Film still from Mostafa Derkaoui’s Amghar

(3.7)

AMGHAR

Technical details

Screenplay and direction: Mostafa Derkaoui
Duration: 4 min
Year: 1968
Film format: 35mm
Silent
Production: PWSFTviT / documentary study

synopsis

The capture of Mouha ou Hammou Zayani (1863-1921), leader of the Amazigh tribe fighting against the French colonial army from 1914 to 1921.

Moha ou Hammou le Zaiani, un royaume berbère contemporain au Maroc [a contemporary Berber kingdom in Morocco] (1877 - 1921), François Berger, Editions l’Atlas Marrakech, 1929, personal collection

For his first short student film in Lódź (a silent 4-minute fiction film), Mostafa Derkaoui focused on the history of Berber Moroccan resistance, and shot a historical re-enactment in the Polish countryside. Abdelkader Lagtaa acted in the film whilst Derkaoui’s brother, Abdelkrim was behind the camera. For this film, Derkaoui was inspired by a book lent to him before his departure by fellow Moroccan filmmakers, Ahmed Bouanani and Mustapha Khayat.

“Worse still, certain events have been hidden. The unrest that shook the entire Moroccan territory in 1958, the Rif’s attempt at secession, the Casablanca riot of the 23rd of March 1965, and the aborted military coups of 1971 and 1972, were purely and simply erased from the official history of Morocco. The same applies to the resistance efforts of Mouha ou Hammou in 1914 and particularly the Rif War (1921-25) in the first version of Memory 14. […] As we have already written, it seems clear that a policy, undeclared thought it may be, has decided that Moroccan memory should be struck by amnesia and only be aware of events–but not all events–from 1956 onwards.”

Ahmed Bouanani, 1986

D In this extract from La Septième Porte, Une Histoire du Cinéma au Maroc de 1907 à 1986 [The Seventh Gate, A History of Cinema in Morocco from 1907 to 1986], (1986, Kulte Editions, Rabat, 2020), Ahmed Bouanani looks at the concealment of historical events by the Moroccan state through the example of the censorship of his film Mémoire 14 (1971) in which he attempted to recount the resistance efforts of Mouha ou Hammou.