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Interview with Maryam Touzani, director of ‘Adam’. In this interview we try to delve into creativity. In part because it is the woman who gives birth to the child, who creates the child and even the adult the child becomes, and in part because it is the woman whose only outlet is creativity in a society that imposes strictures around most activities allowed to them.

Adam is the debut feature directed by Maryam Touzani. This Moroccan feature is a beautiful chamber piece about two vulnerable women: Samia (Nisrine Erradi), an unwed pregnant woman in this conservative Arab country who shows up in Casablanca’s Medina looking for a job and a place to spend the night, and Alba (Lubna Azabal), a young widow with an eight-year-old daughter (Douae Belkhaouda), who begrudgingly takes her in. Their relationship grows along with their own emotional healing and development. Adam is a women’s...

Director-producer Nabil Ayouch and actor-director Maryam Touzani are attending the Marrakech Film Festival for the gala screening of Touzani’s debut feature, “Adam,” on Tuesday. The film, written by her, with the collaboration of Ayouch, and produced by the latter, is Morocco’s entry for the Best International Feature Film at the 92nd Academy Awards.

“Adam” had its world premiere in Cannes Un Certain Regard, has won 16 prizes at major festivals, and has been sold by sales agent Films Boutique to more than 15 territories, including U.S., France, Benelux, Australia, Japan, Italy, Spain, Argentina, Mexico, and Brazil.

The pic, starring Lubna Azabal and Nisrin Erradi, is about a life changing encounter in Casablanca’s Medina between Samia, a heavily pregnant, single young woman from the countryside, and Abla, a widow with a vivacious eight-year-old daughter who has set up a bakery.

Touzani says that the inspiration for the film was...

El Gouna Ff 2019: ‘Adam’ in Feature Narrative Competition‘Adam’, the debut feature by Moroccan director Maryam Touzani was awarded the El Gouna Bronze Star for Narrative Film.

Adam is a beautiful chamber piece about two vulnerable women: Samia (Nisrine Erradi), an unwed pregnant woman in this conservative Arab country who shows up in Casablanca’s Medina looking for a job and a place to spend the night, and Alba (Lubna Azabal), a young widow with an eight-year-old daughter (Douae Belkhaouda), who begrudgingly takes her in. Their relationship grows along with the pregnant woman’s baby and with their own emotional healing and development. Adam is a women’s meditation on life and the family.

The relationship between the two woman and the young daughter of the widow develops bit by bit and each step brings the viewer into their small circle. By the end, one feels a part of the family they have created.

Maryam Touzani’s debut feature and Cannes-player “Adam” has been selected as Morocco’s submission to the 2020 Academy Award for best international feature film – the first time that a picture from a woman director has been chosen to represent the country.

The pic is co-written and produced by Nabil Ayouch. Touzani previously starred in, and co-wrote, Ayouch’s 2017 hit “Razzia.”

The seven-person selection committee was presided by Moroccan director Noureddine Lakhmari (“Casanegra”).

The film received a standing ovation on its world premiere at Cannes, and won an audience award at the Angouleme French Film Festival in August. Berlin-based Films Boutique acquired international sales rights to the pic before Cannes; early distribution deals have been inked in France with Ad Vitam and in Benelux with Cinéart.

The pic turns on the difficulties faced by an unwed heavily pregnant country girl in conservative Morocco. Samia – who has been rejected by the father...

Emile Berling recently played villain to Francois Civil in Dying or Feeling Better and I thought he must be quite used playing supporting parts. I was dead-wrong. In Les Hauts Murs, he played a most memorable part and is the lead actor.

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- - - What the Movie is all about: The shocking story of a young man sentenced to a brutal juvenile home comes to the screen in this drama based on an autobiographical novel by Auguste Le Breton set in the early Thirties. Yves Treguier (Emile Berling) is a fourteen year old who has run away from home and is picked up by police for vagrancy. Yves is sent to an "educational home" for orphans and juvenile felons; the home is more like a prison than anything else, and adults who oversee the youngsters in their care are more interested in discipline and hard labor...

Emile Berling recently played villain to Francois Civil in Dying or Feeling Better and I thought he must be quite used playing supporting parts. I was dead-wrong. In Les Hauts Murs, he played a most memorable part and is the lead actor.

- - -

- - - What the Movie is all about: The shocking story of a young man sentenced to a brutal juvenile home comes to the screen in this drama based on an autobiographical novel by Auguste Le Breton set in the early Thirties. Yves Treguier (Emile Berling) is a fourteen year old who has run away from home and is picked up by police for vagrancy. Yves is sent to an "educational home" for orphans and juvenile felons; the home is more like a prison than anything else, and adults who oversee the youngsters in their care are more interested in discipline and hard labor...

Emile Berling recently played villain to Francois Civil in Dying or Feeling Better and I thought he must be quite used playing supporting parts. I was dead-wrong. In Les Hauts Murs, he played a most memorable part and is the lead actor.

- - -

- - - What the Movie is all about: The shocking story of a young man sentenced to a brutal juvenile home comes to the screen in this drama based on an autobiographical novel by Auguste Le Breton set in the early Thirties. Yves Treguier (Emile Berling) is a fourteen year old who has run away from home and is picked up by police for vagrancy. Yves is sent to an "educational home" for orphans and juvenile felons; the home is more like a prison than anything else, and adults who oversee the youngsters in their care are more interested in discipline and hard labor...

Emile Berling recently played villain to Francois Civil in Dying or Feeling Better and I thought he must be quite used playing supporting parts. I was dead-wrong. In Les Hauts Murs, he played a most memorable part and is the lead actor.

- - -

- - - What the Movie is all about: The shocking story of a young man sentenced to a brutal juvenile home comes to the screen in this drama based on an autobiographical novel by Auguste Le Breton set in the early Thirties. Yves Treguier (Emile Berling) is a fourteen year old who has run away from home and is picked up by police for vagrancy. Yves is sent to an "educational home" for orphans and juvenile felons; the home is more like a prison than anything else, and adults who oversee the youngsters in their care are more interested in discipline and hard labor...