14/03/2023 - Camélia Jordana, Khaled Benaïssa, Shirine Boutella and Mehdi Ramdani star in this Chevaldeuxtrois and La Petite Prod production

Actress Camélia Jordana (© Georges Biard) and actor Khaled Benaïssa (© Agence Wojooh)

Having kicked off on 20 February, filming on Dania Reymond-Boughenou’s debut feature Les tempêtes is now in full swing in Morocco, where shooting is set to continue until 24 March. The director, who turned heads in 2016 with the medium-length film Le Jardin d'Essai and again in 2021 in Clermont-Ferrand’s national competition via her short film Constellation de la Rouguière, has assembled a cast composed of French actress Camélia Jordana (awarded 2018’s Best New Hope César for Le brio [+see also:
trailer
film profile], nominated for 2021’s Best Actress Cesar and Lumière trophies via Love Affair(s) [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Emmanuel Mouret
film profile], and soon to be seen in Avant que les flammes ne s’éteignent) together with Algeria’s Khaled Benaïssa (notably well-received in The Man From Oran [+see also:
trailer
film profile] and The Repentant [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Merzak Allouache
film profile]), Shirine Boutella (discovered in Papicha [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Mounia Meddour
film profile] and also at her best in the Lupin series) and Mehdi Ramdani (Until the Birds Return [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Karim Moussaoui
film profile]).

Written by Dania Reymond-Boughenou herself, alongside Virginie Legeay (Litigante [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile]) and Vincent Poymiro (the winner of 2022’s Best Screenplay César for Onoda, 10,000 Nights in the Jungle [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Arthur Harari
film profile]), the story takes us to a forgotten town battered by strange storms of yellow dust. 45-year-old journalist Nacer is covering the phenomenon for his newspaper. He records the rise of similar supernatural events while his partner who’s back from exile, Fajar, moves in with him. His doctor nephew Yacine, meanwhile, starts hearing dead people. Faced with increasingly menacing storms, Nacer is forced to unpick the past that haunts him…

The Storms is produced by Jérémy Forni on behalf of Chevaldeuxtrois and by Camille Chandellier for La Petite Prod, in co-production with Belgium’s Hélicotronc and associate co-producers Les Films de l'Autre Cougar and Algeria’s 2Horloges. Pre-purchased by Canal+ and Ciné+, the feature film also enjoys support in the form of an advance on receipts from the CNC, as well as backing from Eurimages, the Nouvelle Aquitaine and Pays de la Loire regions, the SOFICA company Cinémage, the Wallonia-Brussels Federation Film and Audiovisual Centre, Shelter Prod, the Doha Film Institute and Procirep-Angoa. The five-week film shoot will unfold in Casablanca and its surrounds, with Augustin Barbaroux (Wild Seas [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile], Teddy [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile]) heading up photography. Distribution in France will be steered by The Jokers.

For the record, Chevaldeuxtrois are currently overseeing post-production on The Other Laurens [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Claude Schmitz
film profile] by Belgium’s Claude Schmitz and Dark Paradise [+see also:
film review
interview: Triin Ruumet
film profile] by Estonia’s Triin Ruumet.

(Translated from French)