Kamal Lazraq

Kamal Lazraq’s stuff doesn’t really fit into neat little boxes, you know? The guy was born in Casablanca back in ‘84, and you can feel that city’s heartbeat pulsing through his films. He’s the brain behind Hounds (2023), Moul Lkelb (2014), and Drari (2011)—pretty wild ride of a filmography, honestly. Lazraq has this whole gritty, in-your-face approach that kind of grabs you by the collar and drags you into the messiness of his characters’ lives. He’s not about fancy, sugarcoated stories; he digs into the raw, uncomfortable bits—guys just trying to get by, weird moments where everything could fall apart, and that ever-present buzz of danger on the streets. Hounds is maybe his most ambitious yet. It’s got this electric atmosphere, tense and jittery, where you never really know what’s coming around the corner. Lazraq’s eye for detail is killer—every scene feels lived in, every character’s got their own scars. He’s big on realism, not in a boring documentary way, but more like, “Yeah, life’s messy, let’s show it.” You’ll catch a bunch of Casablanca’s underbelly—shadowy alleys, beat-up cars, those tiny moments of kindness that flicker up in the grime. His earlier works, like Moul Lkelb and Drari, laid the groundwork—tough stories, restless energy, zero pretension. At the end of the day, Kamal Lazraq’s films aren’t about making you comfortable. They’re about making you feel something real.