"These 10 Movies Will Help You Understand Morocco" by Jamal Bahmad
The relationship between cinema and Morocco is an old and interesting one. Even before the Lumière brothers released the world’s first ever film in Paris on 28 December 1895, the French pioneers had realized that they needed new and exotic “scenes and types” to keep attracting people to the cinemas. They sent their agents around the world to find and shoot such exotic people and landscapes. Morocco was one such first place where they ventured in 1895. The country was not yet under French and Spanish colonial control, but it was possible to film in many places like Tangiers. Not only was the country at the doorsteps of Europe, but also Moroccan medinas and marketplaces provided scenes and types galore. The first film shot in Morocco was released in 1897. It was called Le chevrier marocain (The Moroccan Goatherd).
Morocco came under colonial occupation in 1912, and filmmakers flooded to the Moorish kingdom to shoot more scenes and types. The colonial authorities encouraged the filmmakers’ interest and provided access and logistical help. The films made between 1912 and the country’s independence in 1956 were full of stereotypes about how Moroccans were lazy Orientals and therefore in need of Western domination to civilize them. La mission civilisatrice (‘the civilizing mission’) is the French name for what the British colonial writer working in India called “the white man’s burden.” This colonial discourse animated French colonial movies from the blatantly racist Mektoub (1919) through the sympathetic Itto (1934) to the cheeky Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves (1954).
The French were not the only party making films in Morocco. Hollywood had already established itself as the most powerful cinema industry in the world. Popular American movies in the colonial period included Morocco (1930) with Marlene Dietrich in the lead role, Road to Morocco (1942) starring Bing Crosby, Bob Hope and Dorothy Lamour and featuring Anthony Quinn and Dona Drake, Outpost in Morocco (1949) starring George Raft and Marie Windsor, and Othello (1952) directed by the legendary Orson Welles. But perhaps the most influential film during this period is Casablanca (1942), which I recommend that you watch if you have not done that already! These movies established Morocco as the African Hollywood where American movies have been made ever since. Here are some films which you might not know were made in Morocco: Lawrence of Arabia (1962), The Man Who Would Be King (1945), The Mummy (1999), Gladiator (2000), Alexander (2004), Kingdom of Heaven (2005), Babel (2006), Sex and the City 2 (2010), American Sniper (2014), Prison Break (TV) (2016), and the list goes on!
Morocco gained independence in 1956 and soon afterwards Moroccans started producing their own representations through the film lens. They embarked on the hard but necessary mission of correcting stereotypes about Morocco whilst using cinema to project the social and political ills that have afflicted the country in the post-colonial period. Below is my selection of 10 movies that can help you appreciate the diversity of Moroccan cinema and understand the country better in the process. Note that many of these movies as well as the American ones mentioned earlier are available to watch for free on YouTube and similar channels.
1. Wechma (1970)
This is considered the first Moroccan movie. Whilst it is not the first movie to be made after independence, it remains the first accomplished film both technically and aesthetically. The movie is an allegory of a nascent nation struggling to reach maturity and make sense of its past.
2. Chergui, the Eastern Wind (1975)
The story of Aicha in mid-1950s Tangiers and her suffering as a woman in a patriarchal society, Chergui is the tale of every Moroccan woman aspiring to survive in a traditional society. Morocco has changed significantly since the mid-twentieth century, but so much patriarchy remains in this society and others in the region.
3. A Door to the Sky (1989)
Farida Benlyazid, who directed this movie, is the first Moroccan woman to make a film for the big screen. A Door to the Sky is not only thematically and visually great, but also a powerful feminist statement from a grounded Sufi-Muslim perspective. The movie is set in the medina of Fez and highlights the tolerance inherent in Moroccan Islam.
4. Boujad: A Nest in the Heat (1992)
This beautiful and ethnographically rich documentary is the first movie by the Moroccan-American filmmaker and academic Hakim Belabbes. It chronicles his journey from Chicago to his hometown Boujad, a dusty, small town in central Morocco. The film is an enchanting and touching encounter between generations and the irreparable loss of separation.
5. Looking for My Wife’s Husband (1993)
This hilarious comedy is a tour de force. It is one of the most popular Moroccan films of all time. Set in the old medina of Fez, it tackles the erstwhile custom of polygamy and the questions of generational conflict through the question of age difference in marriage. The film is both funny and deep in its unpacking of a country caught between the forces of tradition and modernity.
6. Ali Zaoua: Prince of the Streets (2000)
This is one of the classics of Moroccan cinema from the prolific and sometimes controversial director Nabil Ayouch. Ali Zaoua is his second feature-length movie and was well received in Morocco and internationally for its daring look at the tragedy of street children in the city of Casablanca at the turn of the millennium. The movie is a touching story through the eyes of its young and unlikely heroes who live on the margins of Moroccan society.
7. Marock (2005)
This controversial film is a no-frills representation of the life of high school students from mixed faith backgrounds in the high society of Casablanca. Rita is a Muslim bourgeois girl who falls in love with her Jewish classmate Youri at the beginning of the movie. It is Ramadan and the high school exit exam is on the doorsteps. This fast-paced and entertaining movie provides a realistic view of social class and Muslim-Jewish coexistence in Morocco and the impending threats on this millennial relationship at the end of the 20th century.
8. Whatever Lola Wants (2008)
Set in New York and Cairo, this film by Nabil Ayouch is a beautiful tale of love and tolerance between the West and the Muslim world in the wake of 9/11. The film seeks to show the humanity of Muslims and the richness of their culture beyond the biased representations in the American and Western media. This serious mission is accomplished through a love story between an American girl, who is infatuated not only with Muslim men but also a retired Egyptian dancer called Ismahan. Lola goes to Cairo to find Ismahan and learn belly dancing from her.
9. Casanegra (2008)
This popular movie is an unforgiving look at a society where the divide between the rich and the poor has become too large. Casablanca is no longer the white house as its name suggests, but a casa negra where violence has become part and parcel of everyday life. Youth are impoverished and have no opportunities to achieve their dreams save for crime and hopeless dreams of migration to Europe.
10. House in the Fields / Tigmmi n Yigran (2017)
This is a beautiful documentary set in a small Amazigh (Berber) community in Morocco’s High Atlas mountains. Nobody is talking in most of the film’s scenes, or rather there is no need for anyone to say anything. Nature is the main character in this visual symphony. What is more is that this movie belongs to Amazigh cinema, which emerged in the 1990s and has suffered from the lack of support from the Moroccan state which has sought to Arabize the Amazigh majority-country since independence. Tamazight speakers have dwindled to about 50 percent of the population today because of the state policy of Arabization.
Jamal Bahmad holds a PhD in film studies from the University of Stirling in the UK. He is currently an Assistant Professor of Cultural Studies at Mohammed V University in Rabat, Morocco. Bahmad specializes in Moroccan cinema and has published widely in this area. He has also written peer reviewed articles and contributed to edited books on Moroccan and North African youth, urban cultures, Amazigh cultural politics, Moroccan Jews on screen, collective memory, and higher education in Morocco. He recently published Moroccan Cinema Uncut: Decentred Voices, Transnational Perspectives (Edinburgh University Press, 2020) with Will Higbee and Florence Martin. Bahmad teaches a course on Moroccan cinema for Amideast Education Abroad students in Rabat, Morocco.
If you are interested in learning more about Morocco, studying with Dr. Bahmad, or practicing your Arabic or French, Amideast Education Abroad offers three program options in Morocco: Regional Studies in French; Area and Arabic Language Studies; Intensive Arabic - Summer.
