In 2015, Olfa Hamrouni, a Tunisian mother of four daughters, plunged into a nightmare. In fact, his two elders, Rahama and Ghofrane, left to join the armed group Islamic State in Libya. How did these two teenagers become radicalized? And why ? So many questions that haunt Olfa Hamrouni and her two youngest daughters, Eya and Tayssir, and which are at the heart of the documentary Olfa’s daughters, by Kaouther Ben Hania. In order to fill the absence of Rahama and Ghofrane, the filmmaker had the idea of inviting two actresses to play them. The result is a fascinating hybrid work.
In fact, the two young girls now imprisoned are not the only ones to be played by actresses. Olfa is also, by Hend Sabri, during the reconstructions, but also during the “meta” passages where Kaouther Ben Hania films the making of his film.
On these occasions, the real Eya and Tayssir interact with the doubles of their sisters and their mother. Sometimes, the real Olfa intervenes, correcting a line or clarifying a particular intention. Note that actor Majd Mastoura plays all the male characters, from Olfa’s ex-husband to her subsequent lover, including a police officer.
The fact that Olfa Hamrouni is, in reality, a larger-than-life character adds to the film’s power of attraction. She has always fiercely protected her four daughters. Hence the incomprehension and dejection to which she is still prey when she revisits the events preceding the sudden departure of Rahama and Ghofrane.
In this regard, undoubtedly the most poignant passages are those where Olfa, Eya and Tayssir meet Nour Karoui and Ichraq Matar, responsible for interpreting Rahama and Ghofrane, respectively. Their presence upsets the mother and sisters, whose reaction transcends the “docufiction” device and hits us right in the heart.
Regarding the said device, moreover, Kaouther Ben Hania uses it not only with discernment, but brilliantly. Far from trying to hide or attenuate the artifice, the director and her director of photography, Farouk Laaridh, exacerbate it by means of sophisticated compositions, complex lighting and a palette worthy of Pedro Almodóvar (who would certainly not deny this story conjugated in the feminine plural).
The technique is very perfect: we only have to think of this shot where we think we see Olfa reflected in the mirror, to realize that it is rather Hend Sabri, from behind, looking at Olfa. Olfa who takes to the game straight away… Noting the similarities between Ghofrane and the actress who plays her, she is euphoric, as if she had found her daughter, then, the pain returns, immense.
The emotional charge deployed could not be more real.
Break the cycle
The interactions between Olfa Hamrouni, her daughters and the actresses also give rise to enlightening discussions where the first reveals herself in her contradictions. With a strong temperament, she fought from adolescence against the men who tried to force their way into her mother’s house: she confides that she did bodybuilding and started dressing like a boy in order to to intimidate potential attackers. On her wedding night, she stood up to her overly brusque husband (recreated memory), whom she eventually divorced.
Except that alongside these impulses for self-determination, she admits to thinking that a woman’s body is the property of a man, and raised her daughters accordingly. This, while being sorry to reproduce to the letter what she reproaches her own mother.
And Olfa’s interpreter points out to the latter that her two youngest daughters are precisely in the process of breaking this cycle…
In short, rather than lessening the impression of ambient authenticity, the bias towards hybridization amplifies it, by contrast. In other words, a targeted pretense becomes, paradoxically, the ally of a larger truth.
Ultimately, we can only applaud that the tragedy of this exceptional woman would have been handled in such an unorthodox manner. This is certainly another reason why Olfa’s daughters captivates and capsizes the viewer at this point.