FIFM has matured into a full-fledged fest, US Variety Magazine

As Morocco's domestic film industry matures, the fest has also upped its programming of national films. Since 2010 there has consistently been at least one film (this year, Mohamed Mouftakir's sophomore outing "The Blind Men's Band"), said the American weekly entertainment magazine.

Morocco's film industry is now one of the most stably funded in the Arab world, but Karim Debbagh, producer at Tangier-based Kasbah Films (a co-producer on "A Hologram for the King"), said the scarce presence of local movies in competition underlines the need of the burgeoning Moroccan industry to be better positioned on the international market.

"Moroccan filmmakers and producers need to start making films for the whole world in order to be represented in a major festival, travel to foreign markets and become commercially successful," said the magazine quoting Debbagh.

Toscan du Plantier and Bruno Barde are planning to emphasize an industry presence at the festival. Barde one idea is to launch a workshop for Moroccan screenwriters, another is to organize a mini-forum presenting local projects to international producers, distributors and sales agents, it wrote. As one of the leading cultural events in Africa and the Arab world, Marrakech also reinforced its links to other Arab film industries, in particular Egypt's, with an opening-night career tribute to Egyptian actor Adel Imam and a competition berth for "The Blue Elephant" from Marwan Hamed ("The Yacoubian Building"), it said.