Tunisia | Feature Films | 1990 - 1999

The country has changed a lot in the absence of the father Wahid Haydar and the daughter Sofia, returning to Tunisia after a long stay in West Africa and after being separated from her French mother for ten years, the young Soufia arrives in Tunis heavily steeped in her African heritage, feeling trapped, now claims her way back to her mother.

Tunis, winter of 1954, the events that follow bring together two intellectuals Brahim and François, they arrive from France and find themselves in the same train that will lead them to phosphate plants in Redeyef, south of Tunisia.

A close knit group of young men get in a heated squabble in which one of them gets fatally injured. Panicked, these 20 year olds fear for their friendship and promise to stay silent. They then meet Pierrot and Madonna, an out of the ordinary couple who met and got married as a result of a prank masterminded by the group of young men. The encounter with the couple is heartwarming and exudes a message of love and hope.

Amina a married Muslim woman living in Tunis with her two daughters. Even though she is allowed certain freedoms as a Muslim woman this is curtailed when she meets her old friend from school Aida.

The 27 years old Nozha comes home with a sense of failure and despair following a long absence after marrying against her family's will.

In Tunis, the chance encounter between Nidal, a teenager who begs to support his family, and Amine, a famous painter in his forties who faces a crisis of creation.

"Honey and Ashes" tells the stories of three women from contemporary North Africa. Caught between tradition and modernity, they seek success in their lives and in their relationships with men. Although their age and social backgrounds differ, their paths cross, bringing to light the multiple obstacles which society has placed in their way.

Summer, 1967. La Goulette, the touristic beach of Tunisia, is the site where three nice seventeen-year-old girls live: Gigi, Sicilian and Catholic; Meriem, Tunisian and Arab; Tina, French and Jewish. They would like to have their first sexual experience during that summer, challenging their families. Their fathers, Youssef, Jojo and Giuseppe, are old friends and their friendship will be in crisis because of the girls, while Hadj, an old rich Arab, would like to marry Meriem.

A semi-autobiographical story, based on the life of director, in which a young boy is left home alone to watch over the family residence when his impoverished family emigrates to France. The boy discovers the joy of movies at a local cinema and begins to try and re-enact them.

Follows the last years of Tunisian singer Habiba M'sikar's life between 1927 and 1930 when she was at the peak of her glory and performed in the "soirées" of Tunis.

As she grows up, Alia (the daughter of housemaid Khedija) learns the secrets of the peaceful palace where she and her mother live.

Tunisia, early thirties, the young and plump Bajou, lives modestly with his parents. One day after a flood, his father suddenly disappears. Thanks to his uncle and his cousin Marcel, he moves with his mother Oumi to work for the wealthy landowner Mr. Scali, a talkative and boastful man.

Locked in a room until the release of her fiance from prison, a young woman escapes with the help of his brother.

In Tunis, Fethi, Brando and her boyfriend Bannour, work in Madame Rita's Italian pastry. They only have to drag girls to take them, in a convertible, take a ride on the side of the Wave. Souad and her cousin Latifa, charming, clumsy and reserved will do their job. Escapes, fugues, love, disappointment, flight, rape, kidnapping and to save honor and morals, the passage before the Mayor.

Roufa, a young prostitute (Bezness) befriends a French photographer sent to do an expose.

The story of an old man who is losing his grip on reality, fighting to keep his memory in spite of the fast moving society in which he lives.

This second feature in Nacer Khemir's "Desert Trilogy". The story revolves around Hassan, who is studying Arabic calligraphy from a grand master. Coming across a fragment of manuscript, Hassan goes in search of the missing pieces, believing that once he finds them, he will learn the secrets of love. With the help of Zin, a lovers' go-between, he meets the beautiful Aziz, Princess of Samarkand. After encountering wars, a battle between false prophets and an ancient curse, he learns that an entire lifetime would not suffice for him to learn the many dimensions of love.

Noura struggles to reconcile two worlds, Muslim women and men, while also dealing with his own sexuality.

A city in the middle of the desert is dying. Women are doubly veiled. Sarah is ambitious and impatient, and wants to leave this desert where she is held against her will.