Yesterday's screening of the film epic Journey to Mecca: In the Footsteps of Ibn Battuta was a first for Tangier, the city where "IB" was born and from which he set off in 1325 on the first of what would be three decades of world travel.
Ibn Battuta has the city's airport named after him, and intrepid urban explorers can seek out his tomb in the medina, but there is precious little else here devoted to this Arab Marco Polo.
So it was time to bring IB back to his birthplace.
Yesterday's crowd at our Cinémathèque show was appreciative, and the film showcases the kind of spectacular Moroccan scenery that can depict a medieval pilgrimage from Tangier to Mecca, with every type of setting in between. The film's producers have put together a great Educator's Guide (Download JTM_Educators Guide), and we were pleased to see a good number of Moroccan students in the audience.
Four years after I originally saw the film and reviewed it for IMDb, we "repatriated" IB to Tangier.
Gerald Loftus
