The Silences of the Palace

Samt el qusur

Tunisia, France

1994

128 Min

Color

1.66:1

French, Arabic

Currently 4.0/5 Stars.
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PROD Ahmed Baha Attia, Richard Magnien

SCR Moufida Tlatli, Nouri Bouzid

CAST Hend Sabri, Amel Hedhili, Najia Ouerghi, Fatima Ben Saïdane, Zahira Ben Ammar, Ghalia Lacroix, Sami Bouajila, Sabah Bouzouita, Sonia Meddeb, Michket Krifa, Kamel Touati, Kamel Fazaa

ED Camille Cotte, Karim Hammouda, Moufida Tlatli

Cannes (Quinzaine des Réalisateurs): Caméra d'Or - Special Mention, New York, Toronto: FIPRESCI Prize, Chicago (Competition), San Sebastián (Open Zone), Vancouver, Telluride, Sundance (Special Screenings), Rotterdam (Hubert Bals Fund), BAFICI

Synopsis

As Alia, the daughter of a beautiful servant Khedija, grows up in the Kings Palace at the end of the French colonial rule in Tunisia, she realizes the sexual favours required of her mother and other servants. —IMDb

Director

Moufida Tlatli

Moufida Tlatli (born in Sidi Bou Saïd in 1947) is a Tunisian film director. She was the first Arab woman to direct a full featured-film (The Silences of the Palace) in the Arab World. She was born in Sidi Bou Saïd suburb of the capital Tunis in 1947. She said that she discovered her love to cinema with the help of her philosophy teacher.

After graduating from the French Institut des hautes études cinématographiques in 1968, she returned to Tunisia where she worked as a film editor for different Tunisian films.

She directed her first featured-film The Silences of the Palace in 1994. The film was acclaimed critically and won several awards : Cannes Film Festival’s Golden Camera, the Golden Tanit of Carthage, British Film Institute Awards’ Sutherland Trophy, Toronto Film Festival’s International Critics’ Award and Istanbul International Film Festival’s Golden Tulip.

Her second film, The Season of Men, was screened in the Un Certain Regard… read more