For further information please download the film sheet (PDF).
In the decades after it was founded in 1944, the Centre Cinématographique Marocain (CCM) produced newsreels for screening in theatres before the main feature. Mohamed Afifi, Ahmed Bouanani, Abdelmajid R’chich and Mohamed Abderrahman Tazi were filmmakers working at the CCM after the country gained independence for whom film was an art form. Afifi was the oldest, while Bouanani, R’chich and Tazi knew each other from their student days at the IDHEC (Institut des hautes études cinématographiques) in Paris. Afifi was the first to dare to subvert a newsreel commission to create an auteurist meditation. Visually captivating, Men Lahm waSalb (1959) films a day in the life of the Casablanca port, without dialogue or voiceover, with the images flowing to the rhythm of music, while Sitta wa Thaniat ‘Ashar (1968) is a study of the Casablanca light between the hours 6 and 12. Al-‘Awdah li Agadir(1967) films the reconstruction of Agadir after the earthquake that almost destroyed the entire city and is akin to a modernist constructivist moving image tableau. Bouanani’s first short Tarfaya Aw Masseerat Sha‘er (1966) is adapted from a 15th century poem by a legendary Moroccan bard. (Rasha Salti)
Short Films 1
Men Lahm wa Salb (De chair et d’acier)
Mohamed Afifi, 1959
Production: Centre Cinématographique Marocain (CCM), Rabat
Camera: Bernard Taizant
Format: 35 mm, Black/White
Running time: 15 min
Language: French
Sitta wa Thaniat ‘Ashar (Six et douze)
Ahmed Bouanani, Abdelmajid R’chich, Mohamed Abderrahman Tazi, 1968
Production: Centre Cinématographique Marocain (CCM), Rabat
Format: 35 mm, Black/White
Running time: 18 min
Language: Without dialogue
Al-‘Awdah li Agadir (Retour à Agadir)
Mohamed Afifi, 1967
Format: 35 mm, Black/White
Running time: 12 min
Language: Without dialogue
Tarfaya Aw Masseerat Sha’er (Tarfaya ou La marche d’un poète)
Ahmed Bouanani, 1966
Production: Centre Cinématographique Marocain (CCM), Rabat
Camera: Mohamed Abderrahman Tazi
Cast: Ahmed Maji, Abdeslam Sefrioul
Format: 35 mm, Black/White
Running time: 20 min
Language: French
