PROMIS LE CIEL (PROMISED SKY)

Erige Sehiri
Tunisia/ France/ Qatar 2025 I Original version with English subtitles I 95 min
In the presence of the director

TUE 11 NOV
19:30 OPENING
CITY KINO WEDDING

In Tunis, three migrant women from Côte d’Ivoire live together like a chosen family. Their everyday life is marked by a tense social climate and daily discrimination.
Ivorian pastor Marie has been living there for ten years and runs an underground church in her illegally rented apartment. Her home becomes a refuge for Jolie, a determined student from a wealthy family, and the lively Naney, who had to leave her child behind during her flight from Côte d’Ivoire.

A special community emerges, in which each woman tries in her own way to build a new life. When they take in four-year-old Kenza, whose parents died in a shipwreck while fleeing, their solidarity is put to the test…
The second feature film by French-Tunisian director ERIGE SEHIRI tells, in a moving way, the life of African migrants on their own continent from a female North African perspective. PROMIS LE CIEL opened this year’s Un Certain Regard section at the Cannes Film Festival.
The event takes place as an ARSENAL ON LOCATION SPECIAL at City Kino Wedding.

Before the screening: SPOKEN WORD PERFORMANCE by Genifer Marione Habbasch.

ERIGE SEHIRI is a French-Tunisian director, producer, and former journalist whose work bridges documentary realism and narrative cinema. She began her career in documentary film, directing the acclaimed RAILWAY MEN (2018), capturing the daily struggles of Tunisian railway workers. In 2022, she wrote, directed, and produced her first feature film UNDER THE FIG TREES, an intimate portrait of youth, work, and fleeting moments of connection set in a rural fig orchard. The film premiered at the 54th Directors’ Fortnight at Cannes.

Beyond her work as a director, Sehiri actively advocates for freedom of expression and media literacy. She co-founded the media company INKYFADA and the Tunisian NGO Al KHATT. She is also a founding member of the collective Rawiyat – Sisters in Film, which supports female filmmakers in the Arab world and diaspora. PROMIS LE CIEL is her second feature film.