Egypt is a country of superlatives. Not only does it look back on millennia of cultural history, it also has one of the world’s largest metropolitan areas – the megacity of Cairo – and the longest river on the planet. Making its way from the south to the north of the country, the Nile has always played an important role in Egypt’s culture. The breathtaking beauty of the landscapes has been captured in countless films. As soon as cinema was invented, Egyptians began making movies. The film industry on the Nile started booming in 1896 and has produced many famous directors and stars, including some who were internationally successful, such as actor Omar Sharif (1932–2015). Next to the cotton industry, the film industry was the country’s biggest economic sector in the mid-20th century. To this day, most films are shot in the Egyptian Arabic dialect, Aamiyya, and they are shown in both the Maghreb and the Mashriq. As a result, the Egyptian dialect has become a lingua franca in the region – a language everyone understands. Egyptians loved the movies. Late-night family trips to dark cinemas were common even with young children, and the box office was ringing. Production companies reinvested part of their considerable profits into new films, and the movie business ran like a perpetual motion machine. Films were made under real market conditions, and since short films don’t make a profit, they hardly existed. There is no state film funding in Egypt.
Short films always offer a certain measure of freedom. In Egypt, they tend to be either first attempts by film school students, which are subject to censorship, or experiments by established directors. Among the latter is the internationally renowned filmmaker Youssef Chahine, whose «Cairo As Seen by Chahine» (1991) is one of the first Egyptian shorts to offer a critical view of the country. Blurring the line between documentary and fiction, Chahine presents a candid yet affectionate portrait of his city, appearing in the film himself, as a filmmaker who produces a commissioned work with his students. In truth, the film was commissioned by French television. Celebrated at its premiere in Cannes, it was banned in Egypt because it supposedly cast the country in a bad light. In 1990s Cairo, VHS tapes of the short film nevertheless circulated in secret.
When the Arab Spring began in 2011, it didn’t just revolutionize the music industry, which abandoned the same old love songs in favour of singing about social issues. The streets were full of theatre performances and concerts, and in film, anything seemed possible. Without permits, filmmakers were shooting tirelessly. A new scene emerged, with directors using the affordable digital equipment to try out styles, document social injustices, and tackle topics not previously talked about. Filmmaking was less about quality than about the issues. In «The Elevator» (2012), Hadeel Nazmy tells the story of a young woman who gets stuck in an elevator, where she is subjected to sexual harassment. To date, the film has been viewed over 4.3 million times on YouTube.
However, when the new government came to power in 2013, the creative awakening on the Nile ended abruptly. The current, politically repressive environment is not conducive to innovative filmmaking. Thus, many directors either practice self-censorship or resort to stereotypical action films and comedies. Much of the population now lives below the poverty line and can no longer afford movie tickets. They stay home and watch films on streaming platforms like Netflix or Shahid. With crowds staying away, the producers’ profits have dwindled, lessening their willingness to invest, which in turn has reduced the volume of film production.
In spite – or perhaps because – of all this, short films are booming. The most established director is Morad Mostafa, whose high-quality works cater to international tastes, screening at hundreds of festivals. However, most Egyptian shorts are still made with a low or no budget, and they usually fly under the radar of censors. «As I Open My Eyes» (2024) by Ghazzal Abdullah tells the story of bulldozers destroying buildings and trees in Egypt’s cities. The short film treats this highly topical issue in an experimental manner, giving the authorities little room for attack.
Today, there are several private initiatives that offer film workshops. In addition, technological advances, especially the growing quality of mobile phone cameras, provide opportunities to make films in a challenging but stimulating environment. It will be interesting to see what the future holds.
Sandra Gysi, Ahmed Abdel Mohsen
22 MillionThe Nile is known as the lifeline of Egypt: Along its banks, the earth is fertile, and the river has connected the country’s major cities since Egypt’s ancient civilization originated thousands of years ago. Today, over 95% of the Egyptian population live on the narrow strip of land along the river, which only makes up around 5% of the country’s surface area. The rest consists of desert as far as the eye can see. Most people in Egypt, which is the most populous country in the Arab world, live in cities. In the country’s pulsating urban centres, space is tight, and community is central – sometimes overwhelmingly so. The five films in 22 Million don’t show idealized images touting a way of life that appears exotic to the global North. Instead, Egyptian filmmakers offer honest portrayals of their cities and their compatriots, affectionate yet candid looks at the challenges of living in close quarters. The clichés that Western viewers might expect are absent.
Nowhere is this more obvious than in the opening film, a short by renowned director Youssef Chahine (born in Alexandria in 1926, died in Cairo in 2006). In «Cairo As Seen by Chahine», originally commissioned by French television, Chahine and his film students explicitly mock their sponsor’s expectations of an Egyptian film. At the same time, these are also the demands that the Egyptian state places on representations of the country for foreign viewers. At the premiere in Cannes in 1991, three Egyptian critics found the film offensive – they thought that its images of poverty, traffic, and cramped conditions in Cairo conveyed the wrong impression of the country. This prompted the Egyptian censorship board to demand the removal of certain scenes. Chahine refused, and the film was banned. The short is a tribute to the many individuals living their daily lives in this city.
«Cairography» resulted from a workshop with dancers who explored their relationship with the streets of Cairo. Each dance was performed in the street and filmed with a hidden camera aimed at capturing honest reactions. The dancers thus made the street their own, reclaiming public space. The clash between the personal and the public requires constant renegotiation.
The same is true in the historic ruins of Fustat in Cairo’s old town. «Al’Maw’oud» shows the tensions between government-appointed guards and the population of a nearby informal settlement, who use the area as a shortcut, playground, looting grounds, and living room extension.
In «As I Open My Eyes», the young filmmaker Ghazzal Abdullah captures Cairo’s urban metamorphosis with her camera. A personal film that underscores how much each narrative and each memory is subjective. A city of millions made up of millions of individuals.
Today, there are over 110 million Egyptians; in 2009, the number was around 80 million. The film «80 Million» by artists Mohamed Zayan and Eslam Zeen El Abedeen is a percussive dialogue, part tribute, part elegy for their compatriots.
Kuratiert von Laura Walde und Senta van de Weetering
with the kind support of: 
