When mom visits Paris and you're actually broke as hell — the immigrant lie we all know.
A young Algerian in Paris has not been as successful as he claims in letters home, and when his mother unexpectedly arrives for a visit of several months, he is hard put to hide his circumstances -- and the fact that he has resorted to small-time criminal activity to support himself. His mother disembarks in her traditional attire, a warm-hearted woman who does not have a clue as to how this foreign society functions but also has absolutely no inhibitions about finding out, if the need arises. As the story progresses, the mother catches on to her son's circumstances though the two are still not able to confront the deception and right it. Even with a low budget, this first-time feature-length story by Bahloul Bahloul combines satire, comedy, and pathos to bring home a relationship between mother and son that transcends life's many obstacles.
Acting
Chafia Boudraa's mother — warm, stubborn, devastatingly perceptive.
Writing
Satire that never punches down at its struggling characters.
Director
Abdelkrim Bahloul
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Made during France's tense 1980s immigration debates, the film quietly humanizes Algerian diaspora experience without centering white French perspective at all.
Abdellatif Kechiche would later direct Blue Is the Warmest Color — you can see his obsession with unspoken longing and physical performance already forming here.
FR
