On the occasion of its 21st edition, which takes place from November 29th to December 7th, 2024, the Marrakech International Film Festival will present 70 films selected from 32 countries in its various sections: the Official Competition, Gala Screenings, Special Screenings, the 11th Continent, the Moroccan Panorama, Cinema for Young Audiences & Families, and films shown as part of the Tributes program.

Earlier today, the Moroccan festival announced that Italian Algerian filmmaker and fashionista Luca Guadagnino will replace Danish helmer Thomas Vinterberg, who had previously been appointed president of the jury and had to excuse himself for family reasons.

“I will never forget the first time I arrived in Marrakech,” Guadagnino confessed in a written statement, after being named Jury President for this year’s edition. “It must’ve been more than 20 years ago, when I was a guest of my friend Valentina Cervi, who was sitting on the jury of the short film competition. I had never been to Morocco before but my Algerian mother grew up there and moved to Casablanca at the age of five. The first time I landed in the great city of Marrakech it was because of this amazing festival and since then for me the City and Cinema are indissolubly connected. My Arab DNA is really, really engraved in the amazing powers of the festival of Marrakech and it is a tremendous honor to lead a wonderful jury for the 21st edition—I am thrilled to see all the great movies and to meet all the great filmmakers participating this year.” It’s an extraordinary decision and he’s joined by a who’s-who of international cinematic talents.

Among them, Iranian director Ali Abbasi, Indian director Zoya Akhtar, American actor Patricia Arquette, Belgian actor Virginie Efira, Australian actor Jacob Elordi, British-American actor Andrew Garfield, Moroccan actor Nadia Kounda, and Argentine director Santiago Mitre.

The jury will award the 21st edition's Étoile d’Or to one of the 14 films in competition, following last year's winner, Asmae El Moudir's The Mother of All Lies, decided by a jury chaired by Jessica Chastain. 

The Official Competition seeks to reveal new talents in world cinema through 14 first and second films. The filmmakers vying for the Étoile d’Or explore a wide range of cinematic genres, from melodrama and documentary to futuristic storytelling and romantic comedy.

The titles chosen include Moroccan filmmakers Saïd Hamich Benlarbi and Hind Meddeb respectively present Across the Sea, a luminous love film about exile, and Sudan, Remember Us, a poetic ode to the resistance of Sudanese youth. Other films in the competition take a humanist look at current events, including the situation in Ukraine in Under the Volcano, Damian Kocur's powerful second feature, and in Somalia in The Village Next to Paradise, Mo Harawe's tale of love and resilience. With The Wolves Always Come at Night, Gabrielle Brady probes the consequences of climate change in Mongolia in a documentary with splendid images. 

Films from Asia list among them Huo Xin’s Bound in Heaven, which delivers a portrait of strong women to tackle the issue of domestic violence in China, and The Maw Naing's Ma—Cry of Silence , a depiction of the courageous struggle of Burmese women workers. In their debut feature films, Muhammed Hamdy and Dania Reymond-Boughenou plunge viewers into the history of their respective countries: Egypt in the hypnotic Perfumed with Mint and Algeria in the fantastical Silent Storms, which makes its international premiere in Marrakech. The new revelation of Turkish cinema, Murat Fıratoğlu, presents One of Those Days When Hemme Dies, a graphic work about a man determined to triumph over injustice.

Two films in the Competition take advantage of unspoken elements of the family unit to expose societal realities: a Palestinian family living in Haifa in Scandar Copti's Happy Holidays and Argentinian families in Silvina Schnicer's The Cottage, which comes to Marrakech as an international premiere. Finally, two charming comic dramas portray youths searching for their voices: Neo Sora traces the political awakening of Japanese high school students in the futuristic Happyend, while Laura Piani's Jane Austen Wrecked My Life is a funny, heartfelt film about the romantic hopes of a bookseller.

This year’s opening night film is The Order, a crime thriller directed by Justin Kurzel, who is back for the third time to the Marrakech International Film Festival, as Screen points out. “Kurzel's debut feature Snowtown won the festival's top prize, the Etoile d'Or, in 2011, and the filmmaker returned in 2022 to serve on the jury.” The Order world premiered in Venice and stars Jude Law as an FBI agent who goes after a white supremacist terrorist group known as the Order, which really existed and was active in the United States in the 1980s.

Also on Screen, by clicking the link above you’ll be able to find the complete lineup, which is extensive and includes retrospectives of the Honorees’ work, including Sean Penn’s and the late Moroccan actress Naïma Elmcherqui. And a line up from filmmakers from the “11th Continent” whose work doesn’t belong to any country in particular but offers a world’s eye view second to none.

The prestigious six Gala Screenings for this year’s edition present some of the most eagerly awaited international films of the year. Brazilian filmmaker Walter Salles’s I'm Still Here is a deeply moving family drama that recounts the courageous struggle of a woman confronted with the disappearance of her husband during the military dictatorship. In Marrakech for its Moroccan premiere, Nabil Ayouch’s Everybody Loves Touda is a portrait of a free woman featuring an incandescent performance by Nisrine Erradi. Both are candidates for the Best International Film Academy Award, representing their respective countries. David Cronenberg, the great master of science fiction to whom the Festival pays tribute this year, brings his most personal film, The Shrouds, to Marrakech. Carine Tardieu presents The Ties That Bind Us, a benevolent film about motherhood centered on a sensitive performance by Valeria Bruni-Tedeschi. Mohammad Rasoulof’s The Seed of the Sacred Fig, also an Oscar candidate is about a family film that veers towards the thriller genre, represents a powerful plea for freedom in Iran. Rasoulof is expected to be in Marrakech to present the film. The Gala Screenings program closes with David Oelhoffen's Fourth Wall, which takes place in war-torn Lebanon in 1982 and questions the role of art in times of conflict.

For more information about the festival, please visit their website.

Images used with permission.