11/07/2016 - Principal photography is currently under way for this 4 à 4 Productions film, which will be distributed in France by Epicentre Films

Actress Hafsia Herzi

Since 30 June, Mehdi Ben Attia has been in Tunis shooting his third feature film: The Love of Men [+see also:
trailer
film profile]. Having made a name for himself in 2010 with The String [+see also:
trailer
film profile] and been selected in the 2013 Berlinale Forum with I’m Not Dead [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile], the director has called on Hafsia Herzi (winner of Venice’s Marcello Mastroianni Award in 2007, as well as the César Award for Most Promising Actress and the Lumière Award for Best New Actress in 2008 for her role in La Graine et le mulet [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Hafsia Herzi
film profile], a 2009 European Film Promotion Shooting Star, who recently graced the screen in Par Accident [+see also:
trailer
film profile] and will be appearing in Sylvie Verheyde’s Sex Doll [+see also:
trailer
film profile] from September) to head up the cast, with support from Tunisian actor Raouf Ben Amor, among others.

Written by the director (who notably co-wrote the screenplay for André Téchiné’s Unforgivable [+see also:
trailer
film profile]) and Martin Drouot, the script is set in modern-day Tunis. Amel, a 25-year-old photographer, lives with her husband, Nabil, in her in-laws’ flat located in the middle of a bustling neighbourhood. Her happiness crumbles when her husband dies in an accident. Amel would be alone in this world, if not for the affection that her father-in-law, Taïeb, shows her. She takes refuge in her work and the meetings she has with boys from the street in order to take their portrait shots. She is particularly troubled by one of them, Rabah, while she starts falling for a young intellectual with whom she works, Sami. Between the all-too-perfect memory of her husband, her father-in-law’s increasingly suffocating affection and the excitement of shooting her young models, Amel discovers a new life.

Produced by David Mathieu-Mahias and Mani Mortazavi for Parisian company 4 à 4 Productions, which has titles such as Poison Friends [+see also:
trailer
film profile] and Un Enfant de toi [+see also:
trailer
film profile] on its books, The Love of Men has a co-production agreement with the Tunisian outfit Cinétéléfilms as well as an advance on receipts from the CNC. As a reminder, the project was awarded in the most recent Locarno Film Festival’s Open Doors co-production lab. Principal photography is currently under way in Tunis and is slated to wrap in early August, with Antoine Parouty (Les Invisibles [+see also:
trailer
film profile], Portrait of the Artist [+see also:
trailer
film profile]) serving as DoP. The film’s French distribution will be handled by Epicentre Films.

(Translated from French)