Marrakech Film Festival Returns after Covid Cancellations

The Marrakech International Film Festival logo.
The Marrakech International Film Festival logo.
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Marrakech Film Festival Returns after Covid Cancellations

The Marrakech International Film Festival logo.
The Marrakech International Film Festival logo.

The Marrakech International Film Festival returns to the Moroccan tourist hub this month, with organizers hoping to woo star-struck fans after a two-year hiatus due to the coronavirus pandemic.

British actress Tilda Swinton is set to attend, with Italian director Paolo Sorrentino heading up the jury, AFP said.

The festival, running from November 11-19, features emerging directors from across the world who will "shape the cinema of tomorrow", according to Prince Moulay Rachid, who presides over the festival's foundation.

Sorrentino, whose film "The Great Beauty" won a foreign-language Oscar in 2014, is joined by French actor Tahar Rahim, Lebanese director Nadine Labaki and German-American actress Diane Kruger.

Fourteen feature films from across the world, including six by women, will be in the running for the festival's top prize, the Gold Star.

Artistic director Remi Bonhomme told AFP that the festival "brings together different cinematic worlds, through 76 films (representing) 33 countries covering all continents".

The opening film is "Pinocchio", a remake of Carlo Collodi's animated tale by Mexican director Guillermo del Toro.

Tributes will also be paid to American director James Gray and to Swinton, who headed the festival's jury in 2018 and 2019, as well as Moroccan director Farida Benlyazid and Bollywood star Ranveer Singh.

Known for its conversational side events, the festival will give the public the chance to question Iran's two-time Oscar-winning director Asghar Farhadi.

US independent director Jim Jarmusch is also on the line-up, with events set to take place at a string of venues across the city with its famous red buildings.

Marrakesh's iconic Jamaa El-Fna square will host outdoor screenings of science fiction epic "Dune" and James Gray's "Ad Astra".

The city's famous Yves Saint Laurent museum will also host the "11th continent" collection of recently restored archive films, including "Muna moto" (1975) by Cameroonian Jean-Pierre Dikongue-Pipa or "Beirut the Encounter" (1981) by Lebanon's Borhane Alaouie.

Other screenings will include films that have already debuted recently at top festivals, including "No Bears" by Iran's Jafar Panahi, who has been detained in Iran since July.

The film received the Special Jury Prize at the 2022 Venice Film Festival.

Legal drama and Venice Silver Lion winner "Saint Omer", by French director Alice Diop, will also be screened.

Alongside the festivities, organizers will hold the Atlas Workshops, a program supporting young filmmakers from Africa and the Middle East with development and post-production that also awards prizes.

A previous winner, Egyptian director Omar El Zohairy, was awarded a Grand Prize at the Semaine de la Critique in Cannes in July for his scathing "Feathers".



'Mufasa' Film Puts Classic Lions Into More Complex Storylines

This image released by Disney shows characters Afia, voiced by Anika Noni Rose, left, Mufasa, voiced by Braelyn Rankins, center, and Masego, voiced by Keith David, in a scene from "Mufasa: The Lion King." (Disney via AP)
This image released by Disney shows characters Afia, voiced by Anika Noni Rose, left, Mufasa, voiced by Braelyn Rankins, center, and Masego, voiced by Keith David, in a scene from "Mufasa: The Lion King." (Disney via AP)
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'Mufasa' Film Puts Classic Lions Into More Complex Storylines

This image released by Disney shows characters Afia, voiced by Anika Noni Rose, left, Mufasa, voiced by Braelyn Rankins, center, and Masego, voiced by Keith David, in a scene from "Mufasa: The Lion King." (Disney via AP)
This image released by Disney shows characters Afia, voiced by Anika Noni Rose, left, Mufasa, voiced by Braelyn Rankins, center, and Masego, voiced by Keith David, in a scene from "Mufasa: The Lion King." (Disney via AP)

Director Barry Jenkins believes it was important to revisit the Disney classic "The Lion King" with the prequel "Mufasa: The Lion King" for audiences to understand that the protagonist lion Mufasa was never perfect, and the villain Scar was not always evil.
"For 30 years we've been living with this idea of Mufasa as unimpeachably great and good, and Scar is like the full embodiment of evil," Jenkins told Reuters.
"In this story, we get to go back and show that no one is born good or born evil. You'll get a result of all these different choices that you make, good parenting, bad parenting, nature versus nurture," the "Moonlight" director added.
Jenkins found that it was key to the story to introduce a more complex look at the classic characters.
The film, written by Jeff Nathanson, uses photorealistic animation and serves as both a prequel to the original animated 1994 "The Lion King" and a sequel to the 2019 remake, which was directed by Jon Favreau.
"Mufasa", distributed by Walt Disney Pictures, arrives in theaters on Friday.
The movie includes the voices of leads Aaron Pierre as Mufasa, the lion who grows up to be the king and father to Simba along with Kelvin Harrison Jr. as Taka, who's eventually known as the antagonist named Scar, a prince and Mufasa's adoptive brother.
Taking place in the Pride Lands of Tanzania after the events of the 2019 "Lion King" film, "Mufasa" follows Mufasa and Taka, who become friends and eventually adoptive brothers until a series of devastating events threaten their bond.
The voice cast also includes multi-Grammy winner Beyonce Knowles-Carter who reprises her role from the 2019 film as Simba's mate, Nala, and the "Texas Hold 'Em" singer's daughter, Blue Ivy, making her film debut voicing Simba and Nala's daughter, Princess Kiara.
It was important for Pierre to pay homage to the late James Earl Jones, one of the most renowned actors in Hollywood and the original voice of Mufasa.
"He really for me is just top level," the "Genius" actor said.
For Pierre, Jones was his guiding light that extinguished any fear that he had about the iconic role.
"I actually managed to use that (his fear) in the adolescent version because the adolescent version doesn't have it all figured out," he added.