HARKA

2022 / 87 min / color

Ali (played by Adam Bessa, who won Best Performance in Un Certain Regard at last year’s Cannes) hasn’t seen his family for a long time. He barely makes ends meet selling contraband oil on the black market. But when his father dies he has to take responsibility for his two younger sisters who are about to be evicted from the family home. Anger and frustration grow in Ali, exacerbated by the social and systemic injustices that still define the Tunisian reality many years after the Arab Spring. Lotfy Nathan’s debut feature shows how Ali has to struggle with the burdens of a patriarchal heritage that still governs Tunisian social and family relations. The story told by Ali’s younger sister has the quality of a morality play, and the characters’ dilemmas shed light on another dimension of the country — as a popular tourist destination.

• Cannes IFF – Best Performance (Adam Bessa)
• Red Sea IFF – Best Director, Best Actor (Adam Bessa)