The Tunisian film last night El Jaidaproduced by Selma Baccar, was screened at Cairo Film International Film Festival (CIFF). This film contributes to the “horizons of the new Arab cinema” competition.
He was scheduled for express, yesterday, November 25, International day for the elimination of violence against women.
This film, which is located just before independence, tells the story of women of different age, temperament and social backgrounds, but who are all imprisoned in Dar Joued.
These women had been condemned because they had unfolded to the men of their families. They were subject to the goodwill of the males and could in no case have themselves.
The independence of Tunisia, and then the promulgation of the personal status code will change the lives of these women, who will become full -fledged citizens.
The projection ofEl Jaida took place in the presence of director Salma Baccar, two actresses Souhir Ben Amara and Amira Derouiche, actor Khaled Houissa and the decorator Rahma Bejaoui.
The Ambassador of Tunisia to Egypt and his wife were also present.
The film was very successful. Not only was there not a single unoccupied armchair, but he even had standing spectators, which is very rare in CIFF!
Personally when I saw El Jaida at the Colosseum, During the world premiere during Carthage’s cinematographic days, I hadn’t particularly liked it. I had found that he had all the ingredients to make a good film, but that in the end the result was not up to my expectations. Was it fatigue? Possible. That evening we had line up for 3 hours, we were all exasperated and edited.
But yesterday I really liked the film.
Is it because yesterday, I was also very proud of our Tunisia? It is also possible.
I was surrounded by Egyptians and I felt their astonishment, especially towards the end of the film when the little girl of the heroine had become a member of the Constituent Assembly and had made a speech for the defense of the rights of women.
Yes, what pride !!!!
The debate that followed the film was very interesting. In fact, there were not so many questions, there were mainly praise. Praise for the film, but especially for Tunisia which has been able to move forward and resist, to date, the obscurantist forces which wanted the rights of women to regress.
Salma Baccar was also congratulated for having linked the woman’s condition to the liberation of the country and parallel between the two. All have insisted that no country can move forward and evolve if half of its population is subject and does not enjoy their rights.
Salma Baccar explained that she had written her film in 2007, but that after the Revolution, she had rewritten him. Indeed, after the 2011 elections, there was a real fear that Tunisian women’s rights be called into question. The Islamists had spoken to restoring polygamy, they had also spoken of complementarity of women and had especially wanted to introduce sharia in the Constitution. The struggle had been very hard, and finally article 21 of the Constitution had affirmed gender equality. In addition to this, last summer, the organic law against violence against women was voted.
Of course, there were two people who yelled that it was contrary to religion, that claiming equality of inheritance between men and women is hramthat it is not normal for Tunisian men to be able to marry four women in accordance with Sharia law….
The critic Ahmed Shawky, who modeled the debate, put an end to this controversy by saying that only the questions concerned the film were accepted and that we were not there to debate the Tunisian Constitution.
Salma Baccar still answered by saying that she was not there to discuss religion, but that she believed that the human mind is unlimited and that he must always try to find solutions to make laws and rules that comply with the real needs of human beings and that adapt to our societies.
What was very fun yesterday was to see the Egyptians defend beak and nails Tunisian women. They were enthusiastic, we would have thought they were themselves Tunisian! In fact, they envied us!
Debate after the screening of the film El Jaida
Apart from these two energumes, the spectators loved the film. They loved the sets, the costumes, the performances of actors …
A Lebanese critic posed a somewhat special question: he said he found that in the film, men were rather weak and erased. For what?
Khaled Houissa replied by saying that:
1/ The movie El Jaida Is feminine and feminist par excellence and therefore the characters highlighted were that of women, men with secondary roles.
2/ The characters of men were not weak but were rather complex.
3/ The Tunisian man has also campaigned for women’s rights because he has understood that a society has not been able to evolve for a long time if women do not enjoy their rights, are not educated, fulfilled … Especially since it is women who raise children and therefore form future generations.
He also cited as an example Tahar Haddad And Bourguiba Habib.
Honestly last night, I felt very proud to be Tunisian. And this pride persisted even more today when I found that people were still discussing the film and the rights of the Tunisian woman.
Neïla Driss
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