vernon film society
Bringing the best in world and Canadian film to film lovers of Vernon and the North Okanagan
SATIN ROUGECountry: France/Tunisia "One of the more
intoxicating movies of recent memory." –
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| Lilia soon becomes a regular at the cabaret, first sewing costumes for the dancers, then shyly taking performance lessons in the dressing room from Folla. So long trapped in a cocoon of loneliness and melancholy, Lilia finally emerges from her matronly, featureless life when, one night, she is convinced to take the stage with her new-found dancing talents. Her release of long-pent up sensuality is met with great success and a new cabaret star is born. While exhilarated, Lilia’s life becomes increasingly complicated as she must now negotiate a double-life as mother and respectable seamstress by day and dancing temptress by night. Amari’s SATIN ROUGE is an Arab-world, mid-life, rags-to-sequins saga, sumptuously told, and above all, richly empowering. "A fascinating examination of the joyous, turbulent self-discovery made by a proper, middle-aged woman." - Chicago Tribune |
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Writer/Director,
Raja Amari, fashions a surprising gem with SATIN ROUGE,
a “Shirley Valentine-esqe” mid-life tale
set in Tunisia. Lilia (Hiyam Abbas), a widowed seamstress,
has little excitement in her life, devoted to keeping
her family apartment clean and caring for her self-involved
teenage daughter Selma (Hend El Fahem). Noticing a suspicious
trend in her daughter’s activities, Lilia begins
to suspect that Selma is slipping out to the neighbourhood
cabaret. One night, Lilia goes to the cabaret to investigate
and comes face-to-face with the club’s swirling
revelry of belly dancers and male partiers. Initially,
repulsed by these images, the prim Lilia becomes increasingly
fascinated by the movement of the dancers and the excitement
of the experience. Drawn again to the night club the
next night, she is befriended by Folla (Monia Hichri),
the club’s outgoing lead belly dancer.