The 16th Festival international du film oriental de Genève (Fifog) was held from June 21st to 27th. “Hope” was this year’s catchword, with the objective of promoting film, diversity and intercultural dialogue in the world through 50 films from 20 different countries.
“Papicha” by Franco-Algerian director Mounia Meddour won the competition’s most prestigious award: the Golden Fifog for, in the words of the jury, “her mastery of screenplay and interpretation of actresses”. In 2020 the film had already received the César for Best First Film and its principal actress, Lyna Khoudri, the César for Best New Actress.
“Papicha is about Nedjma, an 18-year-old student living on a university campus in Algiers in the mid-1990’s, in the middle of the civil war. Dreaming of becoming a fashion designer, she refuses to be fatalistic and decides to fight for her freedom by organizing a fashion show, defying all prohibitions.”
In a 2019 interview the director explained the story is based on real, semi-autobiographical events:
“I was a journalism student in Algiers in the 1990’s. I had a little programme on Algerian radio and I lived in a university campus similar to the one shown in the film. We were five students per room and we shared a lot of time together. The campus was a kind of microcosm of Algerian society, with students, room-mates helping each other, their resourcefulness, complicity, friendship, but also with the enormous daily difficulties and mounting danger. I wanted to recreate on film this little cocoon in opposition to the outside world.”
“Papicha”, a young woman, flirtatious and free
Set in the midst of the civil war, the heroine’s story revolves around the haik – the traditional garment worn by Algerian women, but also a symbol of national resistance against French colonial rule. Mounia Meddour tells us: “At that time women hid the fighters’ weapons under this garment and its use was interesting symbolically because it showed that women have always resisted alongside men, fighting colonialism or terrorism.” Her first feature film, “Papicha” is a tribute to these women’s struggles in Algeria and to their resistance.
For more information on the audiovisual news in Algeria, click here.
Sources: elwatan.com, arabnews.fr, jeuneafrique.com, cnc.fr, fichesducinema.com
