Portrait: four filmmakers of edition 5

There are four of them. Two women, two men, and one thing in common: a first film to bring to life. Selected for edition 5 of Let's Make Your Film, Sirine Achir, Aghiles Rebrab, Borhane Cherbal and Inès Daif went the whole way with us, from the writing residency to the edit. Here are their films, and what they say about the people behind them.

Let's start with Sirine Achir. Her film, Aswat, is the only documentary of the edition, or more precisely a 12-minute docu-fiction. Its subject: children born anonymously and the mothers who had to let them go. On both sides, the same trauma, and a longing for reunion that rarely speaks its name.

Sirine's choice lies in the title: aswat means voices. The film relies on sound testimonies, words that stayed in the shadows. It is a bold choice for a first film: trusting sound as much as image, and letting the audience listen to what we usually prefer to keep quiet.

Aghiles Rebrab, for his part, films a heroine with her back to the wall. In Soumeya, a 30-minute fiction, a 27-year-old woman is preparing for a decisive job interview. The day before, a pregnancy test turns everything upside down. Supported by her flatmate Lynda, she looks for a way out and runs into the silence, then the rejection, of those around her.

What strikes you in Aghiles's project is its directness. The film stays close to Soumeya without ever judging her. It is the portrait of a woman who refuses to let others decide for her, and of people who would rather stay silent than help.

With Le Reflet, Borhane Cherbal takes on grief. Aïssa keeps a roll of film he has never dared to have developed, a memory of his lost wife. His daughter Louiza wants to talk about the absence her father keeps silent. The film runs 25 minutes.

Borhane builds his story around an image we never see: what the film roll holds remains suspended. Between father and daughter a dream opens up, a beach where the dead brush against the living. Le Reflet is about what we keep, what we reveal and what we finally let go.

Finally, Inès Daif takes her camera to Annaba. L'Être indélébile, 29 minutes, tells the story of Fatiha, in her fifties, who lives alone with her daughter Leila. The day Leila drowns, everything collapses. Eaten up by remorse, haunted by rumours of suicide, Fatiha slowly withdraws into a shadow of herself.

It is probably the darkest film of the edition. Inès looks guilt, the weight of rumour and what remains when you have lost everything straight in the eye. An intimate drama, carried by a mother character of a kind rarely seen on screen.

Four films, four subjects, but one shared path. The four winners first went through CinéMash, the writing residency organised with Solis Production, the Institut français d'Algérie and the British Council. Their scripts were read and discussed there with artists from other disciplines, until they found their final shape.

Then came summer 2024 and the shoots, between Algiers, Blida, Sétif and Annaba. About a week per film, with equipment and logistics provided, volunteer technicians and trainees on set. For each of the four, it was the leap from page to set, with a full crew around them.

What also brings them together is the courage of their subjects. Anonymous birth, unexpected pregnancy, grief, drowning and rumour: none of them took the easy road. That is exactly what Let's Make Your Film wants to support: singular voices with something to say, who need a framework to say it.

The films are now in post-production: editing, colour grading, sound mixing, subtitling. Their release is planned for September 2025, with a premiere in Algiers, followed by a tour through the network of cinémathèques and the branches of the Institut français d'Algérie.

And you? If you too are carrying a first film, keep an eye on our Call for applications page: that is where the next edition will open. In the meantime, find Aswat, Soumeya, Le Reflet and L'Être indélébile in the Films section.