Zineb Oukach On How Roe v. Wade Disappearing Reverberated Around the World for ‘Interruption’

One phone call can alter the course of your entire life. In the case for a young woman seeking an abortion in another country, the right to choose is imperative, but when the United States Supreme Court overturns the landmark 1974 Roe v. Wade decision, it also abandons women on the other side of the globe. Zineb Oukach’s fiery Live Action Short contender, Interruption, implores citizens to consider how this law being overturn extends across borders.

Interruption centers on Sarah, an activist who is trying to make her country of Morocco safer for women. What she doesn’t know is that a policeman is determined to take her down and even rifle through her past in order for her to get arrested and silenced. When Sarah discovers that she’s pregnant, her observer watches her even more closely, but his viewpoints are challenged when his wife reveals that she finds herself not ready to have another child.

At the beginning of our conversation, I expressed my sorrow and sympathies with women who feel frightened and angry at this decision. I remember exactly where I was when I heard this news, and Oukach agreed that this was a shameful moment that we won’t soon forget.

“I feel your anger, Oukach says. “I live in New York City, but when I go to Morocco, I can feel that. It’s constant harassment even if it’s something as simple as a woman driving a car. There is a great book called Rage Becomes Her [:The Power of a Woman’s Anger] that talks about the injustices that women have endured from the Victorian Era. I will inherit less than my brothers in my home country because of the law.”

It’s impressive at how quickly Oukach was able to get her film made. We feel how necessary it was for this artist to say something. Interruption should be regarded as one of the most important entries in the post-Roe world.

“I remember exactly where I was–I was in Montreal with my co-producer working on a future project,” she says. “When I was in Canada and I heard the news, I told my co-producer that I needed to make this film. It was the end of June or July in 2022, and I was scouting by December of last year. I shot all through this year.

It’s not just the United States–this decision affected the whole world. I grew up in Morocco, and abortion is illegal and taboo so when you see that the free world is taking an extreme ban, people will keep doing it. Women will never stop getting abortions, and they will go to other countries. Even though Roe v. Wade was in place, it was something where pro-life people and pro-choice people met in the middle. It was a concession law. I wanted to bring a human story to a political issue. When you bring the heart to a political debate, we can detach ourselves, but people go through pain. I heard so much testimony from men and women, and I wanted to bring that to this film.”

This particular policeman has the ability to stalk Sarah from the shadows, and Oukach doesn’t think Sarah knows that she is being spied on by this man. Oukach never has them meet with one another, but they are inextricably linked. Sarah is out there every day risking her life to speak out against a deeply patriarchal society.

“She doesn’t [know],” she say. “There is a scene where she comes out of her house, she looks left and right before getting into a car. She knows that the work that she takes risks in her life, and that’s why she tells her sister that she can’t have her abortion in Morocco. I won’t say which country, but this is inspired by a true story. It happened. Women have been taken to prison because they were challenging the powers that be. There is nothing that Sarah can do. When she faces the ocean, she is wondering if she can cross it. Does she even have the ability to leave? I am an immigrant, and I know that it takes years and decades to get into the culture and the language.”

When Sarah can longer travel to America, she turns to other places in order to get the job done. When she arrives at the clinic, the policeman is already there. There is something powerful in how Oukach asks us to watch him observe Sarah enter the clinic. They don’t have to say anything to each other, and we can tell that he is wrestling with someone deeply profound and confusing.

“It is a deep interaction without words,” Oukach says. “He is there before her, and he’s always one step ahead. He sees her vulnerable before she has the procedure, and then he thinks about her own situation. I love the scene after where she leaves the clinic and he’s still inside and the camera is in there with him. We see him, after the camera is outside, and the way the reflection is on him, it looks like he is behind bars. He is the caged one now and not the bird. He is imprisoned while she is a bit freer in a sense. There is some composition with animals being trapped and I wanted to do that with him. When him and his wife meet up and he decides to give her the information that he now knows, the bars are behind him. So he has stepped outside of that. He frees himself.”

*If you would like to avoid any spoilers, please stop reading now. Once you see Oukach’s film, we encourage you to come back and read her answer to this final question.*

The policeman returns home to his wife who is still tending to their home. Earlier in the film, he toys with a caged bird outside on the patio, and we wonder what is going to do with the information he now knows about the clinic and what happens there. He tells his wife, “I left the money on the dresser” as a gesture that he is okay with her having an abortion, but he walks away from her. He doesn’t have a thoughtful conversation with his wife nor does he seem to want to be involved. Oukach was interested in leaving us with a lot of thoughtful questions.

“I was so blessed with my actors,” he says. “He decides to tell her to take care of it, because he doesn’t want the responsibility. He doesn’t want the emotional consequences, and he thinks that he did his job. That’s how men talk in my culture. It’s taboo. He doesn’t touch her or anything, and he just walks away. He doesn’t want to hear her complain or ask questions. We don’t know if she’s going to go to the clinic or not and I wanted to leave that open to avoid any judgement on the issue. I think it’s a personal choice, and it had to be between two people or a woman and her doctor. He wants to get beyond this.”