Cinema
The Silences of the Palace
صمت القصور
Moufida Tlatli · 1994
Synopsis
Alia, a twenty-five-year-old singer, has been living for ten years with Lotfi, who wants her to have yet another abortion. On hearing of the death of Sidi Ali, a prince of the beylical family, she returns to the palace where she grew up and where her mother, Khedija, sold as a child by her own family, served all her life as a domestic servant and dancer and was the prince's mistress. In the empty corridors there return her forbidden friendship with Sarra, the master's niece, who taught her the lute, the never-settled question of her father, and her mother's efforts to protect her from the prince's advances.
Context
Tlatli's first feature film, which she wrote and edited, it was produced by Cinétéléfilms, Mat Films and Canal Horizon; Anouar Brahem composed the music. Amel Hedhili plays Khedija, Ghalia Lacroix the adult Alia and Hend Sabri the child Alia, alongside Najia Ouerghi, Sami Bouajila and Hichem Rostom. Running one hundred and twenty-seven or one hundred and twenty-eight minutes depending on the sources, it was selected in 1994 for the Directors' Fortnight at Cannes, then released in France from 7 September 1994. It depicts the secluded life of the women of a palace, where masters and servants do not live by the same rules.
Who it is for
A film in Tunisian Arabic with subtitles, moving back and forth between two periods; domestic servitude is shown in it without comment.
Prizes and reception
Special mention of the Caméra d'or at Cannes, Golden Tanit at the JCC, Golden Tulip in Istanbul, critics' prize in Toronto.
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