Set in and around the Mongolian capital of Ulaanbaatar, Lkhagvadulam Purev-Ochir’s debut feature, City of Wind, is a quintessential tale situating the spiritual conflicts at the juncture between nomadic tradition and global urbanism. At the centrepiece of this dilemma is the young adult protagonist, Ze, who distributes his life between serving as a shaman to his community and being a … Read More
Kaouther Ben Hania’s “Four Daughters” is a cinematographic blend of documentary and fiction, an honest exploration of memory, loss, and the complexity of reality and fantasy. The lines between the two are blurred in the film’s captivating use of cinematography and unique narrative, specifically its semi-fictionalized form, inviting the viewers to navigate a perplexing web of perception and understanding. The … Read More
Kaouther Ben Hania’s newest experimental docu-drama hybrid, Four Daughters, depicts a world of vicious and merciless creatures, ravenous for prey, a world where Olfa Hamrouni’s two eldest daughters are “devoured by the wolf.” In this case, the wolf is emblematic of the Islamic State and the radicalization of her children. It’s 2015, only a few short years following the Tunisian … Read More
A few years back, the news of a single mother, Olfa Hamrouni, losing two of her four daughters, Rahma and Ghofrane, to the influence of ISIS filled the Tunisian national news. In the hybrid documentary Four Daughters, director Kaouther Ben Hania develops a participatory environment with Hamrouni and her remaining two daughters in a processual exercise to come to terms … Read More
Co-winner of the Golden Eye for Best Documentary at this year’s Cannes, Tunisian filmmaker Kaouther Ben Hanja’s docudrama Four Daughters tells the story of Olfa Hamrouni and her four daughters –Ghofrane, Rahma, Eya, and Tayssir— in a desperate effort to understand why Ghofrane and Rahma, in 2015 (aged 15 and 16), left home to join ISIS. To tell the story … Read More
Directed by Kaouther Ben Hania, Four Daughters is a Documentary film that tells the stories of a Tunisian family — Olfa and her daughters (Ghofrane, Rahma, Tayssir, and Eya) — while challenging methods of nonfiction storytelling. The film explores the struggles of women, a spectrum of extremes, and radicalization while highlighting memory, grief, and truth in the most raw and … Read More
By Samantha Cox Kaouther Ben Hania’s Four Daughters retells the story of a mother, Olfa, whose eldest daughters, Ghofrane and Rahma, disappear to join ISIS. It is a documentary that both recreates what happened and lets the real family recount the events leading up to the disappearance. In the beginning, the two youngest daughters recount the time their mother had … Read More
MacKenzie Davis’ WOACA heralds this programme’s veneration for humanity’s unspoken daily traumas. Largely shot using a single camera set-up, a woman stands stoically before her bathroom mirror and performs her ablutions. Staring out from the mirror, directly at the viewer, the meticulous routine, normalized over her lifetime, grows increasingly excruciating. When a seemingly insignificant pimple appears, Davis takes aim at … Read More
Short Cuts 2023 Programme 05 is an interesting medley of stories showcasing people from different backgrounds experiencing loss. The two that specifically stood out to me were WOACA directed by Mackenzie Davis and Sawo Matang directed by Andrea Nirmala Widjajanto. These shorts start very pleasant. WOACA comments on the vanity of women in society and questions the consequences of stripping … Read More
Four Daughters is an emotional and poignant docudrama that restages a tragic news story in Tunisia with professional actors. The film tells the story of Olfa Hamrouni and her four daughters, which made international headlines because the two eldest – Rahma and Ghofrane – left their family and decided to join the Islamic State in Libya. Director Kaouther Ben Hania … Read More
