Filming of the film “Autisto” by Jérôme Cohen Olivar has started in Casablanca. This feature film produced by Zhor Fassi Fihri and starring the sultry Loubna Abidar in the lead role, returning to Moroccan cinema after ten years of absence, evokes, as we will have understood, the theme of autistic children.
A theme that touches the director personally and it is for this very reason that the preparation of the film was particularly arduous, sometimes painful for four years. “I met the producer Zhor Fassi Fihri and with her we modified the script of the film which was originally a co-production between the United States, Israel and Morocco», affirms Jérôme Cohen Olivar for Le360.
Filming began on June 10 and will last a total of six weeks. The budget, as specified by the producer, is around 8.5 million dirhams, but this amount will be revised upwards in post-production. “Jérôme would like to add special effects among other things, and we will probably have to do another fundraising, look for sponsors to complete the financing», confides the producer.
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Loubna Abidar was chosen to play the character of Adam’s mother, a severely autistic child. Lowly paid while working as a waitress in a bar, she must manage the harshness of her daily life and her constant efforts to help her son to be a minimum of independent and to prevent him from being rejected by society. “Loubna Abidar was chosen for the quality of her acting. She is an excellent actress and she is totally made for this role», Enthuses Jérôme Cohen Olivar.
The autistic child is played by a teenager, Youssef, with Tunisian parents, who have lived in Morocco for around twenty years, and was discovered somewhat by chance at the end of a casting organized at the Studio des arts alive, in Casablanca.
By Quds Chabaa And Adil Gadrouz
06/16/2024 at 11:43 a.m.
