Moroccan Film "The Blue Caftan" Tackles LGBTQ Taboos at Angoulême Festival

"The Blue Caftan" is a film that, while addressing the daily life of Halim (Saleh Bakri) and Mina (Lubna Azabal), owners of a traditional caftan shop in the medina of Salé, Morocco, delves into one of the still taboo subjects: homosexuality. And what could be more descriptive than a love triangle to highlight the consequences of a repressed sexuality. "The Blue Caftan" is the second film by the Moroccan director, who has brought essential questions to the public that are difficult to address.

Currently in competition for the Valois d’Or at the Francophone Film Festival of Angoulême, which will be held from August 23 to 28, Franceinfo Afrique asked the filmmaker why she chose to address repressed homosexuality. Maryam Touzani replied that the film tells the story of certain men like Halim that she has met throughout her career and who are forced to live surrounded by lies, fearing the gaze and judgments of society. "I think it must be very hard to get up every morning and pretend to be someone else because of social pressure. I met a man in the medina on my last feature film. I never discussed his private life with him, but I had the impression that he was hiding something. It may have been my imagination, but all of this brought back those old memories. The character of Halim that I started writing was this man who became a maalem, who hid his homosexuality and lived on his own, in a kind of darkness."

As for Lubna Azabal, who plays Mina, the woman who has chosen to live with the man of her life, while being aware of his homosexuality, she argues that it is not an easy choice and that many women like Mina live this kind of situation. "She has always sought to protect Halim and, in this sense, she is like a mother to him. She wants to give him, in a way, the courage to face the world. Mina wants to leave behind a happy man. She has immense strength of character because it is not easy to accept that the one you love is in love with someone else. But Mina knows what it is to love."

Maryam Touzani has a close relationship with each of her actors. This is the case with Lubna Azabal. "She is whole. When she loves a character, it’s for real! She is her character when she plays. As a filmmaker, it’s something I appreciate. It’s a gift for a director and it’s very beautiful to direct her. It was Lubna from the beginning because Mina is a very singular character. And I knew that Lubna had what I was looking for to embody her."