One of the most powerful, important qualities of international film is its ability to slice through language and cultural boundaries to reveal what unites us. Regardless of flags, food, or faith, we all share a common humanity and, tragically, common discrimination. The brave souls who dare follow today’s current events will be familiar with routine reports of innocent people herded into groups that are stereotyped and blamed for society’s ills.
One of the tactics-du-jour for scapegoating governments is the demonization of migrants and anyone who has the nerve to look or sound like them. With Promised Sky, French-Tunisian director Erige Sehiri offers an intimate view from the diverse perspectives of those caught in the mess of systemic prejudice, and how difficult it can be to play fair when the deck is stacked against you.
Though uneven at times, strong performances and a ripped-from-the-BBC story make for a heartbreaking reflection on the challenges of being moral in an immoral place. Promised Sky’s glimpse of the uncertainty ingrained into the lives of a vulnerable population is set in Tunisia, yet it’s unnerving how seamlessly it could take place in the United States.
Sehiri’s second feature follows three women on three different paths while all living under the same roof. That roof belongs to Marie (Aïssa Maïga), a pastor and former journalist whose humble abode doubles as a house of worship. While the roof doesn’t truly belong to her, it’s her lease and her rules. Occasionally at odds with those rules are her niece Jolie (Laetitia Ky), who studies at the university, and Naney (Debora Lobe Naney in her debut), a streetwise hustler. All four have dark skin, identifying them as part of Tunisia’s French-speaking, sub-Saharan (read: Black) population, which is governed by the Arabic-speaking, light-skinned majority. Though the three are not refugees in transit to Europe, they get swept up in the government’s crackdown on illegal immigration.
The film opens with the trio bathing Kenza (Estelle Kenza Dogbo), a girl too young to understand the horrors of the capsized boat she’s survived. She’s asked her age, home country, and family name––none of which she can answer. Kenza only shares her name and a few horrifying details of the boat’s demise in the naive, matter-of-fact manner that kids do.
The faithful and honest Marie already has her hands full; struggling to keep her small congregation afloat as authorities target worship groups who serve the migrant population. She acts as a bank for those unable to open accounts because of their immigration status, and has to smile and politely deal with her light-skinned, neglectful landlord who feels he already does enough by sticking his neck out and renting to her.
The life Marie has built is so fragile that even Kenza’s tiny presence feels as if it could shoot cracks throughout its surface. Kenza becomes yet another ball for Marie to juggle as she grapples with the dilemma of whether to take in the girl for good or follow the law and turn her over to the state. This decision is further complicated by an underdeveloped plotline of a child Marie lost, for whom Kenza becomes a replacement.
As Marie fosters her besieged faithful, Jolie and Naney bop through the party scene and get passed over by taxis who prefer light-skinned fares. By day, Jolie is a dedicated engineering student from a middle-class family who has to assuage her father’s fears over TV reports of sub-Saharan Africans being hunted down. “It’s only for those here illegally,” she tells him. Jolie prefers to live in the student dorm where classmates can help with lessons that are often only taught in Arabic, though her father feels she is safer with Marie.
For three years, Naney pounds the streets trying to earn enough to support her quickly aging daughter. Via tragic video chats on her tiny phone, Naney asserts some motherly advice after her daughter’s first period and makes sincere but broken promises about coming home for the holidays. One of the most engaging aspects of Sehiri’s film is the relationship between Naney and her partner-in-crime Foued (Foued Zaazaa). Together they scheme and con through their days while commiserating in their shared experience away from their children. “Distance kills love,” moans Foued. In a memorable scene, they both exuberantly glide through a parking lot on an electric scooter Foued has brought Naney for her birthday, only to reveal it’s just a rental.
Sehiri makes clear the prejudiced divide between the two groups. “Are you not African, too?“ Marie asks her landlord when he qualifies the cake she’s making an “African cake.” The tension increases as the grip of the state grows tighter. Despite having her official student card, Jolie is jailed, Naney warns others simply out on the street that the police are patrolling, and Marie’s landlord becomes more concerned with her worship group. Throughout the increasing pressure, the image of Tunisia increasingly looks like our own country’s slide into xenophobic authoritarianism. The most clearly reflective moment is when a television report accuses the migrant population of (sound familiar?) eating cats.
Journalism and art bring nuance and empathy that counter the easily digestible rhetoric. Sehiri’s initial interest in depicting the sub-Saharan community in Tunisia happened to coincide with the President Kaqis Saied’s European-sponsored clampdown on immigration. Sehiri tucks the story into the injustice to ask the question: how much faith or hope can one be expected to conjure under these conditions? As our own President follows the same playbook, Promised Sky could prove just as relevant an American story as it is Tunisian.
Promised Sky opens in theaters on Friday, June 12.