Une histoire du cinéma français. Héritages maghrébins

For over sixty years, French cinema has been transformed by the impetus of filmmakers, actors and actresses from Maghrebi immigration. Their works have introduced new narratives, new faces and new forms, redefining the imaginaries of the seventh art. The exhibition "Une nouvelle histoire du cinéma Français" traces this history by highlighting those who have contributed to shaping and continue to shape French cinema.

Directors, from the pioneer Ali Ghanem to Mehdi Charef, Rachid Bouchareb, Hafsia Herzi or Lina Soualem, as well as actors Jamel Debbouze, Rachida Brakni, Roschdy Zem or Sami Bouajila, have contributed to shaping a unique cultural history.

Their journeys, between France and the Maghreb, have helped redefine, over generations, the imaginaries of French cinema.

Their films, often pioneering, have paved the way for unprecedented narratives, blending the experience of exile, the quest for identity, and the renewal of cinematographic forms.

Rather than focusing on figures of immigration as they have been represented on screen, "Une nouvelle histoire du cinéma français" chooses to place itself on the side of the artists who, since the 1960s, have written large parts of the history of French cinema without this history ever having been told.

Through film excerpts, posters, production photographs, storyboards, iconic cinema objects such as Césars, and press archives, "Une nouvelle histoire du cinéma français" offers a concrete and sensitive journey through this history.

The exhibition brings into dialogue widely recognised works and others more rarely shown, sometimes restored or digitised for the occasion.

The exhibition concludes with a sequence looking towards the future: the irruption of genre cinema, the importance of women, formal freedom, the audacity of narratives, and the emergence of new voices circulating between the two shores.