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Al-Ahram Weekly 31 August - 6 September 2000 Issue No. 497 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 31 August - 6 September 2000 Issue No. 497
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Travel Living Sports Profile People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Belly laughs
By Mustafa Darwish
Egyptian films appear to be reduced to a single genre -- comedy, released, for all practical purposes, during a single season -- summer. For with the exception of the two Eids summer is the only time cinemas the length and breadth of the land have anything to offer that is new in the way of local films.
The industry appears content to hibernate until students are on holiday, until workers return from the Gulf, at which point it disgorges its readily digestible fare for this increasingly casual audience. As soon as the weather got hot, at any rate, the makers of Belia wi Demagho El-Alya, Al-Hob Al-Awal and Al-Nazer lost no time in releasing their films in as many cinema houses as possible.
The title of the first film suggests that it treats of kif and its rituals. Yet with the excpetion of the car mechanic Belia (Mohamed Heniedi) being tempted occasionally by one of his friends to join a "happy bunch" for a few drags on a felucca -- and eventually giving in to the temptation towards the end -- the film was thankfully free of "the kif gathering" scene that has plagued Egyptian cinema since Hussien Kamal's film version of the Naguib Mahfouz novel Tharthara Fawq Al-Nil almost 30 years ago.
Perhaps Belia comes free of cannabis-consumption scenes to avoid offending Heneidi's middle-class audience who have only recently been dragged back to the cinema after decades of watching television by their children's idolising of Heniedi and his phenomenally popular trilogy (with script-writer Medhat El-Adl) -- Ismailia Rayih Gayy (which included the song sensation "Kamannana"), Sa'idi Fil Gam'a El-Amerikia and Hammam fi Amesterdam. Belia is, by any count, the weakest of the four Heniedi films. Unless there is some serious redirection in his career it will, I believe, mark the beginning of the end of his popularity.
Much of the problem resides with El-Adl's script, which amounts to no more than a hotch-potch of fragments, some copied from old Egyptian films, others barely even patched together. The result is incoherent, and the lack of any internal logic makes Belia's depression, which director Nader Galal and El-Adl use as the hanger for their hero joining the happy bunch on the felucca ride, particularly unconvincing. We do not, of course, actually see him smoking, and the scene seems little more than an excuse for the film's only song, a saddened plea with the universe in the style of "Kamannana".
While Belia's director is a veteran filmmaker, Hamed Said (the director of Al-Hob Al-Awal) is new to the cinema. He has previously directed only a video clip for Mustafa Qamar -- the star of his debut film. Indeed, the film is really a series of five video clips pinned together with painfully contrived love stories. Khaled (Qamar) sings at the villa of the rich girl, Rania (Mona Zaki) in the presence of the father of Wafaa (Hanan Turk) who has just arrived from the Sa'id with an armed nephew who consistently taunts Hassan (Hani Ramzi). Four Russian belly-dancers and four black "tea boys" contribute a little dance. Khaled, of the dulcet tones, falling in love with Rania, has been compared to Abdel-Halim Hafez triumphant falling for a series of leading ladies in his films of the 50s and 60s, which is errant nonsense.
As for this summer's third feature, it revolves wholly around Alaa Waleyeddin -- and for no reason, apparently, apart from his being fat. Perhaps it is because he is so fat that filmmaker Sherif Arafa managed to capitalise on it, giving him the main part in Abboud Alla El-Hodoud. For some reason Abboud was phenomenally successful at the box office, allowing Arafa to repeat the experience in Al-Nazer (the version that I saw was entitled Al-Nazer Salaheddin), and instead of deploying Waleyeddin's obesity in one role, makes more extensive use of it, employing him in six simultaneous roles, including the school master junior, the school master senior and his wife. Waleyeddin's performance in all three roles is pretty much revolting. Any attempt to differentiate between the characters is based only on the pulling of faces and caricatured, in-your-face gestures. Yet without Waleyeddin the film is worth nothing. It's story merely duplicates Madraset Al-Moshaghibin, a play that, in its film and televised forms, has degraded the taste of generations of Egyptians.
With the possible exception of Hassan Hosni (even he was not at his best), actors have abandoned even the pretence of acting.
