‘Sophia’ Teaser: Jessica Brown Findlay & Dhafer L’Abidine’s Co-Star In Tunisia-Set Child Kidnap Drama Set For Marrakech Debut
EXCLUSIVE: Tunisian actor and director Dhafer L’Abidine’s third feature Sophia makes its world premiere at the Marrakech Film Festival this week and Deadline can reveal a first international teaser.
Jessica Brown Findlay stars as a British woman who travels to Tunisia with her daughter Sophia so the young girl can spend time with her father (L’Abidine), from whom she is separated.
She makes the trip against the advice of her family, and it seems their concerns are vindicated when Sophia disappears shortly after their arrival.
The film world premieres as a red-carpet gala screening at the Marrakech Film Festival on Tuesday night, having previously participated in its Atlas Workshops project incubator event last year when it was at the post-production stage.
It is a busy period for multi-lingual actor and director L’Abidine, whose career spans Europe, the Middle East and Hollywood, with credits ranging from UK dramas The Bill and Casualty to A Hologram to the King, to The Eddy and Brides Of Beirut.
He is currently appearing in Palestinian Oscar entry Palestine 36 as well as Egyptian director Tarek Alarian’s box office hit Elsellem Wel Te’ban 2 and arrives in Marrakech from jury duty at the Doha Film Festival.
Sophia is L’Abidine’s third feature after his 2021 debut Ghodwa, which was shortlisted for the Golden Globe Awards and won the FIPRESCI Prize at the Cairo International Film Festival, and To My Son, which won the Best Film award and a Special Mention for Screenwriting at the Hollywood Arab Film Festival.
Alongside Brown Findlay and L’Abidine, the cast also features Jonathan Hyde (The Brutalist), Kais Setti, Hiba Abouk and newcomer Maya Celine Gharbi.
The feature is produced by L’Abidine under the banner of his Tunis-based Double A Productions and Christopher Simon’s UK-based New Sparta. Mad World is handling international sales.
