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PRODUCTION / FUNDING France / Morocco

EXCLUSIVE: Sofia Alaoui’s Animalia is now in post-production

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- Oumaïma Barid, Mehdi Dehbi, Fouad Oughaou and Souad Khouyi star in the cast of the director’s first feature, produced by Wrong Films in league with SRAB Films

EXCLUSIVE: Sofia Alaoui’s Animalia is now in post-production
(On the first row, from left to right) Actress Oumaïma Barid, director Sofia Alaoui and actor Fouad Oughaou on the set of Animalia

After 35 days on set, last week saw Sofia Alaoui wrap filming on her first feature film Animalia [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Sofia Alaoui
film profile
]
. For the cast of what’s described as "a mystical journey through modern-day Morocco, part social drama and part science-fiction", the filmmaker who turned countless heads with So What if the Goats Die (awarded the Jury Grand Prize at Sundance 2020 and the 2021 César for Best Short Film) has gathered together the likes of Oumaïma Barid (making her big screen debut), Belgium’s Mehdi Dehbi (who leads the cast of the Messiah series and whom we’ll also be seeing next year in Boys from Heaven), Fouad Oughaou (who also bagged a role in the director’s multi-award-winning short) and Souad Khouyi.

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Written by Sofia Alaoui herself, the story revolves around 22-year-old Itto, a newly wed who’s living with her husband at her in-laws’ home while pregnant. As her pregnancy nears its end, a supernatural event turns their daily lives upside down… For the record, this project was the recipient of the International Arte Kino International Prize at the Atlas Workshops in 2020.

Animalia is produced by Thomas Carillon and Margaux Laurier on behalf of Wrong Films, with co-production outsourced to SRAB Films and Morocco’s Jiango Films and Dounia Productions acting as associate producers. Likewise co-produced by Arte France Cinéma, the feature film has been pre-purchased by Canal+, Ciné+ and Arte, and benefits from an advance on receipts from the CNC and the Centre Cinématographique Marocain, as well as support from the SOFICA companies Cinémage, SG Image and Cinécap, and backing from Procirep and Angoa. Distribution in France is entrusted to Ad Vitam.

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(Translated from French)

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