Fest Promo Trailer for Thrilling Tunisian Film ‘Behind the Mountains’
by Alex Billington
September 1, 2023
Source: YouTube
“You saw me fly, Yassine, right?” Luxbox has revealed a festival promo trailer for a film titled Behind the Mountains from Tunisia, which is premiering at the 2023 Venice Film Festival currently underway in Italy. This looks like one of the most exciting discoveries of the festival, though not many people are paying attention to it yet – maybe this trailer will help build some buzz. The vague description says – the film is about a man who violently breaks free from his banal environment, evading society with its principles, codes and institutions. Majd Mastoura stars as Rafik. “It’s the story of a man who violently breaks free from his banal environment, subtracting himself from society with its principles, codes, and institutions.” He takes his son to show him something incredible. Also starring Walid Bouchhioua, Samer Bisharat, Selma Zghidi, and Helmi Dridi. This trailer gives a big hint that it’s the ability to fly that is hiding “behind the mountains”, which is used as a fascinating metaphor for breaking free – I like what he says about humans going from crawling to walking. I definitely want to see this – keep an eye out for it at other festivals as well.
Here’s the official trailer (+ poster) for Mohamed Ben Attia’s Behind the Mountains, from YouTube:
Via Venice: “After spending four years in jail, Rafik has only one plan, to take his son behind the mountains and show him his amazing discovery.” Also: “Rafik is not an intellectual. He obeys to no ideology and cannot express his vision of the world in words. His acts seem to emerge from a passionate, almost savage drive. His rejection of a brutally conformist society is steered by an extraordinary momentum, a vital outburst of freedom, a deep desire to flee bland and standardised reality, a conventional bleak world which has become the reign of political correctness, of a single way of thinking where everything is rashly dictated. In times where fear and propriety rule the world, Rafik is a threat. I wanted to show a man capable of widening the spectrum of possible in a country which has become schizophrenic, a world that has become absurd.” Behind the Mountains, also known as Oura el Jbel, is both written and directed by the Tunisian filmmaker Mohamed Ben Attia, director of the films Heidi and Dear Son previously, plus other short films. This is premiering at the 2023 Venice Film Festival in their Orizzonti section. No release dates are set – stay tuned.
 |
