The Documentary Film Month (MCD) Kicks Off with "La Guêpe et l'Orchidée"
The Documentary Film Month (MCD) opened on Thursday, September 18, at the Cinémadart de Carthage, with the preview screening of "La Guêpe et l'Orchidée", a Tunisian-French co-production directed by Saber Zammouri.
Exploring the Tension between Dreams and Reality
This film explores the tension between dreams and reality, nostalgia for one's roots, and the illusion of a better life elsewhere. It questions the use of images, both as a language of freedom and a tool of cultural hegemony, which fuels the aspirations of young people from southern Tunisia to join France, presented as an inaccessible "paradise".
Zammouri anchors his story in his native village of Zammour, in southern Tunisia. He describes the social and economic marginalization, the lack of basic conditions for a dignified life, until the late arrival of electricity and then television in 1989. The latter crystallized the dream of exile in the imagination of young people, shaped by idealized images of France.
A Two-Part Documentary
Built in two parts — Zammour and Paris — the documentary follows the journey of a young man who, rocked by a photograph of his father posing in front of the Eiffel Tower, grew up fantasizing about emigrating. But upon arriving in France, he confronts a very different reality: a precarious daily life as a deliveryman and worker.
In the background, the story of this character merges with that of the director himself, who puts himself on stage through his family, his mother, and the landscapes of his childhood, as an attempt to revisit the deep reasons for his own departure.
A Global Agenda
During the debate that followed the screening, Zammouri affirmed that "immigration is not an individual choice, but the result of a global agenda", initiated by the introduction of television and the recurring image of an idealized France.
Rich Symbolism
The film is also distinguished by its rich symbolism. It opens with a scene where a mother puts cotton in her son's eye — an ancestral gesture intended to heal — and closes when she removes the soiled cotton, a metaphor for the gaze saturated by dust, pollution... and illusions. The eye, also highlighted on the film's poster, becomes the guiding thread of the story: what we think we see, what we are shown, and what we ultimately understand.
The original title, Fable/Photographie, translated into Arabic, reinforces this play of contrasts. The "fable" refers to the story of the village and the exile of its young people, while the "photography" evokes the power of television images that have disrupted the collective imagination.
