In Detail

Nora, a cleaning lady in her fifties, looks after her small family in a housing estate in the northern part of Marseille. She is worried about her grandson Ellyes, who has been in prison for several months for robbery and is awaiting his trial with a mixture of hope and anxiety.

Nora does everything she can to make this wait as painless as possible. An instantly involving portrait of a fifty-something woman in contemporary Marseilles diligently holding together several generations, ‘Good Mother’ firmly establishes actor turned writer/director Hafsia Herzi as a significant French filmmaker.

Anchored by non-pro Halima Benhamed (who had never acted and merely accompanied her daughter to an audition) as radiantly stoic central character Nora, the film’s always-convincing narrative is a seemingly effortless example of all the intersectionality, diversity and women in front of and behind the camera anyone could possibly want. With Halima Benhamed and Sabrina Benhamed.

- FEMALE DIRECTOR

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