"4937 Kilowatts A Year" Goes to the Other End of the Line
Premiered at Hot Docs 2026, Ellie Delvaux and Madeleine Faburel-Dumail's short documentary follows electricity sales calls back to a small call center in Marrakech.
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A short documentary by Ellie Delvaux and Madeleine Faburel-Dumail, 4937 Kilowatts A Year takes place inside a call center in Marrakech, where agents call French citizens to offer electricity contracts.
Instead of staying with the people who receive these calls, the film moves to the other side of the line. It observes the working space of those who make the calls, and follows the daily rhythm of a small call center far from the usual image of a crowded and noisy office.
The call center in the film is smaller and quieter than the image often associated with these workplaces. Some desks are empty, and much of the film stays close to the pauses, routines, and conversations that shape the space.
For Ellie Delvaux and Madeleine Faburel-Dumail, the project started with a familiar situation. As Europeans, they had often received sales calls like these, including calls from Morocco. They wanted to go to the other side of the line and meet the people whose voices usually arrive through a phone call.
In their note about the film, the directors describe call center work as a common social phenomenon. They also point to unequal working relations between Morocco and France, including Moroccan agents adapting to French work schedules and using fictitious French-sounding first names when making calls.
Voice became one of the main points of the film. Inside the call center, agents work with scripts, training, and telephone lines. Later, songs and group singing enter the same space.
These scenes keep the film inside the call center, but add another side to it. Alongside the daily work, the film also includes rehearsal, music, and the voices of the people taking part.
4937 Kilowatts A Year was made as part of the Regards-Croisés program between INSAS in Brussels and ESAV Marrakech. The program gives students the chance to work with a partner school abroad and make a short documentary in a limited period of time.
Delvaux and Faburel-Dumail spent six weeks in Morocco. During that time, they researched the subject, met the people who appear in the film, and completed the shoot. Post-production was later completed in Brussels.
Ellie Delvaux was born and raised in Brussels. Before moving into cinema, she worked in music as a singer and songwriter. Her work often moves between fiction and documentary, with music and voice as recurring elements.
Madeleine Faburel-Dumail is a French cinematographer based in Brussels. She studied at the Fine Arts school in Lyon before joining INSAS in 2021. She works across documentary and fiction, and has been the director of photography on several short films.
The two filmmakers have worked together since 2022, when they began their studies at INSAS. Their collaboration is shaped by a shared interest in films that move between reality, fiction, poetry, and humor.
4937 Kilowatts A Year had its world premiere at Hot Docs 2026 in Toronto. The film runs 22 minutes and 47 seconds, and is in French and Darija, with subtitles available in French, English, and Spanish.
The directors have said they would like to develop the project into a longer documentary. According to them, conversations around the film at Hot Docs suggested that there is more to explore in the subject and in the people they met during the shoot.
The film screened on Saturday, May 2 at 8:00 PM, with an additional screening on Sunday, May 3 at 11:00 AM. Both screenings were listed at TLB 4.
Check out Hot Docs film page
Directors’ Instagram:
Madeleine Faburel-Dumail
Ellie Delvaux
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This piece, published by Souzian Dispatch and written by Abbas Souzian, is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0), unless otherwise noted.
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