(MENAFN- Arab Times) Franco-Moroccan director Nabil Ayouch said on Tuesday he was shocked after Morocco banned his movie "Much Loved" about prostitution in the conservative North African nation, following its screening at Cannes.
"I'm shocked and surprised by this ban," Ayouch said after the government said on Monday the movie would not be shown there.
"I don't understand that my film can be banned when we haven't yet applied for a permit for it to be shown," he told AFP.
"Much Loved" focuses on the problem of prostitution in Morocco through the eyes of four women.
Clips released over the past few days have caused a backlash in the kingdom against the director and his principal actress, Loubna Abidar.
The government announced late on Monday that it would not be screened, calling it "a grave outrage against moral values and Moroccan womanhood", and "a flagrant attack on the kingdom's image".
Ayouch denounced the decision on Tuesday.
"The freedom of expression of all Moroccan artists is under threat by this act of censorship by anticipation," he said.
In a statement on Monday, the ministry of communications said the decision to ban the film had been taken after a team from the state-run Moroccan Cinema Centre saw it "at an international festival", a clear reference to Cannes.
The CCM implements all rules concerning the Moroccan movie industry.
Its chief Sarim Fassi-Fihri told Huffpost Morocco that the country is still very conservative, and that the film's "crude language would not have been passed at the level of the commission".
"At best, scenes would have been cut. At worst, it would have been refused" release.
Ayouch, who is best known for "Horses of "", a 2012 drama about suicide attackers behind bombings in Casablanca in 2003, has repeatedly defended his approach.
"Prostitution is all around us, and instead of refusing to see it we should try to understand how women who have had difficult lives end up this way," he has said.
Ayouch said that before making the movie he spoke to between 200 and 300 young women who were, or had been, prostitutes.
Kino Lorber has acquired all US and Canadian rights to Stephane Brize's "The Measure of a Man," starring Vincent Lindon, winner of the Best Actor award at the Cannes Film Festival.
Brize directed from a script he co-wrote with Olivier Gorce about a working-class man struggling with unemployment and later facing a difficult moral choice as a security guard in a supermarket. Lindon also starred in Brize's "Mademoiselle Chambon" and "A Few Hours of Spring."
Variety's Scott Foundas gave "The Measure of a Man" a strong review, calling it "a veritable master class in understated humanism."
Kino Lorber, which released "Mademoiselle Chambon" in the US, plans to release "The Measure of a Man" in theatres in the fall. Home media and digital releases will follow in 2016.
The deal was negotiated between Kino Lorber's Richard Lorber and MK2 International's Victoire Thevenin.
"Jurassic World" is shaping up to be a box office monster.
The latest installment in Universal Pictures' "when dinosaurs attack" franchise doesn't hit theaters until June 12, but pre-release tracking suggests it will feast on an opening weekend of $100 million or more - an impressive debut for a franchise that hasn't released a new chapter in more than a decade.
"The trailers are connecting in such a big way," said Phil Contrino, vice president and chief analyst at BoxOffice.com.
Pre-release ticket sales have been robust since they kicked off on May 15, and Fandango reports that the film is one of its top five best sellers this week.
Time appears to have made the heart grow fonder for Universal and Steven Spielberg's prehistoric reptiles. Though the first film shattered box office records and the second installment was the third highest grossing film of 1997 (both pics were helmed by Spielberg), ticket sales began to decline by the time "Jurassic Park III" hit theaters in 2001. That film grossed $181 million domestically over its lifetime, the lowest figure for any film in the series. The third sequel has shown a willingness to shake things up.
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