page_title: Culture of Tunisia
section_title: Cinema
hierarchical_section_title: Culture of Tunisia / Arts / Cinema
caption_attribution_description: Naceur Ktari
context_page_description: Tunisian culture is very diverseTunisian culture is a product of more than three thousand years of history and an important multi-ethnic influx. Ancient Tunisia was a major civilization crossing through history; different cultures, civilizations and multiple successive dynasties contributed to the culture of the country over centuries with a varying degrees of influence. Among these cultures were the Carthaginian – their native civilization, Roman, Vandal, Jewish, Christian, Arab, Islamic, Turkish, Europeans, and French, in addition to native Amazigh. This unique mixture of cultures made Tunisia, with its strategic geographical location in the Mediterranean, the core of some great civilizations of Mare Nostrum.
  The history of Tunisia reveals this rich past where different successive Mediterranean cultures had a strong presence. After the Carthaginian Republic, the Roman Empire came and left a lasting effect on the land with various monuments and cities such the El-Jem Amphitheater and the archaeological site of the ancient city of Carthage, which is classified as a world heritage site. El Jem is just one of seven world heritage sites found in Tunisia.
context_section_description: Tunisian cinema is today recognized as one of the most liberal, inventive, and prize-winning cinemas of the Arab world. Beginning in the 1990s, Tunisia became an attractive place for filming, and numerous successful companies have emerged serving the foreign film industry.
  Cinema has been present in Tunisia since its first world appearance. Starting from 1896, the Lumière brothers were showing animated films in the streets of Tunis. In 1919, the first feature-length movie produced on the African continent, Les Cinq gentlemen maudits (The Five Accursed Gentlemen), was filmed in Tunisia. In 1924, Zohra directed a medium-length film called Ain Al-Ghazal (The Girl from Carthage), making him one of the very first native filmmakers on the African continent. In 1966, the first feature Tunisian film, Al-Fajr (The Dawn), was directed and produced by Omar Khlifi; it was 95 minutes long, shot on 35 mm film. Tunisia also hosts the Carthage Film Festival which has been taking place since 1966. The festival, which gives priority to films from Arab and African countries, is the oldest film festival on the African continent and the Arab World.
  In 1927, the first Tunisian film distribution company, Tunis-Film, started its activities. After independence, movies were exclusively produced by SATPEC (Société Anonyme Tunisienne de Production et d'Expansion Cinématographique), which controlled cinema and filming productions in the country at the time. Nevertheless, during the 1980s, private production companies and studios emerged and wanted to make Tunisia the Mediterranean Hollywood. The producer Tarak Ben Ammar, a nephew of Wasila Bourguiba, succeeded in attracting some big production companies to shoot in his studios in Monastir. Major foreign movies were filmed in Tunisia, including Roman Polanski's Pirates and Franco Zeffirelli's Jesus of Nazareth. After visiting Tunisia, George Lucas was seduced by the natural beauty and authentic old architecture of some southern Tunisian towns, where he decided to film the important Tatooine scenes of Star Wars, as well as Indiana Jones. Moreover, Anthony Minghella filmed the nine Academy Awards winner The English Patient in a southwestern oasis of the country.
  Domestic Tunisian productions were rare. The few movies which were produced since 1967 tried to reflect the new social dynamics, development, identity research and modernity shock. Some of them achieved relative success outside Tunisia, including La Goulette (Halq El-Wadi, 1996). Directed by Ferid Boughedir, La Goulette showed a flashback of typical community life in the eponymous small suburb, during a period when Muslims, Jews and Christians lived together in tolerance and peace. Boughedir's Halfaouine: Child of the Terraces (Asfour Stah, 1990) is possibly the biggest popular success in the history of Tunisian cinema; it showed the life of a child from the Halfouine suburb of Tunis in the 1960s, and his quest to understand relationships, the world of women and how to be a man.
  In earlier films, including Man of Ashes (Rih Essedd, 1986), director and writer Nouri Bouzid depicts controversial issues in Tunisian society, addressing social issues like prostitution, pedophilia and inter-faith relations between Tunisian Muslims and Tunisian Jews. In the 1991 film Bezness, he explores the country's emerging sexual tourism trade.
  The Ambassadors (As-Soufraa, 1975), directed by Naceur Ktari, portrayed the life of immigrant Maghrebins in France and their struggle against racism. The film won the Golden Tanit for the best picture in the Carthage Film Festival in 1976 and the special jury award from the Locarno International Film Festival in the same year, and was classified in the Un Certain Regard category during the 1978 Cannes Film Festival.
  The first feature film ever to be directed by a woman in the Arab World was The Silences of Palace (Samt Al-Qusur, 1994). The director, Moufida Tlatli, won several international jury awards for her work. The movie shows the daily life in an aristocratic palace in Tunis through the eyes of a young woman.
  In 2007, 
caption: Naceur Ktari (2000)
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