Today, I went to see Nidhal Chatta‘s feature film, and I came away feeling very emotional. Not shocked, no, but a duller, more intense wave that continues to resonate. My congratulations to Nidhal, who has produced a sober, restrained feature film, but one with an emotional density that grips the gut.
Here, everything is said without words. Silences scream, glances speak, and absences are everywhere.
The story takes place in a building by the sea, in which the characters – often women – live as much in space as in pain.
The film is not there to please, nor to reassure. It’s there to shake you up. To confront you with the unspeakable. To lend us our own silence, the silences we’ve accepted.
The staging is impressively rigorous. Nothing is left to chance: neither the lighting, nor the setting, nor the unspoken words. The camera is discreet, almost discreet, but always right. It accompanies, it listens. It respects. The cast is magnificent. Rym Hayouni, Mohamed Dahech, Lamine Belkhodja whose return to the big screen has not gone unnoticed , Abdelmonem Chouayet, Oumaima Bahri, and a restrained Lotfi Abdelli. They don’t act. They embody. With courage. With a truth that disturbs, because it touches where it hurts. They don’t cheat.
Silentium is not a simple film. Nor comfortable. But it is essential. It disturbs, interrogates, raises questions that we sometimes prefer not to ask.
A film that leaves a mark. Not on the screen, but inside us.
A film that speaks softly so that we can hear it for a long time.
Text: Insaf Boughdiri (Journalist and Senior Communication Manager, PAFO, Pan African Farmers Organization)
Photos: Ahmed OUERTANI
