Archive of films Sleeping Child / L' enfant endormi

Morocco / Belgium
2004, 95 min

Section: Worried About Work
Year: 2005

Synopsis

What becomes of rural Moroccan women whose husbands, fathers and sons fall prey to the prospect of economic opportunity elsewhere? This beautifully-shot feature debut presents a fascinating perspective on their plight. The remote mud-and-stone village where the story unfolds lacks viable employment as well as other facilities of modern living, including telephones and computers. When the community’s able-bodied men leave for Spain as clandestine labour, their lonely women face a daily struggle. They must follow tradition to maintain modesty and the family’s honour even though they work the fields, mind livestock, and care for the elderly and their children. Rebellious Halimi refuses to be downcast by her husband’s absence or the offspring he creates in his rare periods at home. Meanwhile, her friend Zeinab, a pregnant new bride, allows her mother-in-law to invoke the folk ritual of the “sleeping child,” designed to delay a baby’s birth until the father returns.

About the director

Yasmine Kassari (b. 1972, Morocco) is a director, screenwriter and producer. She studied cinema at INSAS in Brussels where she graduated in 1997. In the same year she started the screenplay for the feature film The Sleeping Child. The scenario won top prize in a Paris screenwriting competition in 2003. Before making her feature debut with, she directed two shorts, Chiens errants (1995) and Linda and Nadia (2000), and the documentary Quand les hommes pleurent (2002). Since making its debut at the Venice film festival, The Sleeping Child captured the Best Director Prize and the Cinematography Prize at the Mar del Plata Festival, the Audience Award at Film Francophone de Namur, and acting kudos for Rachida Brakni and Mounia Osfour in Angers, France and Koszalin, Poland.

Contacts

Les Films de la Dreve
7, Ruelle de France, 4651, Battice
Belgium
Tel: +32 87 78 35 95
Fax: +32 87 30 02 74
E-mail: [email protected]

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About the film

Color, 35 mm

Section:	Worried About Work

Director:	Yasmine Kassari
Screenplay:	Yasmine Kassari
Dir. of Photography:	Yorgos Arvanitis
Music:	Armand Amar, Koussan Achod
Editor:	Susana Rossberg
Producer:	Jean-Jacques Andrien
Production:	Les Films de la Drève, koprodukce/coproduction: Les coquelicots de l´oriental
Cast:	Mounia Osfour, Rachida Brakni, Nermine Elhaggar, Fatna Abdessamie
Contact:	Les Films de la Dreve

www:	www.lenfantendormi.be