'Queen Mom'

Source: © Kazak Productions – Frakas Productions – ARTE France Cinéma - 2024

‘Queen Mom’

French sales outfit Totem Films has acquired international rights to Arab Blues director Manele Labidi’s second feature Queen Mom and will kick off sales at EFM next month in Berlin. 

The film, now in post, blends social drama and bittersweet comedy and follows a Tunisian family living in France in the early1990s, exploring questions of identity, generational conflict and racism.

Queen Mom stars Cesar-winning actress Camelia Jordana and well-known rapper turned actor Sofiane Zermani. The two reteam after co-starring in Mehdi Fikri’s  police violence drama After the Fire.  Damien Bonnard co-stars.

Arab Blues premiered at Venice’s Giornate Degli Autori in 2019 and starred Golshifteh Farahani as a Tunisian-born psychoanalyst who moves back to her homeland after living in Paris. It was released in over 40 territories and was nominated for a best first film Cesar award and a Lumiere award in 2021

Kazak Productions, whose credits include Arab Blues, as well as Corsage, produces with Belgium’s Frakas Productions, with support from Arte France Cinema. The film was pre-sold to Arte, Canal+, Amazon Prime Video, RTBF and Proximus. Diaphana will release the film in France.