Single parent in Morocco: “Adam” tells of female solidarity – cinema

– New in the cinema: The Moroccan chamber play “Adam” is a jewel of delicate beauty.

Samia (Nisrin Erradi), heavily pregnant, knocks on every door in the alleys of Casablanca to offer himself as a domestic help. But when you look at the nine-month belly, the neighbors’ expression darkens, because a young woman who is expecting an illegitimate child is poorly regarded in Morocco.

Abla (Lubna Azabal) also first slams the door in her face. The widow lives alone with her daughter Warda (Douae Belkhaouda) and runs a small bakery out of the window. But when she saw Samia crouching in the doorway across the street late at night, she called the pregnant woman in to her. Just for one night, Abla explains gruffly.

Against their will, Samia makes herself useful the next day and bakes the elaborate Rziza pastries, which sell well. Finally, Abla offers her to live with her until the child is born.

Slow approach

The two women approach each other only very slowly. Abla doesn’t want to hear about the fate of the young woman. She’s just getting by with her daughter and has locked herself in the grief for her husband. Samia, on the other hand, is not very hopeful about the birth of her child. She wants to put the newborn up for adoption right away, because it won’t stand a chance as a “bastard”.

The Moroccan filmmaker Maryam Touzani tells with great sensitivity of the slowly awakening empathy of the two women for one another in a society in which single mothers are stigmatized and solidarity among women is not a matter of course. In atmospherically dense images, the narrow bakery becomes a place of confrontation and rapprochement, while the outside world passes through the small window as if on a theater stage. A delicate, haunting film of quiet beauty. (98 min.)

The film is shown in these cinemas.

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