Part-road movie, part coming-of-age drama, Where the Wind Comes From (original title: Tunis–Djerba) collapses together a delightful set of elements to create an emancipatory journey for two young Tunisians, marking writer-director Amel Guellaty’s solo feature debut that is full of life. The film world-premiered in Sundance’s World Cinema Dramatic Competition and then immediately enjoyed its European premiere at the 2025 International Film Festival Rotterdam in its Harbour sidebar, seeing two vastly different audiences take to the film in close succession.
In Tunisia, the confident and charismatic teen girl Alyssa (Eya Bellagha) is introduced wearing bright red, while her childhood best friend Mehdi (Slim Baccar), a slightly older young man who is an amateur artist, wears a contrasting blue in an evident yet striking piece of symbolism. Our primary protagonist Alyssa—a dreamer at heart—must take care of her younger sister in the wake of her father’s death and mother’s deep grief, having put aside her creative endeavours of woodworking after the loss. Alyssa smokes, dresses casually, has an active imagination (which we see throughout the film in bits of floating CGI)—and doesn’t have a Muslim name, as a group of young men harassing her immediately point out.
Desperate to leave Tunisia, Alyssa—flashing a smile that nobody can deny—persuades Mehdi to draw a portrait to her and submits it to an art competition with a six-month art residency in Germany, seeing that as their way out of a society for which she seems ill-fitted. Mehdi’s piece is accepted—the only issue? The finals are across the country, and they must attend in person with the portrait. The scrappy young duo must thus find a way from Tunis to Djerba—granting the film its original title—which they eventually do by stealing a local gangster’s black pickup truck adorned with a flame pattern (fittingly absurd for their situation).
Using a vibrant colour palette, Guellaty’s directorial approach has a carefree quality starting with the first scene, using a playful style to the cinematography and camera movement (with lensing by Frida Marzouk) that is in strong agreement with the motivations of her characters. Despite some predictable narrative points and cliché statements spoken out loud about future generations, the filmmaker gets away with it in light of the film’s very sincere energy, reflecting the hopes and dreams of many in Tunisia—and many parts of the world—today.
While Alyssa dreams, Mehdi speaks in mini-parables—of women who howl in a desert across the world to create the wind and a heart buried deep under the earth to create the tides. Mixing a contemporary score of electronic music and soulful songs, the film’s music rounds out the story’s charming yet motivational feel. Alyssa and Mehdi are just well-rounded enough for us to grasp on to them, even if their intentions sometimes feel simplistic. The convincing nature of the duo is carried by their chemistry— in particular, Bellagha, who is a marvel in her first feature film role, where she captures the deep rooted pain of emerging into adulthood, especially for women.
Through Alyssa, Guellaty deftly explores several intersecting topics as one grows older: the place of newfound responsibility toward family, grieving for childhood innocence, and the predatory perception by men and patriarchy that grows stronger each day. Perhaps she could do more if she didn’t have the duties to her family, which she very willingly accepts—or maybe more opportunities for her if she weren’t confronted so frequently by those so afraid of breaking the status quo. The teen’s outlet for emotion becomes the way she imagines the world, which allow her moments of respite and escape—and we, too, are privy to this exploration, even though they are brief.
A crucial sequence sees the duo enter the city of Sousse, where wealth unlocks a ritzy world also associated with permissible social progressiveness in the shadows beneath neon lights. At a club, Mehdi dances his heart out, while Alyssa’s uninhibited desires can play out freely, which includes a brief encounter with an older woman with whom she has a connection. Although this is merely brushed upon through the rest of the film, this crucial moments is a beautiful synecdoche for everything else that Alyssa could desire, demonstrating the realm of possibilities that lie ahead—if only she could move beyond her current systemic conditions. The two cling to hope stronger than most, shows Guellaty, but perhaps it’s not all in vain.
