The Man Who Sold His Skin Movie Review
By
Samuel Goldwyn Films
Director: Kaouther Ben Hania
Writer: Kaouther Ben Hania
Cast: Yahya Mahayni, Dea Liane, Koen De Bouw, Monica Bellucci, Saad Lostan, Darina Al Joundi, Jan Dahdouh, Christian Vadim
Screened at: Critics’ link, NYC, 2/21/21
Tunisia’s entry to the 93rd Academy Awards
Sylvia Sims sang the classic song that opens: “You’d never think they go together/ But they certainly do/ The combination of English muffins/ And Irish Stew.” Top chefs know how to mix quite a number of things that would not have been attempted years ago. In the same way, stories combine groups from different classes, nationalities, and religions. Suprisingly, sometimes they find common ground. One example is found in female director Kaouther Ben Hania’s sophomore feature, which is the official entry of Tunisia into the 93rd Academy Awards competition. She mixes Sam Ali (Yahya Mahayni) a poor, uneducated Syrian ,one who has been arrested for
The Man Who Sold His Skin Movie Review: A poster of the film (courtesy themanwhosoldhisskin themovie)
Cast: Yahya Mahayni, Dea Liane, Koen De Bouw, Monica Bellucci, Saad Lostan, Darina Al Joundi
Director: Kaouther Ben Hania
Tunisian writer-director Kaouther Ben Hania s
The Man Who Sold His Skin is easily the most intriguing of the films vying for the Best International Feature Film Oscar at the 93rd Academy Awards. Her choice of story and treatment sets this contender apart from the 14 other titles on the shortlist. The film is also on the threshold of history.
Ben Hania is an African Arab Muslim woman filmmaker, as removed from the profile of directors (mostly European) who have won or been nominated in this category all these years. Films from Maghreb - as many as five from Algeria (two of them helmed by non-Arab directors, Costa-Gavras of Z and Ettore Scola of Le Bal) and one from Mauritania (Abderrahmane Sissako s Timbuktu) - as well as two each from Lebanon and Palestine a
WENN.com
Way back when in early 2020, Hollywood––and everyone else––was enjoying its pre-pandemic innocence.
Early 2020 was an exciting entertainment awards season with the Golden Globes kicking things off on January 5th; then came the British Academy of Film and Television Arts Awards (BAFTA) on January 9th; The Screen Actors Guild (SAG) Awards on Jan 19th; The 62nd Grammy Awards on January 26th; and ultimately, the awards season big finale: The 92nd Academy Awards ceremony on February 9th. Things were certainly good in the ‘Wood back then, but what we didn’t know at the time is that the 2020 Oscars would be one of the country’s last major entertainment events before lockdown began.