Throughout the film festival, we’ll be bringing you bitesize, behind-the-scenes, blogs to read. Written by Ja’far ‘Abd al-Hamid, a writer-director, with a focus on Arab British stories. His latest feature film, Kal & Cambridge, is scheduled for release next year.
Explore the full programme here, SAFAR Film Festival runs from 29 June to 9 July across 9 cities in the UK.
Today I attended a double bill screening at Cine Lumiere: Cairo As Seen by Chahine (1991) and From Cairo (2021).
Friday evenings can’t get any better.
Turning into Queensberry place, I am drawn to the sight of a small group of filmmakers standing and chatting across the street from the venue. They look so chilled and at ease, I wish if I could join their conversation.
I head to my favourite seat at the main auditorium; I have been booking the same place for a few years now. It’s an aisle seat, on the shorter of the two rows flanking the path from the door at the back all the way to the screen.
I do a double take; someone happens to be seated there already. I check my booking, lest I had booked a different place in error; it’s definitely the usual seat on my booking email.
“Hello, I am sorry, I think you’re in my seat”, I gingerly explain to the elegant woman.
She apologises in her perfect English, with melodic notes that hint at her Egyptian heritage.
We get talking, and as festival curator Rabih El-Khoury introduces the films, she warns me that watching Cairo and the Cairenes will bring her tears. We both agree, that the films are likely to add urgency to my wish to visit Cairo again; I haven’t been since my dad took me there when I was still in my teens.
From the very first sequence of Cairo As Seen by Chahine (1991), I am transported to Egypt of Chahine’s lens; the rebellious youth in love (The Return of the Prodigal Son – 1978), with Hesham Selim and Majida El Roumi; the proud weathered features of al-fallah [farmers working on their own small land] (The Land – 1970), played by the great Mahmoud Al Meleji; the intellectual with a split personality (The Choice – 1971); and the lasting image of Bahiyyah, performed by Muhsinah Tawfiq, running through the streets at night, calling for the nation to rise to the defence of Egypt (Al-Asfour – 1972).
Watching the master at work in Cairo As Seen by Chahine, developing a number of story and imagery threads is truly mesmerising. He finds faces in the crowded streets of the capital, blending scripted scenes with a collage of documentary shots of life unawares in the Cairo of 1991, during the first Gulf War.
Completed thirty years later, Hala Galal’s From Cairo focuses on two women, Heba and Aya, leading an active life as artists in the sprawling metropolis.
The filmmaker’s bond of trust with her subjects allows the viewer to hear what feels like an internal monologue in which Heba and Aya, respectively, explore their relationships with their bodies. The relationship is both in their personal space, how they see themselves, as well as when going about their lives in public spaces, where sexual harassment and the fear that it can engender becomes quite real.
In a circular motion, all of this can return and colour and affect the way in which these women view their bodies, and perhaps themselves.
After the screening, I want to confirm to the Egyptian lady sat next to me that both films have made me even more eager to re-visit Cairo, a glorious metropolis that comes with an immense cultural wealth. Like any mega city, it is also afflicted by social and economic issues that both Hala Galal’s and Youssef Chahine’s films address; points that both films call to be studied and long term remedies for which to be found.
On the way out, I overhear a heart-to-heart between a few of the audience members recounting their own experiences of sexual harassment. The exchange takes place at the top of the wide marble staircase, with a couple of those taking part descending the steps while nodding and commenting on what’s being said a few steps behind them. I imagine that Youssef Chahine would be pleased with the shot composition for this scene.
By the festival ticket desk, I say hello to a couple of the volunteers. One of them turns out to be an Egyptian, who is studying in the UK. On the issues covered in From Cairo, she agrees that sexual harassment is quite real in Cairo; however, “it depends which part of the city you go to!” She explains.
Appreciating the young woman’s thoughts, I head home in the cool summer evening breeze, looking forward to the next screening at the festival.
My picks from SAFAR 2023
My Lost Country (July 1st, Cine Lumiere)
Birdland (July 3rd, The Garden Cinema)
19B (July 4th, The Garden Cinema)
The Damned Don’t Cry (July 6th, Cine Lumiere)
Shorts: A Journey Through Time (July 7th, ICA)
The Blue Caftan (July 8th, Barbican)
Beirut the Encounter (July 8th, Barbican)
Notes on Displacement (July 9th, Barbican)