Viva Laldjérie

France, Algeria, Belgium

2004

117 Min

Color

1.85:1

French, Arabic

Currently 3.6/5 Stars.
1
2
3
4
5

PROD Bertrand Gore, Nathalie Mesuret

CAST Lubna Azabal, Biyouna, Nadia Kaci, Jalil Naciri, Waguih Takla, Lounes Tazairt, Akim Isker, Fabien Aïssa Busetta, Lynda Harchaoui, Kamel Abdelli, Florence Giorgetti, Abbes Zahmani, Fawzi B. Saichi, Serge Avédikian

MUSIC Pierre Bastaroli

Karlovy Vary (Horizons), Rotterdam (Time & Tide), Göteborg

Synopsis

This is a story of old and young in Algeria told through a mother and daughter hiding out in a hotel from local terrorists. We follow pretty Goucem (Lubna Azabal), 27, through the urban landscape of modern-day Algiers as she attempts to assert her own version of a liberated lifestyle. She battles daily with the conflict of a new Algiers; pitting traditional life against the rapidly modernizing city. Goucem is contrasted by her more traditional mother, Papicha – played by Biyouna – who is an ex-singer longing for her cabaret and for an Algeria of days gone by. Fifi (Nadia Kaci), the women’s neighbor at the hotel, adds more color to this story as an energetic prostitute who keeps herself busy with wealthy men twenty- four hours a day. –Film Movement

Director

Nadir Moknèche

Viva Laldjérie is the second film by Nadir Moknèche. His first film, the Harem of Madame Osmane, was released in cinemas in France in July 2000 and was screened at numerous international festivals. Born in 1965, he spent his childhood and teenage years in Algiers where he went to the Saint Joseph school until it was nationalised in 1976, then a public secondary school and lycée until 1984, when he passed his baccalauréat in France. After two years studying law, he left for London and started travelling. When he returned to Paris, he followed drama lessons from 1989 to 1993 at the Chaillot National Theatre and with Ariane Mnouchkine at the Thétre du Soleil. It was during this apprenticeship that he discovered the cinema, bought a super-8 camera and shot several short films. Between 1993 and 1995, he attended film lessons at the New School for Social Research in New York and made two short films, Jardin and Hanifa, the winner of the first prize at the university festival.—Filmmovement… read more