The Damned Don't Cry
Fyzal Boulifa's new film follows a middle-aged single mother and her teen son as they both attempt to use their bodies to escape poverty in Tangier
Fyzal Boulifa's The Damned Don’t Cry borrows its title from a similarly themed 1950s Joan Crawford melodrama, which centres on a woman using her feminine wiles to escape drudgery but only finding more pain. There’s definitely something Crawford-like about Fatima-Zahra (Tebbae), a single mother who’s been keeping her and her surly teenage son, Selim (El Hajjouji), afloat in Casablanca through sex work. But she’s getting older, her voluptuous glamour is fading, and after a violent encounter with a john, she and Selim take to the road to find a different path, eventually settling in Tangier after a tense pitstop at her puritanical family home.
As well as being a dazzling study of an indefatigable woman trying to navigate a world that has written her off, The Damned Don’t Cry also doubles as a queer coming-of-age tale. While his mother tries to catch the eye of a pious bus driver who can offer her some stability, Selim begins to explore his own sexuality and finds Moroccan society as limiting for him as it is for his mother.
Fatima-Zahra and Salim's codependent relationship is at once tender and spiteful, making for one of the most fascinating mother-son bonds in recent cinema. The Damned Don't Cry is a film that knows that the line between love and hate can be a thin one, and that years of trying to keep your head above water will take its toll. Melodrama has become a dirty word in modern cinema culture, but this one is fresh, nuanced and heartbreaking.
Released 7 Jul by Curzon; certificate 15
Fyzal Boulifa will be at Glasgow Film Theatre on 8 Jul for a Q&A as part of SAFAR Film Festival