The Feminine Mashriq: THE SILENCES OF THE PALACE

TW: This film includes a scene of sexual assault. It occurs from 1:02:46 to 1:03:53

For the third installment of The Feminine Mashriq, we won’t be in the Mashriq at all. Instead, we head to the Maghreb region (Northwest Africa) to look at the film, The Silences of the Palace. Written and directed by Moufida Tlatli, Silences of the Palace debuted in 1994 and received numerous accolades including Cannes’ Golden Camera and Toronto International Film Festival’s Critics’ Award. This is Tlatli’s first feature length film and is a coming of age story about a young woman named Alia who is born into servitude. Alia is unaware of who her father is, but grows up closely with her mother Khadijah and a group of kitchen staff working in a prince’s palace during the occupation by France. Inspired by her last years with her mother, Tlatli realized she knew little about her mother’s history and found her silence about her origins frustrating. So she decided to make a film where a young woman is able to find her voice.

Long, lingering shots convey the lackadaisical daily lives of these women, some of whom seem grateful for their position in the palace while others clearly feel trapped. The palace’s upper level holds gilded decor and exquisite Moor-ish architecture; A perfect distraction from the dank and bare lower level that acts as the servant’s quarters. The space itself is a beautiful prison. It’s a jail with a lush garden contained by wrought iron gates. Our protagonist herself has never been off of the palace grounds. All she knows of Tunisia is the violence she hears on the radio. As she grows more assured in herself, she is forced to question if the violence of the outside world could possibly be worse than the violence she has to witness her mother experience. She must wonder how much longer she has until that same violence is turned to her.

Tlatli’s mise-en-scene is as decadent as it is raw. She lets every shot sit with the brilliant performances long enough to feel like the characters are actually right in front of you. Though the women in her film are abused and oppressed, she never lets them become victims to the audience’s gaze. They move with dignity and valor throughout the film and are in control of themselves even in their darkest moments. This is most likely due to Tlatli having the servant women be stand-ins for Tunisia as a whole, while the monarchs act as France. This film is a perfect example of a person being allowed to tell their own story, avoiding an overly traumatic depiction of life and death in “The Orient.”

The Silences of the Palace is a stunning feminist melodrama. It’s a dense and cruel journey to self liberation and in turn, national liberation. This film helps contextualize what colonization looks like in the day to day. It makes exploitation of a people, which can be vast and inaccessible, clear and audible. Tlatli’s genius lies in making such a large concept bite sized. When we see Alia sing her way to freedom, we see the people of Tunisia refuse to sit in silence.

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The Feminine Mashriq is a series shining light on the thriving independent cinema of the Arab world - 50% of which is made by women and femme directors. This series will focus on narratives that don’t explicitly center on war or poverty, but instead the mundane, poetic, and human aspects of taking up space in the MENA region. Each week we will highlight a film from a different country and explore the idea of national and regional cinema.