The class of 2013 was the first to explore writing a feature-length film project.
The sessions were hosted mainly in Ouarzazate (Morocco) by the Ouarzazate Film Commission and in Marrakech (Morocco) by the Fondation du Festival International du Film de Marrakech, in partnership with the Institut Français de Marrakech.
When an entire people allows a power to silence them, its citizens become zombies.
Zak and Hind have been inseparable since childhood. In Agadir, on the Moroccan Atlantic coast, their life is sweet and their adolescence carefree. But when Hind becomes pregnant with a vacation sweetheart, they will have to break through the bubble in which they lived until then and cross a country of which they do not know all the facets.
Mehdi returns from the United States. His whole family is gathered to wait for him at the airport. They are far from discreet. His father, who has nothing to envy of the Taliban, argues with his older brother, who exposes his tattoo in his face. The mother, newly divorced, pays little attention to the fight since it has already happened and will eventually happen again. As for Osama, the younger brother, he tries to look away from the shame people throw at him with humor and sarcasm. When Mehdi finally comes home, he must navigate two worlds, his mother's house, a modern universe where things seem open but only in appearance. And his father's neighborhood which he likes to describe as Raqqa, the capital of fundamentalism. When his father pushes him to get married, Mehdi will reconnect with Kate, an American ex-girlfriend of his. To marry her, he will bring her back to Morocco and try to get the family to accept his relationship. But Kate is a free spirit, bi-polar and has stopped taking her medication. She also converted to shiâa. The two families will eventually oppose the relationship and, strangely, come together to destroy it.
Damascus, March 2011. The start of the civil war. Nahla is a 25-year-old young woman, torn between her desire for freedom and the hope of leaving the country thanks to an arranged marriage with Samir, a Syrian expatriate in the United States. But Samir prefers his younger sister Myriam, who is more docile. Nahla then gets closer to her new neighbor, Madame Jiji, who has just arrived in the building to open a brothel.
About a fortnight ago, a makeshift boat, carrying 15 illegal immigrants from Algiers, trying to reach the Spanish coast at night, was caught in a storm and disappeared. Two bodies were found dead and only one survived, HAMID, spotted and boarded by the Spanish coast guard. He is back in Algeria after Spanish authorities handed him over to Algerian police. The others missing are still being sought, but without any hope of finding them alive after 15 days of the sinking. It's time to mourn.Hamid returned home in critical condition. Everyone takes him for depressed, a traitor, a madman, a deaf-mute... In any case, this shipwreck caused him a psychological shock. He tries to overcome his very affected psychological state in the face of pressure from the families of the missing, the police, his family and the social life he was preparing to leave. This is the return to point zero. Hamid is locked in a labyrinth.
After the Tunisian revolution of 2011, 4 railway workers were assigned to line No. 1. They nicknamed it “The Normal Way” because it was the first railway in the country and the only one built according to international standards. It is also the most neglected on the network, and nothing ever goes as planned. Son and grandson of a railway worker, AHMED (34) decided late in life to join the SNCFT. With his hands in the machine, with the means at hand, he learned his trade on the job alongside the train drivers.FITATI (39 years old), one of them, has been documenting for years all the technical failures of the railway network and trains, even if it means attracting the wrath of his superiors, who always refuse him tenure, and making his wife despair of ever having a “normal” life. Crossing the green landscapes of the North, the old locomotive must without ceases to be patched up. At his command, the drivers overcome fear each in their own way. Every day, AHMED becomes a little more aware of the precariousness of the conditions in which he must hold his position. Night trains, delays, stations without heating even in winter, not to mention the deadly accidents that no driver can avoid: although the pride of the corporation remains, the world of the Voie Normale railway workers is rock'n roll to say the least. Not far away, Najib the station manager (45), silently adapting to his celibacy, watches time pass by tirelessly directing the trains. Seeming to be the only one to refuse fate, FITATI persists in making his evidence public and drawing the attention of the media to the risks faced by users and railway workers. Fitati is transferred to ticket sales. When two serious train accidents occur, suddenly stirring public opinion, TV shows now relay his denunciations. But too late: FITATi is fired. A cross-portrait of Tunisian railway workers, La Voie Normale is a poetic and social road movie about work as a metaphor for a changing society.
Danièle Suissa, originally from Casablanca, was deeply influenced by her childhood in Morocco, where the magic of the environment and the vibrant colors, faces,sounds, and music shaped her creative path. After studying at Marymount Paris and New York, she graduated from the National Conservatory of Dramatic Art in Paris. She began her career as a stage manager at the Theatre du Palais Royal and went on to assist renowned directors in Europe and the United States. Danièle collaborated with Anaïs Nin on three screenplays and adapted her novel "Une Espionne Dans La Maison De L'amour" with Jeanne Moreau. In Montreal, she directed numerous plays in both English and French and co-produced films in Canada and France. She also directed commercials and taught acting, directing, and production at various institutions. Danièle later moved to Jordan and taught at the Red Sea Institute of Cinematic Art before returning to Morocco.
After studying cinema at the University of Paris I, Alain Layrac enjoyed success with the creation of the series "Une famille formidable" in collaboration with Danièle Thompson. In 1997, he wrote the screenplay for the film "Héroïnes", directed by Gérard Krawczyk, which was a TV hit despite failing in theaters. His original screenplay "Mauvaises Fréquentations" was directed by Jean-Pierre Améris in 1999, marking the debut of Lou Doillon and earning a César nomination for Robinson Stévenin. In 2001, his original screenplay "Barnie et ses petites contrariétés" was adapted by Bruno Chiche, starring Nathalie Baye and Fabrice Luchini. In 2005, he again wrote the original screenplay for the film "Avant qu'il ne soit trop tard", directed by Laurent Dussaux. In 2017, he published "Atelier d'écriture" and adapted his essay for the cinema with "Le Cours de la vie" in 2023, directed by Frédéric Sojcher and starring Agnès Jaoui and Jonathan Zaccaï.
Abdelkrim Bahloul was born in Algeria. After studying at the Conservatoire National d'Alger (1968-1671), he moved to France, where he obtained a master's degree in modern literature (Université de Paris III) and entered the Idhec to study cinema (1972-1975). He worked as a camera operator at Antenne 2 and TF1 from 1976 to 1980, then as an assistant director at TF1 from 1980 to 1983. He made two short films, La Cellule in 1975 and La Cible in 1978, then directed his first film after leaving television, Le Thé à la menthe in 1984. In 1991, Un vampire au paradis won awards at several festivals - Chamrousse Humor Film Festival, Paris International Festival for Children and Youth (FIFEJ). In 1998, his third feature, Les Sœurs Hamlet, made in 1997/98, won the Grand Prix at the Festival International du Cinéma Méditerranéen de Valence and the Grand Prix at the Festival Vues d'Afrique de Montréal. La Nuit du destin, for which Abdelkrim Bahloul had already won the Best Director and Best Film awards at the All Africa Films Awards in Johannesburg, was released in May 1999.
Born in 1963 in Aderj, Morocco, Hassan Legzoulihas lived in Lille, France, since the 1980s. After studying mathematics, heturned to cinema. In 1994, he graduated as a director from INSAS, the film school in Brussels, Belgium. In 1990, he directed his first short film, Ailleurs et ici, followed by four others, Coup de gigot (1991), Le Marchand de souvenirs (1992), Là- bas si j'y suis (1993) and L'Ère du soupçon (1994).
Ridha Béhi, a sociologist by training, obtained his doctorate in 1977 with a thesis on Tunisian cinema. He began his career writing scripts for Tunisian television, and made his first short film in 1967. His feature films "Soleil des hyènes" (1977) and "Les Anges" (1984) were selected for the Directors' Fortnight at Cannes. He won the International Critics' Prize at the Carthage Film Festival with "Les hirondelles ne meurent pas à Jérusalem" (1994). His film "The Magic Box" (2002) was presented at the Venice Film Festival. In 2011, he directed "Always Brando", which was selected for the Toronto International Film Festival. Ridha Béhi has also directed documentaries and teaches at the Ecole supérieure de l'audiovisuel et du cinéma in Gammarth.
Louis Gardel is a French novelist. He is a member of the Conseil supérieur de la langue française, collection director at Seuil, member of the Prix Renaudot jury and publisher. A man of numerous skills, Louis Gardel has distinguished himself as a novelist with 'L'Été fracassé' in 1973, 'Fort Saganne' in 1980, which won the Grand Prix de l'Académie française, and as a screenwriter with Régis Wargnier's 'Indochine' and 'Est-Ouest' and Alain Corneau's 'Nocturne Indien'. Louis Gardel is the author of the magnificent 'La Baie d'Alger', published in 2007, which recounts his memories of childhood and adolescence in Algeria.
Faouzi Bensaidi trained as an actor at the Institut d'art dramatique et d'animation culturelle in Rabat, then at the Conservatoire national supérieur d'art dramatique in Paris in 1995. After directing several plays, he turned to short films in 1997, most notably La Falaise, which won 23 festival awards. He co-wrote the screenplay for André Téchiné's Loin in 1999, then signed his first feature Mille mois in 2003.
His film Volubilis was selected in the Venice Days section at the 2017 Venice Film Festival.
Yves Ulmann was born and raised in Paris. After studying literature and business school, and a spell in advertising, he began reading screenplays, first for a producer, Philippe Carcassonne, then for a chairman of the Commission d'Avance sur recettes. His initiation continued with Claude Sautet, when he collaborated with Jacques Fieschi on the writing of his last two films, Un cœur en hiver and Nelly & M. Arnaud. He subsequently worked on screenplays as co-writer or consultant with Florent-Emilio Siri, Laetitia Masson, Brigitte Rouan, Diane Kurys, Louis-Do de Lencquesaing, Jérôme Bonnell and Serge Bromberg...
In parallel, he practices systemic and strategic brief therapy according to the Palo Alto school.
