The Rooftops
The Rooftops By Merzak Allouache Best Director From The Arab World/ Narrative Competition- The chants of muezzin calling the faithful to prayer echo across the rooftops of Algiers five times a day, from dawn to midnight. The chants are heard on five rooftops in different neighborhoods, by five groups of people whose stories are snapshots of contemporary Algiers. On one roof, a man is being tortured because he refuses sign a document that appears to involve real estate. On another, an old man is imprisoned in a wooden cage, and tells stories about his life as a revolutionary, to a young girl. An elderly woman lives in a shabby hut on top of an apartment building, tenderly caring for her emotionally damaged niece and the niece’s drug addict son. A rock band practices on another roof, the female singer silently observed by a neighbor woman wearing a hijab. An alcoholic lives in a squalid rooftop washroom, illegally renting out space to a boxer and to a man who claims to be a spiritual counselor. Over a 24-hour period, there is humanity, violence, love, politics, religion, death, music, drugs, and food and director Merzak Allouache juggles all his elements masterfully. Allouache says that the film continues his exploration of the contradictions of Algeria. “As the Arab world is rocked by a series of crises without precedent, Algeria seems to be, paradoxically, serene, turned onto itself, almost indifferent. It cherishes its new peace after a decade of bloody terrorism. However the reality is quite different.”
Margarita Landazuri