Event

Tacoma Sister Cities International Film Festival - El Jadida, Morocco

February 23, 2012
Cultural program from our sister city of El Jadida, Morocco begins at 6:15. The movie Fragments starts at 7:00.

Movie Synopsis:

FRAGMENTS Morocco, 2009, by director Hakim Belabbes, charts the lives of the Belabbes family and presenting a first-hand view of Moroccan society and culture. This is also a recording of the first steps taken by the director into film and photography, documenting an incredible filmmaker finding his voice through the medium. Through his eyes, a beautiful and bravely human film emerges, showing how personal stories portrayed in film are able to expose universal issues that apply to us all.
The filmmaker is playfully mocked by his mother and father, who say that he's never actually achieved anything. Another father bitterly mourns his son's disappearance some 30 years before. A former political prisoner describes the torture he suffered and his desire for reintegration. An old man washes himself in the open air. A circumcision. A man being shaved for the last time. A moving farewell. Conversations about family, life and death, success, failure, loss and grief. FRAGMENTS is an autobiographical essay film, a collection of images from two decades which documents the relationship between the filmmaker, who emigrated in the 80s, and his family, his country and its culture. A home movie made by a man who is both insider and outsider and a meditation on the passing of time.
The film director Hakim Belabbes will be here in Tacoma to introduce his film and participate in Q & A afterwards.