Algeria’s most prominent filmmaker Merzak Allouache is in his late 70s and yet almost no other director his age continues to explore the medium with the same inquisitive and open spirit. That’s not to say all his films are on the level of his early classics or some of his top later works like The Repentant and The Rooftops. His latest, The Family, is a not entirely successful mix of class satire and political thriller set in 2109, revolving around a corrupt former minister and his hysterical wife who need to bypass a travel ban and get out of the country fast. As dysfunctional families go they’re an extreme example, representative of entitled officials from a generation warped by power who raped the country despite once being part of the revolutionary movement. The film overdoes the couple when what’s needed is Buñuelian wry understatement, especially given how he contrasts them with their “normal” activist lesbian daughter. Despite the flaws, The Family remains intriguing, though it will be a hard sell outside of Arab film showcases.
Viewers familiar with Karim Aïnouz’s Nardjes A. may do a doubletake when they recognize that documentary’s spirited protagonist Nardjes Asli as Sarah, on the streets with her partner Meriem (Meriem Amiar) protesting the country’s restrictive family code. Allouache then cuts to the gardens of a handsome villa, where Merouane (Abderrahmane Ikariouane), in his fancy pjs, gets the news that he’s been slapped with a travel ban. It puts him in a foul mood, exacerbated by the grating flightiness of his wife Khadidja (Hamida Aït El Hadj). He escalates the heated atmosphere by admitting he’s known she’s been cheating for years, which leads her to scream about his string of affairs. It’s all pitched at a feverish level, so much so that it comes as a surprise to learn that the far more chill Sarah is their daughter.
Given Merouane’s ex-minister status, he’s accorded a bodyguard, Khaled (Nacer Eddine Djoudi), who’s clearly the most stable member of the household, knows everyone’s secrets, and arranges for a people smuggler to get the family to Morocco. Before then a lot of loose ends need tying up, so with Khaled in tow, Merouane visits his mistress Fatiha (Hawa Ziour), disingenuously promising he’ll leave his wife to be with her and their baby daughter. The bodyguard also accompanies Khadidja as she shows prospective buyers her holiday seaside home and her yacht: she’s careful not to reveal the couple’s desperation, but they need to sell their multiple high-end properties fast to get the cash before fleeing the country and meeting their son in London.
While Merouane and Khadidja scramble to arrange things and Sarah reluctantly agrees to join her parents, Khaled secretly meets with the mysterious Omar (Adlane Djemil), a young man visibly traumatized by a spell in prison. Allouache aims to weave Omar throughout the film yet he withholds information to tease expectation; one scene with Omar’s former girlfriend Hadjira (Lydia Hanni) isn’t enough to make him feel fully integrated in the plot, and while it doesn’t take too much guessing to figure out how he’ll fit into the narrative, the way his character is handled is the film’s least successful element.
Better, though rather too obvious, is the depiction of toxic privilege, embodied by leads whose initial impact is pure caricature tempered only later by insight. With his unattractive comb-over and air of superiority, Merouane is an unpleasant figure, so oblivious to anyone beneath his social station that the cook Bakhta (Yousra Azeb) tears up when he talks to her for the first time in seven years (and still gets her name wrong). Khadidja is the more spectacular role and Aït El Hadj really sinks her teeth into it, clutching her precious lapdog Prince and loudly lamenting her exaggerated tribulations, always with a catch in her voice (the actress must have been hoarse by the end of the shooting). With a wardrobe as brash as she is, Khadidja’s presence overwhelms everyone and everything around her, so much so that Sarah’s natural spunk seems almost too placid in comparison – she’s like Marilyn in The Munsters, you keep wondering how these parents raised this woman. The script, co-written by the director and his daughter Bahia Allouache, underplays Sarah’s romantic attachment to Meriem, but it’s definitely there and gratifyingly unsensationalized.
As always, it’s fascinating to see how the director continues to engage with his country’s past, damning his peers for allowing their youthful idealism to be debased by the seductions of money and power. Hope is conveyed through the younger generation and Sarah’s activism, though The Family maintains a cautionary outlook: Sarah’s personal life and connection to her parents threaten her activism, raising the specter of self-involvement pushing aside commitment to the greater wellbeing of a nation. Khaled is the most intriguing character, playing multiple sides against each other in a dangerous game, yet while his enigmatic aura is an asset, the script needed to add a few more pieces to the incomplete puzzle that is his motivation.
Cinematographer Mohamed Tayeb Laggoune also shot Allouache’s The Repentant, and his camerawork is supple while controlled, making effective use of locations and the ways the characters inhabit their spaces. Most perplexing is David Hadjadj’s annoying music, jarringly used in moments when silence rather than schmaltz is needed.
Director: Merzak Allouache
Screenplay: Merzak Allouache, Bahia Allouache
Cast: Hamida Aït El Hadj, Abderrahmane Ikariouane, Nacer Eddine Djoudi, Nardjes Asli, Adlane Djemil, Meriem Amiar, Khaled Benaïssa, Mohamed Bendaoud, Yousra Azeb, Hawa Ziour, Lydia Hanni, Chafia Benboudriou, Serge Lledo, Salem Mellal, Abdelhalim Rahmouni, Abdelkader Achour, Yasmina Soltani, Nacer Eddine Nouissi
Producers: Merzak Allouache, Serge Lledo, Nabil Khelili, Sid Ali Allouache
Cinematography: Mohamed Tayeb Laggoune
Costume designer: Kenza Koul
Editing: Merzak Allouache, Samy Zertal
Music: David Hadjadj
Sound: Hafid Moulfi, Alexis Durand
Production companies: Baya Films (Algeria), Les Asphofilms (France)
Venue: Cairo Film Festival (Horizons of Arab Cinema Competition)
In Arabic, French
95 minutes
