The Mother of All Lies

Based on a childhood photo, the director builds his neighborhood in miniature. Innovatively, THE MOTHER OF ALL LIES tells the story of a family, parallel to the history of Morocco.

With the help of her father, El Moudir builds a replica of the neighborhood she grew up in. The result is a beautiful handmade reinterpretation of their shared past, filled with dolls resembling the various family members and neighbors. Here, the director confronts her childhood memories, especially a fateful day in 1981 when Fatima, a young girl in the neighborhood, died.

An economic crisis in the country led to what is referred to as the Casablanca bread riots in 1981. It is believed that over 600 people died in the riot, but most of the deaths were covered up. Fatima was the same age as the director when she died, which deeply moved El Moudir. In this way, The Mother of All Lies beautifully addresses both a personal and a national trauma in Morocco.

The film won two awards at the Cannes Film Festival, among them for best director in the section Un certain regard.

«The Mother of All Lies is an astonishing work whose maturity comes from El Moudir’s wide-eyed approach to her family history, where memory and history are quite literally reduced to playthings in order to process the unspeakable events they conjure up.»
– Manuel Betancourt, Variety –

Red.

Director

Asmae El Moudir (b. 1990) is a Moroccan film director, screenwriter, and producer. She studied at La Femis in Paris and holds a master's degree in film production from the Superior Institute of Information and Communication in Rabat. El Moudir has directed documentaries for SNRT, Al Jazeera Documentary, BBC, and Al Araby TV. After making several short films, she created the documentary The Postcard in 2020, and later The Mother of All Lies, which premiered at the Cannes Film Festival.

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