Il est chrétien, elle est musulmane. Un amour impossible?

A short that explores why marriage is forbidden between a Muslim woman and a Christian man, filming conversations with her mother, an elderly friend of her father ("Does it reflect the image?" he asks of the camera. "And it records sound too?"), religious scholars, and finally her beloved.

In this film, May El-Hossamy brings her family members and others in front of the camera to discuss love, marriage and relationships between Muslims and Christians in Egyptian society.


by May El Hossamy

2012 / Egypt, France / 21 min /, Documentary

"In Egypt, 85 per cent of people are Muslim, so why pick from the 15 per cent of Christians?" The question - somewhat rhetorical as it could easily be heard as an injunction - becomes more complicated when May El Hossamy's mother reminds her daughter that she herself had originally been Christian and had converted to Islam "so that [her children] would not be perturbed". In Défense d'aimer, the filmmaker's need to convince her mother and the whole of Egyptian society that her love is legitimate drives her to throw back at opponents the child's question: "Why"? Soon, as in a tale from the Arabian Nights, one answers leads to another, and the old Muslim sage tells her to see the imam "if you want to know more". Arguments and sophistries overlay a male domination that is neither national nor religious, but universal. The only interlocutor that remains: her beloved. And finally the ability to enter the image oneself by letting go of the shot-countershot - choosing the simplest mise en scene provides the ideal riposte to being forbidden to love. (Charlotte Garson / Cinéma du Réel International Documentary Film Festival 2013, Paris)



9th Rencontres de l'Image at Cairo's French Cultural Centre this Monday, after a week of screenings of Egyptian documentaries and shorts.


2013 | Marseille Documentary Film Festival
* Selected

2013 | 1res Rencontres Internationales des Cinémas Arabes de Marseille / Marseilles' Arab Film Meetings | MARSEILLE, France, May 2013
* Selected

2013 | 9th Rencontres de l'Image | French Cultural Centre, Cairo, Egypt | April 2013
* Best Documentary Short


2013 | Cinéma du Réel, Paris, France | 21st-31st March
* Selected / Sélectionné
* Screening: Friday 22 March 18H00 Petite Salle
* Screening: Sunday 24 March 18H45 Cinéma 1
* Screening: Friday 29 March 16H15 Cinéma 2
www.cinemadureel.org/en/festival-2013/programme/international-short-films-competition/defense-daimer