After years of emigration to Palermo, Raouf decided to return home to Tunisia. But it was only half a return. Instead, he found a new way of life and work in going back and forth between the two shores of the Mediterranean. Thanks to his new status as a traveler or non-resident immigrant, Raouf's gaze becomes more refined, his relationship with the city changes. He becomes curious and sensitive to the colors of the city of Palermo, to the richness of its history and the contrasts of its urban fabric. But most importantly, the emigrant looks at himself in the mirror that the situation of the immigrant population of Palermo holds up to him. And here he discovers, to his great surprise, that Palermo's present can only be understood by looking back at its past and its history. In the eyes of an emigrant from the south, Palermo would be no more than a metaphor for the world.
A former amateur filmmaker and cinephile since the 1970s, Kamel Ben Ouanès teaches at the University of Carthage. He is the author of several articles on cinema and was ...
