The Chant of Noria

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Zeineb has always been strong-willed. She refuses, divorces, and asserts her will. Once divorced, she is free on paper, but remains enslaved as her ex-husband refuses to respect the law, hiring men to violently hound her. Should she leave? She follows Mhamed, who loves her, but who wants to emigrate himself. In the ensuing road movie that takes us deep down into southern Tunisia, the landscapes become increasingly desert-like. The beauty of the settings regularly carries the narrative. The couple, torn by this question of departure in reflection of a country that is losing its children, meet Ali who returns from America wealthy. Is he a mytho-maniac, an impostor? In any case, he is friendly and is himself torn by this painful uprooting vis-à-vis his sister who is forced to get by on her own. In one fine image, his justifications are drowned out in the noise of a passing train. Is emigration a mirage? A departure towards another form of poverty? Mouldi, Ali's sister's husband, denounces the drain of the country's best elements, saying, « It suits you to bury the past to absolve yourself. »