21 - 27 February 2002
Issue No.574
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Al-Ahram Weekly Online 21 - 27 February 2002 Issue No.574 |
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An artist's portrait
But as what? Defender of public morals, educational reformer, agit-prop composer, you name it and it's there, in Mohamed Fouad's latest film, finds Mohamed El-Assyouti
The major box office hit of the current season, which began two months ago with the Lesser Bairam and ends this week with the Greater Bairam, is Rihlet Hobb (Love Journey), a vehicle for pop singer Mohamed Fouad. Somewhat surprisingly, the film's soundtrack has been available since last summer.
Fouad's musical career is two decades old, and among his generation he is the singer who has made the most films -- six to date. Two of those films -- Mohamed Khan's Youm Harr Giddan (A Very Hot Day, 1994) and Khairi Bishara's Isharit Murur (Traffic Stop, 1994) bombed at the box office: Bishara has not made a film since, while it was only last year that Khan, with Ayyam El-Sadat (Days of Sadat, 2001) engineered his cinematic comeback.
Despite such earlier flops Fouad's semi- autobiographical vehicle, Ismailia Rayeh Gayy (Ismailia, Return Ticket, 1995), has continued to provide a blueprint for the kind of light, musical comedy that has its eyes firmly fixed on box-office receipts, and that invariably centres on the attempts of a group of young people to make something meaningful out of their lives. That it was comedian Mohamed Heneidi, supposedly supporting Fouad in Ismailia, who received the lion's share of audience attention on both the screen and the tie-in hit title track, may explain why Fouad has been rather more conscious of his cinematic excursions of late. But Fouad is back, once again in a supposedly semi- autobiographical vehicle, supported this time by comedian Ahmed Helmi. The two are on bill-boards everywhere, standing in torn clothes and pulling faces.
Rihlet Hobb, directed by Mohamed El-Naggar, whose Hani Ramzi vehicle Sa'edi Rayeh Gayy (An Upper Egyptian Going Back and Forth) was a hit last year, begins with Fouad, an unknown artist, finishing a portrait of an Egyptian peasant woman, an image he considers as remarkable an achievement as the Mona Lisa.
"Do you know what the problem with us [Egyptian artists] is? It is that we don't concern ourselves much with what we already have in our country, the Upper Egyptians, peasants, harbour-dwellers," a serious Fouad tells his side-kick, Helmi.
This brief dissertation on the necessity of drawing on local roots in developing Egyptian art stands in stark contrast to the extent to which Fouad and his contemporaries have managed to jettison from their pop songs anything recognisably Egyptian. Incorrectly pronounced, barely vocalised and weak lyrics, monotonous percussion, and a virtual absence of oriental instruments (the violin, the qanoun, the oud and the nayy) have become the trademarks of the successful Egyptian pop song over the past quarter of a century. Still, in one of the scenes of this film, Fouad, who in real life neither plays an instrument nor has had any musical training academically or otherwise, sits oud on lap, a promoter of "cultural authenticity."
In the film -- as in real life -- money dictates stylistic accessorising: "Which do you prefer," the artist asks in one scene, "a portrait, a natural scene or perhaps something abstract?" Nor does he object to his friend's scam in which they pick a photo of a rich man from the obituary page, paint a posthumous portrait, and then persuade the inheritors that the deceased had commissioned a portrait a few weeks before he passed away.
But our protagonist is not just a painter of anything and everything, he is also a composer and a singer and, after one concert, an overnight sensation whose face adorns the covers of countless magazines, including Newsweek.
The film's attractions also include: a sumptuous party at which the poor protagonist sees his wealthy sweetheart while her "villainous" cousin/fiancé notices their mutual attraction; a very costly car chase which concludes with the protagonist's brand new sedan turning over (an amateurly executed scene, although an American stunts and production team was reputedly hired to supervise); a private aeroplane for the protagonist to embark and disembark during the climatic finale scene when, from the window of the plane, he sees his beloved crying. So much for cultural authenticity.
Despite the fact that his once-successful music videos were often copied frame for frame from MTV videos, Fouad is positioned in this film not only as an espouser of cultural authenticity, but also as the protector of childhood innocence and public morality against a music industry that promotes Egyptian and Arab singers along nasty MTV lines. While other singers continue to fill their promotional videos with sultry, pouting models twisting and turning, Fouad's recent releases, and indeed a whole episode in this film, star crowds of schoolchildren.
"I don't want to offend families, and my style is very distinctive in videos and films," says a proud Fouad in one Al-Ahram interview. Fouad's recently discovered moral philosophy might also have informed the publicity and cover of the film's soundtrack: star in squeaky clean white suit against equally spotless white background, and the choice of title for his latest hit album, Al-Qalb Al-Tayib "The Kind Heart."
And maybe it is a developing social conscience that, in the film, leads Fouad's character to try his hand at salvaging Egypt's educational system. In music teacher persona he confronts his headmaster and give him a lesson on how to make education more attractive. The song for this occasion says that syllabi have to be simplified and curricula have to make room for art and sports classes and activities -- the "message" of Alaa Walieddin's summer vehicle, Al-Nazer (The Principal) is restated and sung by Fouad.
From cultural authenticity to family morality, progressive pedagogy -- and politics. One night Fouad is watching TV as the film of the murder of the Palestinian schoolchild Mohamed Al-Dorra is aired: the next morning the pupils demonstrate in the streets and Fouad joins them with a dirge: "Mother of the Martyr: Be Happy." And then -- in a scene reminiscent of the Israeli flag burning in Sa'edi Fil Gamaa Al-Amrikiya (An Upper Egyptian at the American University) -- comes a confrontation with a sympathetic police officer.
Artistic integrity, respect for public morality, conscientious social and political preoccupations: all, the film drives home its not-so-discreet message, abound in the rich person of the successful singer and artist Fouad, who embarked on this film not to praise these qualities in himself, but because it is his duty to support and defend certain values and principles. Some defence.
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