Joint Possession

Morocco, France
Producer: Leila Kilani, Philippe Avril
Production Company: Socco Chicco Films

Project Logline:

On the hills of Tangier, the topography of the city is in turmoil. Pharaonic real estate projects have been launched. Staring at them, the common landscape of most Moroccan cities fringes, a succession of holes, muddy in the winter time, dusty in the summer, clandestine shelters, named the CLANDOS. A decent distance from a CLANDO, lays the Mansouria, an old manor house caught up by supine laxity. Amina lives there with her daughter Hasna and her son Anis. It is summer time. Hasna just announced her hasty second marriage. In a tense frantic atmosphere, the various members of the family organize a rush wedding. But also the family must make a decision upon the sale or not of a huge jointly owned lot of land that extends from the hills to the “clandos”. Amina is pushing the proposition of a real estate group that will turn them all into millionaires. Sun glasses, sexy curve-hugging caftans: Run away or dream on about the up-coming real estate coup? Eat or be eaten, mug or be mugged. There is no even point.

Leila Kilani was born in Morocco, she dreamt of being a clown. She studied Economy in Paris, obtaining a Master's Degree in Mediterranean History and Civilisation, and prepared a thesis at L'École des hautes études en sciences sociales. She shares her time between Paris and Tangiers. She started out making acclaimed documentaries in 2000 including TANGIERS, THE BURNERS' DREAM ("Tanger, Le rêve des brûleurs", 2002) about candidates for immigration to Europe, ZAD MOULTAKA, PASSAGES (2003), and OUR FORBIDDEN PLACES (2009) ON THE PLANK (2011), supported by SANAD, was her first feature film and was screened at Directors Fortnight in Cannes in 2011. Leïla Kilani is working on her second fiction, JOINT POSSESSION. She received in 2013 funds from the CNC for the conception of another project, A PRAY INTO THE SKY, about the fate of Touria Chaoui, the first Moroccan and Arab woman aircraft pilot.