Luca Guadagnino, who serves as president of the Marrakech Film Festival jury, spoke fluently in French about his North African heritage during the opening ceremony on Friday.
On stage with fellow jurors, including Jacob Elordi and Andrew Garfield, Guadagnino gave a lyrical speech in which he revealed his personal connection to Morocco.
“My Algerian mother grew up in Casablanca. She was half Moroccan, so I’m half Moroccan too,” said Guadagnino, whose jury will see the first and second films in competition during the week-long festival to award the Gold Star award.
“For me, Marrakesh and cinema are the same thing,” the director continued: “The ambiguity of the image, the power of montage, the contrast, the beauty and the all-consuming power that revive the cinema that I love, it embodies Marrakesh and Morocco.”
He recalled his first trip to Marrakesh in 2002, when he came to accompany a friend who was part of the short film jury, and said he was swept away by the friendship of Marrakesh. “I immediately rediscovered my deep roots,” Guadagnino said.
The outspoken director’s latest film, “Queer,” premiered at the Venice Film Festival, and Daniel Craig will likely receive an Oscar nomination for his role as a gay American expatriate in 1950s Mexico City. The A24 film is based on the 1985 novel by William S. Burroughs.
The Marrakesh Film Festival jury brings together Guadagnino and Garfield, who has just directed the thriller After The Hunt, also starring Julia Roberts. Elordi also has a relationship with Guadagnino who directed him alongside Margot Robbie in Chanel’s “See You At 5” promotional campaign. Elordi, who was famously shy of the press, appeared on the red carpet but smiled at reporters from a distance.
The rest of the Marrakesh jury also enjoys prestige, with “The Apprentice” director Ali Abbasi; Patricia Arquette; Indian director Zoya Akhtar; Belgian actress Virginie Efira; Moroccan actress Nadia Kunda, and Argentine director Santiago Mitri.
Abbasi was candid on the red carpet as he discussed the backlash to his Donald Trump-directed film “The Apprentice,” which opened at the Cannes Film Festival and was subject to controversy. The film recently made headlines after Sebastian Stan, who plays Trump in the picture, revealed that he could not be part of Variety’s Actors on Actors series because no other talent wanted to be paired with him.
I think the United States has returned to the McCarthy era again. “We are back in the 50s,” Abbasi said. “I don’t think the world will end because Mr. Trump became president, but that doesn’t mean I’ll be any less critical of him.”
In terms of talent roster, it is the biggest edition yet of the Marrakesh Film Festival led by powerful French actress Melita Toscan du Plantier, whom Guadagnino described as the “queen of filmmakers” on stage. He also thanked her, as did the King of Morocco, Mohammed VI, and Crown Prince Moulay Hassan for receiving him.
In addition to the judging panel, Toscan du Plantier has also invited Justine Treat, Tim Burton, David Cronenberg, Sean Penn, Alfonso Cuarón, Ava DuVernay, and Justin Kurzel, among others, who will participate in a masterclass that is free and open to the public. Treat, Cuaron, Burton, and Cronenberg attended the opening ceremony.
The opening ceremony was followed by a screening of Justin Kurzel’s political thriller “The Order,” starring Jude Law as an FBI agent fighting neo-Nazi terrorists. Kurzel, who took to the stage with his producer Stuart Ford to introduce the film, credited the classic American films of Sidney Lumet and William Friedkin as “huge sources of inspiration.”
“I love what they did with this type of movie specifically. They grounded them and brought chaos to the main heroes. The ways in which these characters fail in a way,” Kurzel said, adding that Law’s role in “The Order” is “a throwback to those Great characters.” Kurzel has a long history with Marrakech, where he won the Jury Prize for his first film, “Snowtown,” in 2011.
The 21st session of the festival, supervised by Remy Bonhomme, will screen 70 films from 32 countries, including 12 Moroccan films.