al-Zaribah
Les Fibres de l’ame/Fibers of the Soul The Violin/Al-Kamaan
334
Appendix
Belmajdoub, Jamal
2000 2004 2007
Ben Barka, Souheil
1972
1975–1976
1977–1979 1981–1982 1990 1993 1996
Benjelloun, Hassan
2002 1990
1993–1994 1997 2000 2001 2002 2004
2007 Benlyazid, Farida or Belyazid
1987 1999
Yacout Classe 8 Reve Marocain/Moroccan Dream One Thousand & One Hands / Mille et une Mains/Alf Yad wa Yad The Oil War Will Not Take Place/Harb al-Betrool lan Taqa’/La guerre du Pétrole n’Aura pas Lieu Blood Wedding/‘Ars al-Dam/ Noces de Sang Amok The Drums of Fire (The Battle of the Three Kings) The Knights of Victory/ Cavaliers de la Gloire L’Ombre du Pharaon/Shadow of the Pharoahs Les Amants de Mogador The Wedding of the Others/la Fête des Autres ‘Ars al Acharayn Yaarit Les Amis d’hier/Yesterday’s Friends Levres du Silence/The Lips of Silence Jugement d’une femme/Judgement of a Woman Le pote/The Buddy Derb Moulay Cherif/La Chambre Noire/The Black Chamber Ou vas tu Moshe?/Where are you going, Moshe? Door to the Sky/Bab Smah Maftouh/Porte sur le Ciel La Ruse des Femmes/Women’s Wiles
Appendix
2002 2005
Bennani, Hamid
1970 1995
Bennani, Larbi & Abdelaziz Ramdani
1968–1969
Bennani, Larbi
1995
Bensaid, Hamid
1981
Bensaidi, Faouzi
2003 2006 1982
Bensherif/Bencherif, Hamid Bensouda, Said
1985–1986
Bouanani, Ahmed Boussif, Mourad/ Taylan Barman Boulane, Ahmed
1979–1980 2001–2003 2000 2007
Bouriki, Benghaleb
1984
Bourkia/Bourquia, Farida
1982–1983 2007
Chouika, Driss Chraibi, Omar
1998–2001 2001
2004
335
Casablanca, Casablanca La Chienne de Vie de Juanita Narboni (Juanita de Tanger)/ The Dog’s Life of Juanity Narboni Tattoo/Wechma/Traces or A Scare The Prayer of the Absent/ La Priere de l’Absent When the Palms Fruit/Indama Tandhujn al-Thimaar/Quand Mûrissent les Dattes The Unknown Resistant/Le Resistant Inconnu The Bird of Heaven/Ousfour al-Jenna/L’Oiseau du Paradis Mille Mois/A Thousand Months What a Wonderful World Steps in the Mist/Khataooat fi al-Dibab/des Pas dans le Brouillard The Guard’s Shadow/Thil alHaaris/L’ombre du Gardien Mirage/Al-Sarab/Assarab Au dela de Gibraltar/The Other Side of Gibraltar Ali, Raabia and the Others/Ali, Raabia et les autres Les anges de Satan/The Satanic Angels A White Thread, A Black Thread/Khayt Abyad, Khayt Asouad The Firebrand/al-Jamra Two Women on the Road/Deux Femmes sur la route Mabrouk L’homme qui brodait des secrets/ The Man Who Embroidered Secrets Rahma
336
Appendix
2007 Chraibi, Saad
1975–78 1991 1998 2000 2002 2003
Chrigui, Tijani
2007 1991
Derkaoui, Abdelkrim
1975-1978 1996-1997
Derkaoui, Abdelkrim & Driss Kettani
1984
Derqaoui, Mustapha or Derkaoui
1974–1976
1975–1978 1982
1984 1992 1994 1994–1995 2001
Tissée de Mains et d’étoffe/ Hands and cloth les Cendres du Clos Days From an Ordinary Life/ Chronique d’une Vie Normale Femmes . . . et Femmes/ Women . . . and Women Thirst/Soif The Affair of Sarah T/ L’affaire Sarah T Jawhara: Girl of the Prison/ Jawhara: Fille de Prison Islamour Ymer ou les Chardons Floriferes/ or Tijani, Chrigui Ymer or the Floriform Thistles les Cendres du Clos Zankah al Qahira/Rue le Caire/ Cairo Street The Norie of Moulay Yakoub/ Le Jour du Forain Annaoura au Moulay Yakoub/ Events Without Meaning/ Ahdaath bidoun Dalaalah/ De Quelques événements sans Signification les Cendres du Clos The Beautiful Days of Shahrazade/Ayam Shahrazad Jamila/les Beaux Jours de Chahrazad A Temporary Title/Anwaan Mouaqat/Titre Provisoire The First Story/Fiction Premiere I in the Past (Tense)/Je(u) au passe The Seven Doors of the Night/ les Sept Portes de la Nuit Les Amours de Hajj Mokhtar Soldi/The Lovers of Hajj Mokhtar Soldi
Appendix
Ferhati, Jilali
2003 2004 1978
1977–1978
1991 1995 2000 2004 Ferroukhi, Ismail
2004
Gounejjar, Noureddine
1975–1978 1991 ?
Housaini, Muhammed
1986
Idrissi, Najib Kathiri Ismail, Mohamed
1992 1998 2002 2005 2007 1982
Kacem Aqdi/Akdi, Ahmed
1984
Kamal, Kamal
2001–2003 2003–2005
Kassari, Yasmine (Kessari)
2004
Kettani, Driss & Abdelkrim Derqaoui
1984
337
Casablanca by Night Casablanca Day Light Break in the Wall/Jarha fi alHa’it/Une Brêche dans le Mur Dolls of Cane/Straw Dolls/ Araiss men Qassab/Poupées de Roseau The Beach of Lost Children/ la Plage des Enfants Perdus Cheveax du Fortune/The Horses of Fortune Tresses Memory in Detention/Mémoire en détention The Great Voyage/Le Grand Voyage les Cendres du Clos The Waiting Room/La Salle d’Attente La Mémoire Bleue/The Blue Memory The Seventh Vice/al-Karmoosa al-Saab’ah Aziz Wlittou Aouchtam After/Et après Here and There/Ici et là Goodbye Mothers/Adieu mères The Tragedy of 40,000/Maasaah 40,000/le Drame des 40.000 What the Wind Has Taken/Ma Thahabah al-Reaah/Ce que les Vents ont Emporté Tayf Nizar La Symphonie marocaine/ Moroccan Symphony The Sleeping Child/L’enfant Endormi Le Jour du Forain/The Norie of Moulay Yakoub/Annaoura au Moulay Yakoub
338
Appendix
Khayat, Mostafa
1983–1984
Lagtaâ, Abdelkader
1975–1978 1991 1993–98 1998 2003 2006
Lakhmari, Noureddine Lahlou, Latif
2003–2005 1969–1970 1986 2007
Lahlou, Nabil
1978–1979 1980
1982 1984 1989 1992 2002 2006 Laraki, Abdelhay Legzouli, Hassan Lotfi, Mohamed
2001–2003 2003–2005 1996
Maanouni, Ahmed
1978–1979
The Dilemma/al-Warta/ L’impasse Les Cendres du Clos Love in Casablanca/un Amour a Casablanca La Porte Close/The Closed Door Les Casablancais/The Casablancans Face a Face/Face to Face Yassmine and the Men / Yassmine et les hommes Le Regard/The Look Spring Sun/Shams al-Rabi’a/ Soleil de Printemps The Suspicion of Romance/ Ashubha/La Compromission Samira’s Garden/Les jardins de Samira Al-Kanfoudi/alKanfoudi The Governor General of Shakerbakerben Island/ alHakim al-’Aam al-Jazeera Shakerbakerbene/Gouverneur Général de l’Ile de Chakerbakerben Ibrahim What?/Brahim Yach? The Braying of the Soul/Nahiq al-Ruh/L’âme Qui Brait Komany The Night of Murder/Lailat al Qatal/La Nuit du Crime The Years of Exile/Les années de l’exil Tabet or not Tabet/Tabite or not Tabite Mona Saber Tenja Rhesus, the Blood of the Other/ Rhesus le Sang de l’Autre Days oh Days/Alyam Alyam/ Oh les Jours!
Appendix
Marrakchi, Laila Mesbahi, Abdallah
1981 2007 2005 1973
1974–1975
1975–1976 1977–1979
1978–1980
1980 1982 1983–1986 1989
Mesbahi, Imane
1994 1984 1994 1968
Mesnaoui, Ahmed & Tazi, Mohamad B.A. Moufti, Hassan
1981–1982
Mrini, Driss Naciri, Said Nejjar, Narjiss
1983 2001 2003
Nouri/Noury, Hakim
1978–1980
339
The Situation/al-Hal/Transes Burned Hearts/ Coeurs brulees Marock Silence Is a Forbidden Trend/ Silence sens Interdit/al-Samt Tujah Mamnou’a Tomorrow the Earth (Land) will not Change/Ghradan lan tatabadl al-Ard/ Demain la Terre ne Changera Pas The Green Light/al-Dao’ alAkhdar/Feu vert Where Do You Hide the Sun/ Ou Cachez-vous le Soleil?/ Aina Takhbioon al-Shams I Will Write Your Name on the Sand/sa-Aktoub Ismak ala Raml /J’écrirai Ton Nom sur le Sable Tarik Ibnou Ziyad Le Bonheur des Autres/The Happiness of Others Afghanistan Pourquoi?/ Afghanistan Why? La Terre du Defi/The Land of Defiance The Cry of Bosnia Traces sur l’eau/Traces on the Water Terrorism Life is a Struggle/al-Hyat Kifah Vaincre pour Vivre The Tears of Remorse/Dumou’a al-Nadam/ Les Larmes du Regret Bamou The Bandits/Les Bandits Les Yeux Secs/Cry No More/ Dry Eyes The Mailman/Saa’aee alBareed/ le Facteur
340
Appendix
1990 1993–1994 1995 1997 1998 2000
2001 2005
Osfour, Mohamed
1956–1958
1970
Oulad Sayed, Daoud
1998 2001 2003 2005
Ouazzani, Fatima Jebli
1995–1998
Ramdani, Abdelaziz & Larbi Bennani, & Mesnaoui, Mohamed
1968–1969
Rchich, Abdelmajid
1998–2001
The Hammer and the Anvil/le Marteau et l’Enclume The Stolen Childhood/ l’Enfance Volee The Stealer/Thief of Dreams/ Voleur de Reves A Simple News Item/Un Simple Fait Divers A Woman’s Fate/Destin de Femme She Is Diabetic and Hypertensive and She Refuses to Die/ Elle est Diabetic, Hypertendue et Refuse de Crever A Story of Love/Histoire d’Amour She Is Diabetic and Hypertensive and Still Refuses to Die/ Elle est Diabetic, Hypertendue et Refuse Toujours de Crever The Disobedient (Disloyal) Son/ Le Fils Maudit/The Unfaithful Son/al-Ibn al’Aaq The Stolen Treasure/Le Trésor infernal/al-Kenza al-Marsood Adieu Forain/Bye Bye Souirty The Wind Horse/Le Cheval du vent Tarfaya (Bab Labhar) En attendant Passolini/Waiting for Passolini Dans la maison de mon père/In the House of my Father When the Palms Fruit/When the Fruits Ripen/Indama Tandhujn al-Thimaar/Quand Mûrissent les Dattes L’Histoire d’une rose/History of a Rose
Appendix
2003–2005 Reggab, Mohamed et al. Reggab, Mohamed
1975–1978 1982
Saddiki/Seddiki, Tayeb Sefrioui, Najib
1984 1985 1998–2001
Smihi, Moumin
1974–1975
1981
1987 1991 1994 2005 Smihi, Saïd /Serge le Peron 2001–2003 Souda, Said or Bensouda
1985–1986
1998–2001 Tazi, Mohamed, B.A.
1966 1980–1981 1979–1982 1986
Tazi , Mohamad B.A. & Ahmed Mesnaoui Tazi, Moh. Abderrahman
1968 1979
341
Les Ailes brisées/The Broken Wings les Cendres du Close The Hairdresser of the Poor Quarter/ Hallak darb alFoqarah/ le Coiffeur du Quartier des Pauvres Zeft/The Pitch (Tarmac) The Sun/al-Shams/Chams/ Shams Amour sans visa/Love without Visa Chergui or the Violent Silence/ Shargi aw Al-Samt al-’Aneef/ Chergui ou le Silence Violent 44 or the Night’s Myth/44 ou Ostoorah al-Leil 44 ou les Récits de la Nuit The Kaftan of Love/Caftan d’Amour/Kaftan al Hub The Lady of Cairo/La Dame du Caire Histoires Atlantiques/ Moroccan Stories A Muslim Childhood J’ai vu tuer Ben Barka/I Saw Who Killed Ben Barka The Guard’s Shadow/Thil al-Haaris/L’Ombre du Gardien Du Paradis a l’enfer/From Paradise to Hell Path of Kiff/Tareeq al-Kif/ La Route du Kif Amina/Amina Lalla Chafia Abbas ou Jouha n’est Pas Mort/ Abbas or Jouha Isn’t Dead Life Is a Struggle/al-Hyat Kifah/ Vaincre pour Vivre Mubri al-Filipin
342
Appendix
1981–1982 1988 1993
1996 2005 Tijani, Chrigui
1991
Yachfine, Ahmed
1984 1995 1979 1984
Zerouali, Abdellah
Zideddine, Mohamed
1995 2003–2005
The Passerby/Ibn Sabeel/ le Grand Voyage Badis Looking for the Husband of My Wife A la Recherche du Mari de ma Femme Lalla Hobby Les Voisins d’Abou Moussa/ Abou Moussa’s Neighbors Aimar/Ymer ou les Chardons Floriferes Nightmare/Qabouss/Cauchemar Khafaya The Waterwheel/al-Naoura The Comrades of Today/Rafaaq al-Youm/les Copains du Jour I Am the Artist/Moi l’Artiste Réveil
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Index
2M, 29–31, 192, 209, 216, 239, 242, 260. See also cable 44 ou Les Récits de la Nuit, 314–15 8éme Recontres du Cinéma Méditerranéen, 194, 203 Abbassi, Mohamed, 3, 136, 140, 145 The Accident, 153 Achouba, Abdou, 127, 136 Actualités Marocaines (newsreels), 50–51 Adieu Forain, 237 Afifi, Mohamed Said, 64, 136, 235–36 Aicha, Sadok Ben, 94 AIDS, 313 Les Ailes Brisées, 215, 317 Akarriou, Samia, 267 Alami, Rachid, 227 Algeria, 3, 314 Ali Zaoua—Prince of the Streets (Ali Zaoua—Prince des Rues) (2000), 4, 16, 229, 243, 270–72 Ali, Rabia et les autres, 317 alienation, 4, 8, 138–39, 311–13 Aloui, Moulay Ahmed, 43 Alyam Alyam, 121, 318 Amaoui, Noubir, 217 Amazigh. See Berbers
L’âme Qui Brait (The Soul that Brays), 112, 143, 158, 314 Amina, 94, 309 Amok, 140, 213 Un Amour à Casablanca (Love in Casablanca/Hub Fi Dar al Beida), 18, 16, 203–4, 213–17, 243, 254–56, 277, 307, 30, 218 Les Amours de Hajj Soldi, 159 Angelopoulos, Theo, 222 Les Années de l’Exil (The Years of Exile), 158, 317 Aqdi, Ahmed Kacem, 136 Arabization, 3, 19–20 Arayiss Min Kasab. See Poupées de Roseau archives, 100, 169n23 Armes, Roy, 7 Article XIX (Centre International Contre la Censure), 216 Asli, Mohamed, 4, 21, 22, 268–70 assassination, 36n22 “Association of Cinema Critics of the Maghreb,” 32 Association Marocaine des Critiques de Cinéma, 219 Association Marocaine des Droits du Homme (AMDH), 217
369
370
Index
Association of Moroccan Filmmakers (ACM), 53 audience, 1, 5, 11; accessibility for, 241–42, 276; ages, 59–60; appreciation by, 196–97, 225; catering to, 195–96; creation of, 193; criticism of, 32; defining, 196–97; filmmaker responsibility to, 195–96; identity, 9; rural, 85n93, 219; success with, 277; tastes, 25–26. auteurs. See filmmakers; style Autrement, 245 Ayouch, Nabyl, 4, 196, 214, 220, 228– 31, 243, 270–72, 317 Bab Smah Maftouh. See Door to the Sky Badis, 213, 245, 253, 307–9, 312, 318 Bakir, Miriam, 231 Bamou, 15, 94, 309, 314, 318 Les Bandits, 196, 243 Barka, Souheil Ben, 114–15, 121, 140, 219, 227, 242, 309, 316; criticism of, 198–99, 289n117; plans, 200–201 Barthes, Roland, 139 Basma (Société de Production et de Recherche Cinématographiques), 108 Al-Bayane, 31 The Battle of Three Kings. See The Drums of Fire The Beach of Lost Children. See La Plage des Enfants Perdus Un Beau Monde, 235 Les Beaux Jours de Shaharazade, 3, 159–63, 309 Belaichi, Ahmed, 217 Benchekroun, Larbi, 65–66, 136 Benchemssi, Ahmed, 217 Benghaleb, Bouriki, 136 Benjelloun, Hassan, 204, 242, 317 Benkirane, Najib, 214 Benlyazid, Farida, 4, 136, 151–52, 239, 242–53, 278 Benmasoud, Hamidou, 267 Bennani, Hamid, 2, 30, 65, 71–77, 108, 244
Bennani, Kouider, 132, 145–46 Bennani, Larbi, 64, 66–68, 136 Bensaid, Hamid, 136 Bensaidi, Faouzi, 317 Bensherif, Hamid, 136 Berbers, 6, 18–19, 39n46; as non-audience, 219; culture, 19–22, 33n3, 37n40; identity, 9, 33n3; language, 38n44; video making, 319–20 Beyond the River, 94 Blood Wedding, 140, 309, 318 The Blue Handkerchief. See Le Mouchoir Bleu The Blue Stone of the Sahara. See Les Pierres Bleues du Desert Born without Skis on His Feet. See Né Sans Skis aux Pieds Bouanani, Ahmed, 54, 65, 75, 108 Boughedir, Ferid, 96 Boulane, Ahmed, 317 Bournaz, Kulthum, 239 Bourquia, Farida, 136–37 Boutounes, Rachid, 231–33 Brahim, Yach? (Brahim, Right?), 3, 112, 155–58, 316–18 Brêche dans le Mur (Hole in the Wall), 147–48, 244, 318 Brèves Notes (Brief Remarks), 234–35 Brief Remarks. See Brèves Notes cable, 24–25, 29–30. See also 2M; television Cane Dolls. See Poupées de Roseau caravans, cinema, 4, 49–50, 5, 62, 130; disappearance, 219, 304; programming, 129 Casablanca by Night, 159, 243 Casablanca Casablanca, 245 Casablanca Daylight, 159 A Casablanca les anges ne volent pas (In Casablanca Angels Don’t Fly), 4, 20–21, 268–70, 312 Les Casablancais, 254
Index
Cauchemar (Kabous/Nightmare), 3, 15, 135, 140–43, 209, 313, 315 Les Cavaliers de la Gloire. See Drums of Fire Le Cendre du Clos, 101–2, 108, 253 censorship, 21, 57, 59, 97, 119, 216; and funding, 120–21; outside cinema, 119–20; processes, 121–22; and quality, 75; self-, 216–17; taboo topics, 308; via distribution, 129 Centre Cinématographique Marocain (CCM), 2–3, 105–6; and Berber language, 21; budget, 201–2; cinema clubs, 60; current system, 320–21; creation of, 46–47; criticism of, 198, 220–22; and distribution, 107; documents, 6; effectiveness, 99; filmmaker input, 109; and foreign films, 190–91; functions, 49–52, 100–1; funding, 52, 75, 78, 111–12, 136, 183n227; importance, 187–88; infrastructure, 101, 302; methods of support, 280n4; Moroccanization, 115; performance, 277–78; policies, 102–3; post-independence, 50–51; production, 20, 53, 72, 201–2; propaganda, 66; recommendations, 198; regulation, 4, 97–99; renovations, 201; responsibilities, 47–48; support funds, 4, 109–13. See also Fonds d’Aide Chahine, Youssef, 214 Chaibia, 253 La chamber noire (Derb Moulay Cherif), 317 Le Chambre Marocaine des Distributeurs de Films, 320 La Chambre Marocaine des Producteurs de Films, 320 La Chambre Marocaine des Techniciens de Films, 320 Chams Rabi’i. See Soleil du Printemps Le Chauffeur de Taxi, 256 Chelha. See Berbers Chemin de la Reéducation, 66
371
Chergui, 108, 309, 314, 318 Le Cheval de Vent, 237 Chevaux du Fortune (Horses of Fortune), 17, 148, 243, 307, 312, 317–18 children, 59–60 Chraibi, Omar, 16, 225–27, 239 Chraibi, Saad, 136, 196–97, 204, 317 Chronicle of an Ordinary Life. See Chronique d’un Vie Normale Chronique d’un Vie Normale (Chronicle of an Ordinary Life), 16, 214, 315– 16, 318 Cinéma 3, 75, 96, 127 cinema clubs, 32, 53, 60–61, 119, 124, 216–19; and scholarship, 125–26, 177n158, 218–19; and the CCM, 107; and Third Cinema, 176n147; nationality, 61; overview, 122–23, 167; post-independence, 60–61. See also Federation Marocaine des Cines-Clubs Cinema for Youth, 60 Cinéma Impérial, 240, 256 Cinématèque, 49, 202, 303–4 Le Cinématographe, 61 Cinéphone, 45 Cisse, Souleyman, 203 Cocteau, Jean, 61–62 collectivism, 203–4 colonialism, 4, 11, 314–15; aftereffects, 14; and cinematic concepts, 43–44; and the elite, 12; in film, 143, 309– 10; and women, 317 Colonies de Vacances, 144 Comité du Suivi des Recommandations du lér Colloque sur le Cinéma, 188 Commission d’Agrémént des Scénarios, 49 Communism, 58 La Compromission, 310–11, 316 The Comrades of Today, 94 Conseil Supérieur du Cinéma (CSP), 56 co-productions, 174n125, 215, 282n16. See also funding
372
Index
creativity, and funding, 72–73, 284n50 criticism, 121–22, 217; in cinema clubs, 61; education, 125–26, 218–19; negativity, 127–28; positive role, 321; training, 177n158; without exhibition, 126–27 Cry of Bosnia, 242 Cry the Beloved Country, 140 cultural centers, 217–18 dahirs, 45–49, 56–57, 97–99, 100, 131– 32; and licensing, 48–49 Daoud, Zakya, 53 daraja. See languages The Dead, 153 De L’Autre Côté du Fleuve (The Other Side of the River), 3, 66, 140–42, 145, 312, 318 De Quelques Evénements Sans Signification, 97, 108, 121, 159–60 Demain on Tourne (We Will Film Tomorrow), 231 demographics: audience, 17–18; of filmmakers, 226–27 Department of Cinema, 46 Derkaoui, Abdelkrim, 158–59 Derkaoui, Mustapha, 3, 64, 96–97, 101– 2, 108, 140, 158–65, 239, 242–43; and collectivism, 203; pessimism, 318; style, 204, 225–26 Le Dernier Spectacle, 235 Destin de Femme (Women’s Destiny), 256, 309 Le Devoilement, 253 dialects. See languages Dirassat Sinimaiya (Cinema Studies), 127 displacement. See emigration, urban migration distribution, 1, 4, 23–24; audience transportation, 173n97; and censorship, 121; current system, 209–13; equipment, 124; exhibition funding, 110; funding, 24; improvement, 277; international,
215; motivators, 304–5; overview, 113–14; problems, 113–19, 202, 282n17; profits, 78; publicity, 284n48; regulations, 56; rural, 50, 64, 304; support of Morocco, 214; and TV, 28. See also cinema caravans; cinema clubs; DVDs; festivals; videos documentaries, 121, 144, 146–47; decline in popularity, 136, 225–27. See also individual films Doghmi, Larbi, 137, 158 The Dog’s Life of Juanita Narboni. See La vida perra de Juanita Narboni Door to the Sky (Bab Smah Maftouh/ Une Porte sur le Ciel), 223, 243, 245–253, 276, 309–13 Dos au Mur, 232 Doukouré, Cheikh, 203 Drissi, Abdellah, 136 The Drums of Fire (The Battle of the 3 Kings), 199, 242 DVDs, 23–25 Dwyer, Kevin, 7 education, 66, 220; cinematic, 125–26; films and, 79. See also training L’Education du Regard. See Images Volées Egypt, 2, 321n1, 322n5 Elalj, Amed Tayeb, 267 Electricien, 256 elitism, 21–22, 188, 200 Elle est diabetique, hypertendue et elle refuse de crever (She Is Diabetic, Hypertensive, and Refuses to Die), 243, 256 Elle est diabetique, hypertendue et elle toujours refuse de crever (She is Diabetic, Hypertensive, and Still Refuses to Die), 256 emigration, 4, 188, 311, 313 L’Emigré, 214 En Attendant Passolini (Waiting for Passolini), 237
Index
L’Enfance Volee (Stolen Childhood), 18, 30, 66, 196, 203, 214, 256–60, 307, 311–13, 318 L’Enfant de la Jungle, 65 L’enfant endormi, 309, 312 L’Enfant Maudit, 65 Les Enfants du Haouz, 121 Entre l’Absence et L’Oubli, 237 entrepreneurship, 220 Et apres, 312 Études Cinématographiques/Dirassay Cinimaiya, 217 Eutelsat, 27 Events without Meaning. See De Quelques Evénements Sans Signification existentialism, 154 L’Exposé (The Report), 233 Face a Face, 254 Face aux Jeunes, 217 La Facteur (The Mailman/Saa’aee), 256 failure, 318 Farroukhi, Ismail, 233–34 Fassi-Fihri, Sarim, 214, 239 Fédération Internationale des Archives du Film, 60 Fédération Marocaine des Chambres Professionnelles du Cinéma et de L’Audio-Visuel, 320 Marocaine des Chambres Marocaine des Cines-Clubs[FNCC], 60–62. See also cinema clubs Marocaine des Chambres Nationale des Cines-clubs Marocaines (FNCCM), 123–25, 130–31 Femmes . . . et Femmes (Women . . . and Women), 196, 309 Ferhati, Jilali, 3, 17, 30, 147–52, 165, 181n20–12, 23–44, 307, 317 Festival du Grand Cinéma Inaperçu, 223 Festival of the White Dove, 222 festivals, 3, 119, 130–33, 222, 225; financing, 206; national, 220–22;
373
overview, 168. See also specific festivals La Fête des Autres, 310, 318 Fettou, Mouna, 214, 267 film collectives, 108 Film Engagé, 234 filmmakers: auteurs, 94–96; organization of, 109; role of, 91–92; background, 306; inexperienced, 200. See also individual filmmakers filmography, 8 films: feature, 136, 147; short, 65, 7, 144, 169n23. See also imports; Moroccan cinema; styles Le Fils Maudit (The Unfortunate Son), 66 financing. See funding First National Festival of Moroccan Cinema, 106–7, 133–34. See also festivals First Story, 203, 309, 318 Fittarik, 66, 145 Five Films for 100 Years, 202, 225, 23, 241–42, 245, 256 folklore [in film], 276–77, 291n165 Fonds d’Aide, 206–7; anticipated changes, 209; methods, 206–9 Fonds de Soutien, 204–5 For A Mouthful of Bread. See Lokmat Aiche Forces Royales Air, 144 Foucault, Michel, 7–8 Fourrage, 66, 69–70 Fourth National Festival of Cinema, 33n7 France, 10–11, 15; as colonial power, 314; cinematic influence, 43–44; co-productions with, 203; on foreign culture, 12; and Moroccan film, 47–48 France Libre Actualités, 45 funding, 5, 52, 105–8; amounts, 172n68; and collectivism, 203–4; and creative control, 72–73; and distribution, 115–17; co-productions, 191;
374
European, 280n13; for distribution, 24; for exhibition, 110; for production, 111; governmental, 13; meritorious, 206–7, 209; overview, 167; private, 108; process, 111–12; publicity, 117; support funds, 107–10 Gance, Abel, 61 gender. See women The Generous Memory. See Mémoire Ochre Ghaba, 65 Ghannam, Omar, 54, 72 globalization, 5, 188–89 Gounejjar, Nourredine, 136 government films, 25–26, 44–45 The Governor General of the Island of Shakerbakerben, 112, 158 Gramsci, Antonio, 7 Le Grand Écran, 28, 242 Le Grand Voyage, 233 Le Groupement de l’Industrie Cinématographique (GIC). See Sevice du Cinema Le Guerre du Petrole n’aura pas Lieu, 121, 318 Hadda, 135, 309, 313, 318 The Hairdresser of the Poor Quarter, 318 Al Hal (Trances), 3, 15, 135, 140–41, 213, 315 Hall, Stuart, 10 The Hammer and the Anvil. See Le Marteau et L’Enclume Happy Ending, 240, 253 Hassan II, 227 Hassan, Ali, 27, 92, 242 L’Histoire d’une rose, 309 history, 2, 7–8, 13–17 Hitchcock, Alfred, 62 Hole in the Wall. See Brêche dans le Mur Horowitz, Richard, 238
Index
Horses of Fortune. See Chevaux du Fortune Hub Fi Dar a Beida. See Un Amour à Casablanca al Hyat Kifah. See Vaincre pour Vivre Ibn Sabeel (Son of the Road), 17, 214, 30, 312, 318 Ici et la, 312 Identités de Femmes, 244 IDHEC, 54, 68, 75, 128, 139, 159, 260 Images Volées (The Stolen Photographs), 241 Imazighen. See Berbers imperialism. See colonialism imports, 9, 12, 19, 24–25, 54; Arabic, 55; and cinema clubs, 61; distribution, 304–5; and international relations, 194; Moroccans working on, 280n7; profits, 118; realism, 280n10; and taxes, 52 In Casablanca Angels Don’t Fly. See A Casablanca les Anges ne Volent Pas Independence Charter (1944), 15 International Festival of Youth-Cinema, 222 international relations, 35n16–17, 193–95, 302 Islam, 14, 58, 119 Italy, funding from, 220 It’s a Wonderful Life, 62 J’ai vu tuer Ben Barka, 317 Jawhara: Fille de Prison, 317 The Journal of a Fool, 153 Une Journé dans la vie de Hajja Leithmath, 245 Journées du Cinéma Africain, 223 Jugement d’une Femme, 309 Kabous. See Cauchemar The Kaftan of Love, 309 Kalima, 127, 245 Kamal, Kamal, 215 Al Kanfoudi, 154–55, 158, 318
Index
Keilaz ma Commune, 68 Kettani, Driss, 136 Khayafa, 243, 309, 313 Khayat, Mostafa, 136 Khemir, Nacer, 222 Khleifi, Michel, 222 The Knights of Victory (Les Cavaliers de la Gloire). See The Drums of Fire Laalioui, Mohamed, 136, 144, 227 laboratories, 82n42, 101, 201, 302 Lady of Cairo, 242 Lagtaâ, Abdelkader, 4, 136, 196, 203–4, 239–43, 253–56, 307 Lahkhmari, Nour-Eddine, 234–35 Lahlou, Latif, 2, 64, 68–75, 111, 140 Lahlou, Nabyl, 3, 92, 97, 112, 136–37, 153–58, 165, 199, 242–43; activism, 278; style, 306 Lailat al Qatl (Night of the Crime), 199 Lalalif, 127 Lalla Chafia, 94, 310–11, 313 Lalla Fatima, 270 Lalla Hobby, 267, 312 Lamsharqi, Naima, 267 Land without Bread, 76 language: Berber, 21, 38n44, 251–52; Arabic, 47–48; daraja, 63, 67; dialects, 63 Legzouli, Hassan, 235–36 le Peron, Serge, 317 Lewis, Jerry, 62 Libération, 31 licensing, 48, 55, 97; for exhibition, 184n246; technicians, 102, 280n7. See also regulations Life is a Struggle. See Vaincre pour Vivre Light. See Nour L’Inconnu, 233 literacy, 19, 23 Lokmat Aiche (For a Mouthful of Bread), 67–68
375
Looking for the Husband of My Wife. See A La Recherche du Mari de ma Femme L’Opinion, 31, 122, 127 Lorca, Garcia, 140 Lotfi, Mohamed, 207, 209, 239 Love in Casablanca. See Un Amour à Casablanca Lumière. See Nour Lyautey, Maréchal, 62 Maanouni, Ahmed, 3, 136, 140 The Maghrebian Movies, 27 Maghreb Information, 121, 127 The Mailman. See La Facteur Malle, Louis, 61 Le Marchand de Souvenirs (The Merchant of Memories), 235–36 Marock, 196, 208, 215–17, 243, 272– 77, 307, 313 Marrakchi, Laila, 4, 196, 208, 215, 272–76, 307 Marriage without Fulfillment. See Noces en Sursis Le Marteau et L’Enclume (The Hammer and the Anvil), 30, 203, 256, 307, 318 Martin, Dean, 62 The Mask, 223 medicine, 17 Mektoub, 229, 243, 270 Memoire en detention (Memory in Detention), 148, 317 Mémoire Ochre (The Generous Memory), 237 Memory in Detention. See Memoire en Detention The Merchant of Memories. See Le Marchand de Souvenirs Mesnaoui, Ahmed, 64–65, 70–72, 136, 145, 242 Metropolis, 61 Meziane, Mohamed, 227, 236–38 Miftah, Mohamed, 92 migration. See emigration Mille et Une Mains, 96, 140, 316, 318
376
Index
Mille Mois (A Thousand Months), 243, 317 Ministry of Communication, 81n11, 192, 202, 208–9 Une Minute du Silence en Moins, 229 Mirage, 15, 315, 318 modernity, 4, 8, 11, 14, 313–14 Mohamed V, 15–17, 315 monopolies, State, 57–58 Moroccan aesthetic, 3, 9; criticism,127– 29; definition of, 90–91 Moroccan cinema: accessibility, 276; change, 18, 138; criticism of, 187; current system, 320; demographics, 290n135; elitist, 12; emigrants, 188, 225, 227–28; experimentation, 301–2; functions, 81n2, 89–90, 188–89; future, 4, 319–32; history, 78, 165–66; identity, 8–10, 62–63, 79–80, 307–8; improvement, 302– 3; international relations, 35n16–17; methods of support, 192, 195; national image, 190; politics, 308; and press, 31; problems, 3; public perception of, 32n1; radical, 124; recommendations, 188–91; representations of Morocco, 301; themes, 7–8, 23; and TV, 27. See also films, Moroccan aesthetic The Moroccan Sahara Through the Centuries. See Le Sahara Marocain a Traverse les Siècles Moroccanization, 53–54, 61, 99, 115 Morocco: and France, 10–11; as developing country, 11, 123–24; cinematic representation, 4, 198– 200; identity, 5, 11, 34n12, 188–90; independence, 5 La Mosquee de Timnel (The Timnel Mosque: Birthplace of Almohades), 68–69 Le Mouchoir Bleu (The Blue Handkerchief), 240
Moufti, Hassan, 136 Mrini, Driss, 136 Naciri, Said, 196, 243 Al Naoura, 312, 318 National Federation of Cinema Clubs, 123 nationalism, 10 Natural Born Killers, 223 Né Sans Skis aux Pieds (Born Without Skis on His Feet), 234 Nejjar, Narjiss, 217 newspapers. See criticism; press newsreels. See Actualites Marocaines Night of the Crime. See Lailat al Qatl Nightmare. See Cauchemar Noah. See Noé Noces en Sursis (Marriage without Fulfillment), 232 Noé (Noah), 238 Notre Amie l’Ecole (1956), 65–66 Nour / Lumiére (Light), 239 Noury, Hakim, 136, 196, 203, 239–43, 256–60, 294n191, 307 La Nuit du Crime, 309 Nuits Andalouses, 68 October, 61 Office de Formation Professionelle et de Promotion du Travail (OFPPT), 220 Omnium Nord Africain, 29 On the Roof. See Sur la Terrasse Organization Marocaine des Droits de L’Homme (OMDH), 216 Osfour, Mohamed, 65 The Other Side of the River. See De L’Autre Côte du Fleuve Al Oued, 237 Pappas, Irene, 140 Paton, Alan, 140 patriarchy, 14. See also women pessimism, 4, 318–20 piracy, 25, 201, 215, 303
Index
Les Pierres Bleues du Desert (The Blue Stone of the Sahara), 229–30 La Plage des Enfants Perdus (The Beach of Lost Children), 18, 30, 148, 243, 307, 310–11, 318 Plan Quinquennal, 53, 97–98, 109 pornography, 175n129 La Porte Close, 254 Une Porte du Ciel. See Door to the Sky Poupées de Roseau (Straw Dolls, Arayiss Min Kasab), 148–52, 244– 45, 253, 309, 318 poverty, 17, 311, 321, 316–19 The Prayer of the Absent. See La Priere de l’Absent Première Recontre du Court Métrage Franco-Marocain, 223 press, 31–32, 125–27. See also criticism La Priere de l’Absent (The Prayer of the Absent), 30, 312, 318 profitability, 26–28, 72–73, 78–79, 108; and support funds, 117–18; as nongoal, 278, 280n11, 298n238; lack of, 304–5. See also funding propaganda, 14, 53, 66, 223 prostitution, 217 Pulp Fiction, 223 quality, 45, 73, 112; filmmaker responsibility for, 138, 283n23; importance, 190; measures, 206, 305–6; technical, 92–93, 101–2, 106 Quand le soleil fait tomber les moineaux, 235 Quand Mûrissent les Dattes, 72, 132 Rabat Festival, 223–24 Rabi, 253 Rachid, Amina, 267 racism, 282n18 radio, 219, 301–2, 305 Radio Television Marocaine (RTM), 25–29, 191–92 Ramdani, Abdelaziz, 64, 68, 72, 136
377
rationing, 315 R’chich, Amdelmajid, 75, 108, 136, 215, 317 realism, 322n3 A La Recherche du Mari de ma Femme (Looking for the Husband of My Wife), 4, 27, 30, 116, 214, 245, 260– 67, 209, 218 Recontres Cinématographiques de Khouribga, 130 Recontres Cinématographiques de Tétouan, 223 Le Regard, 234 Reggab, Mohamed, 105–6, 120, 137, 140 Reggab-Films, 108 Region Cable, 29–30 regulation, 11, 55, 97–99, 113, 187; Sustainment Fund, 307. See also Centre Cinématographique Marocaine; licensing Renoir, Jean, 62 La Révolution du Doute, 233 Rhesus, the Blood of the Other, 313 Riffians. See Berbers R’mili, Abdellah, 54, 199 La Ruse des Femmes (Women’s Wiles), 245 Saa’aee. See La Facteur Le Sahara Marocain a Traverse les Siècles (The Moroccan Sahara Through the Centuries), 146–47 Saïdi, Hassan, 223 Sail, Nourredine, 27–28, 96, 121, 127, 202, 267, 280n13 Sans Paroles/Bidoun Kalam (Without Words), 256 Saouda, Ben Said, 136 satellite TV, 24–25, 215, 219, 305. See also television Sayed, Daoud Oulad, 226–27, 236–37, 242–43 Scola, Ettore, 222
378
Index
Second National Festival of Moroccan Cinema, 134–35 Seddikki, Tayeb, 67, 136–37, 154–55 Sefrioui, Najib, 136 Seif, Salah Abou, 222 Sekkat, Mohamed, 75, 108 La Servante, 256 Service du Cinéma (SDC), 45–47, 56 Shams, 309 She is Diabetic, Hypertensive, and Refuses to Die. See Elle est diabetique, hypertendue et elle refuse de crever She is Diabetic, Hypertensive, and Still Refuses to Die. See Elle est diabetique, hypertendue et elle toujours refuse de crever Si Moh Pas de Chance, 312, 318 Sigma 3, 75, 78, 108 Silence Seller. See Vendeur de Silence Silhouettes aux Fils d’Or (Silhouettes of Gold Threads), 70–71 Un Simple Fait Divers, 256, 317 Smihi, Moumen, 108, 139–40, 143, 227, 242–43, 314, 317 Snoussi, Ahmed, 217 Société de Banques et de Crédit (SBC), 111–12 Soleil de Printemps (Spring Sun/Chams Rabi’i), 2, 71–72, 74, 121, 132, 311, 318 Son of the Road. See Ibn Sabeel Souissi Studios, 48 The Soul that Brays. See L’âme Qui Brait Spartacus, 62 Spring Sun. See Soleil du Printemps The Stolen Childhood. See L’Enfance Volée The Stolen Photographs. See Images Volées styles, 128, 13, 165–66, 306–8; auteur cinema, 94–96, 140; entertainment, 93–94; realistic, 319–20; Third Cinema, 96–97 Support Fund, 104, 113, 203 Sur la Terrasse (On the Roof), 239, 245
Suspicion, 61 Sustainment Fund, 207, 304 Symphonie Marocain, 215 Syndicat des Professionels du Theatre, 320 Tabet or not Tabet, 158, 317 Tachelhit. See Berbers, languages Tamazight. See Berbers, languages Tarfaya, 237 Tarifit. See Berbers, languages taxation, 192; administration, 303; corruption, 55, 287n83; on distributors, 200–1, 210–11; on tickets, 51–56, 103–5; use of monies, 109, 206 Tazi, Mohamed Abderrahman, 4, 17, 28– 30, 54, 64, 75, 239–41, 260–68, 306 technology, 5–6, 11, 21, 63–64 television, 6, 19, 22–23, 174n106, 189– 92, 209, 215, 219, 301–2, 305; films, 26–31, 305–6 Television Without Frontiers, 13 Tenja, 235 Terzeiff, Laurent, 140 Thabet, Fawzi, 239 Thief of Dreams. See Voleur de Rêves Third Cinema, 3, 32, 73, 7, 128, 140, 165–66; censorship, 119; Moroccan, 96 A Thousand Months. See Mille Mois The Timnel Mosque. See La Mosquee de Timnel Titre Provisoire, 3, 159, 163–64 tradition, 4, 8, 313–14; representations of, 182n217. See also folklore training, 220, 280n5, 283n27; for film crews, 102–3; technical, 102–3, 170n1, 189, 278, 303 Trances. See Al Hal Le Trésor Infernal, 65 Tresses, 148, 309 unemployment, 17–18, 7, 232 The Unfortunate Son. See Le Fils Maudit
Index
Union des Cineastes Maghrebins, 282n15 Union Maghrébine de Fédérations de Ciné-Clubs (UMFCC), 124 urban migration, 17, 66, 311 Vaincre pour Vivre (al Hyat Kifah/Life is a Struggle), 2, 71–73, 78, 311 Varda, Agnes, 222 Variety, 199 Vendeur de Silence (Silence Seller), 230–31 venues, 81n20, 113–15, 12, 213; classification, 56; equipment, 115; history, 167; multiplex, 213; regulations, 56–57; renovations, 201, 205, 212; urban, 63. See also caravans, cinema clubs La vida perra de Juanita Narboni (The Dog’s Life of Juanita Narboni), 245 video, 21–25, 189–92, 215 Voleur de Rêves (Thief of Dreams), 256 Waiting for Passolini. See En Attendant Passolini Al Warta, 66, 313, 318 Wayne, John, 62
379
The Wedding of the Others, 203–4 We Will Film Tomorrow. See Demain on Tourne Wechma (Traces), 71, 75–7, 108, 311, 318 women, 4, 8, 244, 308–9, 322n6; and television, 23–24; Cheikhat, 183n233; directors, 136, 244; in film, 76–77, 143, 217, 250, 28n225, 309–10, 314 Women’s Wiles. See La Ruse des Femmes Yachfine, Ahmed, 3, 135–36, 140–143, 244 Yacine, Abdel Salam, 119 Yarit, 203, 309 Yasmine et les Hommes, 254 The Years of Exile. See Les Années de l’Exil “Years of Lead,” 17, 217, 208, 217 Les Yeux Secs, 217, 309 Youssef, Ben. See Mohamed V Zawaya, 28, 242 Zeft, 311–32 Ziani, Mohamed, 64, 136
