Moroccan director Asmae El Moudir won the Official Competition of the Sydney Film Festival for The Mother Of All Lies.
Conceived as a drama-documentary, the film explores the director’s family history and the lies told around the devastation and violence of the 1981 riots in Casablanca. Without using archival images or photographs, she meticulously recreates from memory the apartment her family occupied and the old quarter of Casablanca – but in miniature, with little puppet figures representing members of her family.
“By juxtaposing evidence from public documents and private family memories,” as jury chair Anurag Kashyap said afterwards, “the film reconstructs the history of the state, the family and the individual, at three distinct levels.”
In her previous film, Postcard, Mrs El Moudir also dealt with the issue of family memory. From a postcard representing the village which her mother left when she was a child, the director retraces the history of the village, her family and the daily life of the inhabitants.
Co-produced by Morocco, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, The Mother Of All Lies premiered at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival in the Un Certain Regard category.
Sources: Broadcast Pro, Sydney Film Festival, Film Documentaire
