VENICE19 REVIEW: Les épouvantails [The Scarecrows] [2019]

You’re not lost. It begins in a prison cell with a despondent Djo (Joumene Limam) scribbling words on paper as Zina (Nour Hajri) implores her to stand so they may leave. Salvation comes in the form of a lawyer (Afef Ben Mahmoud‘s Nadia) and doctor (Fatma Ben Saïdane‘s Dora) desperate to figure out what has happened and how they were able to return to Tunisia. Details about this question only start to come into focus as Nouri Bouzid‘s Les épouvantails [The Scarecrows] progresses with the explanation that the two women…

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REVIEW: Aala Kaf Ifrit [Beauty and the Dogs] [2017]

What law forbids a human being from seeing a doctor? Fear should never be underestimated as a means for oppression or motivation because there are few emotions more potent. This is why totalitarian regimes use it as a weapon to silence those who dare find the courage to stand up for their rights. They sow fear into the masses, using it to gather support for new laws pretending to protect citizens that actually just insulate those in the position to make them. And if a rebellion somehow proves successful, adjustment…

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