HOMMAGES ET RÉTROSPECTIVES

In 1999, self-taught filmmaker Rabah Ameur-Zaïmeche founded his production company to direct his first film. He surrounded himself with friends and family members and film after film brought in professionals. His cinematic journeys back and forth between France, where he grew up, and Algeria, where he was born, are accurate portrayals of life between two shores, the pleasure of reunions and assimilation in France despite its discriminatory policies. His films straddle the line between his political concerns and his love of cinema. Pulling together in the face of adversity is what best defines his epic plotlines and shooting style. In his last two films, Rabah Ameur-Zaïmeche returns to two figures who particularly inspired him as a child: Mandrin (the so-called Robin Hood of France) and Jesus of Nazareth. Both embody resistance and brotherhood, qualities that continue to inspire his way of making films.

This retrospective reserves the added pleasure of seeing Rabah Ameur-Zaïmeche, who appears in every one of his films, build an ever-growing self-portrait: an exile in Wesh Wesh…, a renegade in Bled number one, a contractor in Dernier Maquis, a messenger for the smugglers in Les chants de Mandrin and a devoted companion in Histoire de Judas. We can hardly wait to see what form he will take in his next film. Through the magic of cinema, his discreet characters still manage to reveal small personal touches that add to the charm of his performances: his way of slipping his body into a landscape, casting his voice or making a slight movement toward another with a hint of a smile. _ Marion Froger

En collaboration avec le Département d’histoire de l’art et d’études cinématographiques de l'Université de Montréal