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Tribute to Tayeb Louhichi

Gorée, the island of the grandfather ( Tunisia 1987 )

Color: Documentary, 50’30’’

Direction: Taïeb Louhichi

Screenplay: Taîeb LOUHICHI

Director of Photography: Ramon SUAREZ

Sound: Hichmi JOULAK

Music: Jimmy OWENS

Editing: Moufida TLATI

Production: Taïeb LOUHICHI/ Jean – Michel CARRE

Synopsis

JIMMY OWENS, a prominent American jazz trumpeter arrives at Gorée, in Dakar. He settled in the historical "House of Slaves". One night, the sound of his trumpet rose. An old fisherman and his little son listen to it from the other side of the island. The air of the Louis Armstrong song "Nobody knows the trouble I’ve seen," that the musician played, causes a violent crisis for the old man. He tells his story to the boy.

Réalisateur

Taïeb Louhichi studied Cinema in Paris. He also holds a doctorate in humanities and sociology. He has directed several short films, including My Village, a village among many others, Tanit gold JCC 1972, The Metayer, Carthage year 12. In 1982, he wrote and directed his first feature film, Shadow of the earth, selected and awarded at the Critics’ Week at Cannes and in many international festivals. His career grows, successively by Goree The Island of the grandfather (1987), Special Jury Prize in Algiers, Layla, my reason (Mejnoun Layla), 1989, selected in official competition at the Venice Film Festival and awarded in Milan and Ouagadougou, Marriage of a moon, awarded in Bari, Montreal, Johannesburg and the dance of the wind. In 2006, Taieb Louhichi was victim of a car accident in Dubai when he was there to preside over a film festival. He loses the use of his limbs. But the filmmaker is the kind of people who, whatever obstacles they face, still keep the desire to move forward, leaving a permanent mark of their passage. The man who is named "the most African Tunisian filmmakers” or also “the filmmaker of the desert” in reference to his birth in 1948 to Mareth (south of Tunisia) and the way he films the Sahara, continues his path in developing projects, writing scenarios and maybe even a book. He shoots a documentary, People of the spark, in 2011. Currently he just completed The Children of the Sun, a fictional feature.