The class of 2015 was hosted in Algiers, Algeria, in November 2014, by the Agence Algérienne de rayonnement du Cinéma-AARC, in Beirut (Lebanon), in March 2015, on the occasion of the Beirut Cinema Days, by the Fondation Liban Cinéma, in Oran (Algeria), in June 2015, by the Agence Algérienne de rayonnement du Cinéma-AARC, on the occasion of the Festival du Film d'Oran (Oran's Film Festival), and in Paris (France) by the SACD.
In the form of a musical comedy, the author shines the spotlight on the Egyptian revolution experienced by young people from disadvantaged neighborhoods. Indeed, “the pickpockets” and the “attackers”, two gangs of thieves led respectively by Sayed Bakr and Nasr El Dakhakhny. Before the revolution, these two bands engaged in merciless war. They decided during the revolution to commit to social justice, by becoming an “ambulance” in Tahrir Square.
Through the “Morning show” of a major Moroccan radio station, the public discovers the adventure experienced by Jemal which the radio host transforms into a comedy for his listeners: Growing up in Essaouira, Jemal left for the USA after winning the Green Card lottery. His dream seemed to come true in the Nevada desert where he had been working for two weeks. But, during a hold-up, he was arrested by the FBI. His only crime was his resemblance to Abu Qataba, a terrorist actively sought after the September 11 attacks. After a year in prison, the truth finally triumphed, the real Abu Qataba was arrested, and Jemal was released.
Sara, a thirty-year-old Frenchwoman, is a metro driver and leads a monotonous and solitary life until one day she collides with an illegal Moroccan woman. She then decides to go to Morocco in search of the stranger's family to contribute to her repatriation to her family. Then begins a winding, unpredictable journey, full of detours and encounters through an unknown country. A journey towards the other. Towards herself...
Reef, 27, Lebanese, speaks four languages and works as an interpreter in Beirut. However, she hates this city and even more, this country, where no glimmer of hope appears. Trying in vain to leave her country, Reef decides to find a husband of foreign nationality to finally obtain the passport that will allow her to live in one of the countries she covets so much.
Algerian, son of a diplomat, Sofiane has always led an easy life abroad. While studying in France, while hoping for a great career as a diplomat, he is the victim of an administrative decision and becomes undocumented. In the hope of regularizing his situation as quickly as possible, he decides to work temporarily for Muslim funeral directors. But becoming an ambassador for the dead will prove to be the experience of a lifetime...
This is the story of Réza, an 11-year-old boy who lives in a small mountainous village in Morocco. He dreams of having a bicycle. To achieve his goal, he collects worn-out bicycle parts or buys accessories with money won in football. When Coca Cola announced a competition in which the prize would be a bicycle, he put aside his plan to build his own bicycle and began looking for the winning capsule.
Tunisia, summer 2011. A family enjoying happy days suddenly finds their lives turned upside down after an ambush in the south of the country. Then follows a real descent into hell where the past suddenly resurfaces.
Maria and Veronica, Spanish from two different generations living in France, share a hospital room. A vital and generational crossroads of exchange that will transform the way in which everyone experiences life. Against all expectations, the young woman dies, and as no one comes to claim her body, Maria decides to take her ashes to Spain, in search of her family. There, she meets a very special man, a biker from Eastern Europe, who manages to awaken in her a long-hidden sensual desire and a desire to live that she seems to have inherited from Verónica.
A married couple, each of a different citizenship, has just lost their child. To be able to remove the body of their son from the hospital and to save the remains of their marriage troubled by this terrible death, the couple undertakes a journey to find the official papers proving the Lebanese nationality of the child in order to be able to bury him decently.
Start of summer. Start of vacation. Young people are bored. The arrival of a mysterious stranger in their village will turn their daily lives upside down. This stranger has a secret. The story, told by the adolescents, varies depending on the speaker, memories, lies, assumed hopes and buried desires. Eventually, the unknown disappears. Things changed over the course of a summer. The end of childhood.
Aged 17, Goksin is a teenager struggling to find his place in the world and to be able to make his own decisions. The Punishment is the tragedy he suffers due to his dysfunctional family environment.
Algeria, 1990s. Islamist terrorism is at its peak. Leaving the north, where death claims dozens of innocent victims every day, two childhood friends, LOTFI and S., venture into the desert in pursuit of Abou Leila, a dangerous terrorist who is actively sought.
Marcel Beaulieu is a screenwriter born in 1952 in Canada. He began his career in 1978 writing radio plays for Radio Canada1. Working in Quebec, France and Europe, he has collaborated on over eighty works, with Léa Pool, Francis Leclerc, Yves Simoneau, Michel Langlois and others. In 1997, he founded a screenplay teaching program at the Institut national de l'image et du son (INIS) in Montreal. He is best known for Gérard Corbiau's Farinelli (nominated for an Oscar in 1995 for Best Foreign Film and winner of the Golden Globe for Foreign Film).
Magali Negroni holds a DEA from the University of Paris 8. Her research focused on Saül Bass. She began her career as an assistant director and went on to become a director, working on short films, commercials and documentaries that have been selected for competition in Berlin, New York and at the César awards.
Currently, she works as a scriptwriter and consultant mainly in the Middle East and Maghreb countries, as well as being a reader for Cinémas du Monde. In collaboration with Virginie Legeay, she co-wrote and produced the following films: "Les Jours d'avant" by Karim Moussaoui, "Hédi" by Mohamed Ben Attia, both of which won prizes in Berlin, and "The Translator" by Rana Kazkaz, which won the Prix Cinéfondation and was acquired by Arte.
Romain Compingt, who graduated from the Conservatoire européen d'écriture audiovisuelle (CEEA) in 2004, co-wrote his first contracts with Alain Layrac, including an aborted film project for Isabelle Adjani. His first work brought to the screen was Régis Roinsard's "Populaire", released in November 2012, which received five 2013 César nominations, including Best First Film. He then co-wrote and was artistic collaborator on "Divines" with director Houda Benyamina, which won several awards, including the 2016 Caméra d'or and the 2017 César for Best First Film.
As co-writer and assistant director, he won Best Short Film at the Los Angeles Screamfest for Holy Fatma's "Please Love Me Forever". Since 2014, he has been a lecturer at the Conservatoire européen d'écriture audiovisuelle and a member of Groupe Ouest's team of consulting screenwriters since 2015. In 2020, he starred in Régis Roinsard's film "Les Traducteurs", and in 2021, he signed the script and dialogues for "En attendant Bojangles", adapted from Olivier Bourdeaut's novel, for Régis Roinsard's third film. He is also a consultant on several projects, including Emmanuelle Bercot's "La Fille de Brest" and Mélanie Auffret's "Les petites victoires", and was dramaturge for Philippe Lafeuille's contemporary dance show "Tutu".
Born and raised in Calabria, he later moved to Rome where he graduated in philosophy with a thesis on cinema. He has collaborated with Gianni Amelio, Bernardo Bertolucci and Giuseppe Bertolucci.
Rafele was also among the screenwriters of The Octopus 8 - The Scandal, The Octopus 9 - The Pact and The Octopus 10; he went on to screenplay other TV series, such as The Voice of Blood, The Young Mussolini, Zodiac and Mom by Chance. In 2009 he published his first novel, La forma della paura, written with Giancarlo De Cataldo and published by Stile Libero (Einaudi).
Antoine Waked studied audiovisual arts at the Lebanese Academy of Fine Arts (ALBA). He has directed three short films: Le Matelas (2004), Giallo (2005) and the animated film The Big Fall (2005), which was selected for film festivals in Paris, Lyon, Sydney, Rome, Morocco and Egypt. Since 2005, he has taught writing and directing at ALBA and currently works as a scriptwriter and development manager at Abbout Productions and Shortcut Films. With Badih Massaad, he co-directed the documentary Un Certain Nasser (2017), a portrait of pioneering Lebanese filmmaker Georges Nasser. Antoine is also the co-founder and artistic director of Maskoon Fantastic Film Festival, the first fantastic film festival in the Middle East, which held its first edition in September 2016.
