Home | Site map | Contact us

Home » Alexandria Again and Forever » A Second Look Back

A Second Look Back

 

 

 

Stills from School Life, Youssef Chahine’s first film, which he
made in 1944 with Osman Ragheb while they
were at school in Alexandria.

When the film Lumière and Cie was made in 1995 with the collaboration of 41 directors from all over the world, one of whom was Alexandrian Youssef Chahine, Roger Ebert had this remark to make: “It is really interesting that it was only the American directors who attempted to tell stories with their films. The European, African and Asian directors were content to create moods or atmosphere”. And this is what we, too, have sought to do in this catalogue: try to recreate the mood or atmosphere of the Alexandria that gave birth to the seventh art in Egypt, and continues to nurture artists with cinematic talent and leanings. Thus, this is not the last word, and would never claim to be the definitive in the history of the cinema in Alexandria. In all fairness to research, this is not the end and can only hope to be a beginning: an introduction to which this is an addendum.

The research carried out was both intensive and extensive, and in good creed we admit some omissions and curtailments that have had to be made here and there to make this catalogue possible in its present form including its wealth of photographs. To extend a photographic metaphor, we have explored angles through a variety of lenses ranging from the wide angle to zoom and portrait. The whole is seen through a fish eye whenever possible.

Like all the firsts we have encountered, we wish to look back on this work with some satisfaction, and a lot of hope that more will follow by amateurs and professionals alike. For the city that has contributed to entertainment history deserves every research into a cinematic past we may at times lament, but do not wish to mourn. In the following pages we will take a second look both at the Alexandrian experience and at the catalogue, trying to sum up at times and at others to add a few points or names, as well as suggestions for further research and exploration.

I. The Sea is Laughing: The Setting
New men arrived from other lands, having had a dream like theirs, and in the city of Zobeide, they recognized something of the streets of the dream.

Italo Calvino, Invisible Cities

Once upon a time, one is almost tempted to begin, and to add, “and a very good time it was.” But we do not want to turn this backward glance into a nostalgic look at a bygone Alexandria; rather, it is a gaze at the city by a Mediterranean that runs deep in Alexandrian veins and gives its citizens her distinctive stamp wherever they are, wherever they go. The sea, the waves, the occasional storms, and the temperance of climate dictated an attitude of tolerance and an ability to blend with the primary colours of its landscape. Historically, too, Alexander’s empire moulded an état d’âme and a rich cultural heritage that produced a global citizen, a man for all times and seasons, who was wise, informed and sensitive, yet culturally rooted and enhanced, ethnically grounded and positively engaged.

Such a landscape, defined by the sea, peopled from around the Mediterranean and harbouring an epicurean tradition of community, friendship and entertainment, made Alexandria the perfect port of debarkation for the camera and its men. If cosmopolitanism is akin to chemistry and atoms, it is little wonder that the human chemistry between the locals and the expatriates created also labs and studios.

The epicurean value of entertainment cannot be emphasized enough, and for the Lumière brothers to set their sights on Alexandria was a stroke of visionary genius. Thanks to their photographic experience, they understood the appeal of people “caught in the act of living”, as one early critic put it – and where better than Alexandria to put this into practice. It was a state of the art technology meeting a state of the art life-style. An epicurean culture mingled with a typical joie de vivre gave the city a flavour so unique, a certain je ne sais quoi, a perfect formula, almost as to provide a recipe for success.

Bred in an emancipated and avant garde society that appreciated the art of life, the Alexandrian citizen had an entrepreneurial spirit, a culture of setting precedents, a culture of the open house, of the conscious effortless effort to communicate and to entertain and please. Alexandrians had the greatest luxury of all, the right to choice – for real cosmopolitans do not insist that everyone become cosmopolitan. They are pluralistic and respectful of the choice of individuals. By virtue of a moral geography, Alexandria was not fenced in on itself nor isolated and not insular to what was happening in the world. It was a magnet where the otherwise marginalized had admission and could occupy the foreground and live in the midst of its people rather than on the side, as did our cinema pioneers, many coming from around the Mediterranean.

If the setting and its people were in a way conducive to the actual industry, Alexandria, with its illustrious past, heroes and immortal dramas was and continues to be the subject of numerous historical movies, beginning with Lama’s Cleopatra in 1943 down to the 2006 Alexander the Great production starring William Shanter, Adam West and John Cassavetas. Alexandria is also the site of more modern historic moments, such as the nationalization of the Suez Canal announced in Alexandria in Nasser 56 and the aftermath of the 1952 revolution played out in the cosmopolitan city and the changes it witnessed in Nnaguib Mahfouz’s classic Miramar. Both Alexandria and its citizens made history and made the city home to a romance between Egypt and the cinema.

II. Behind the Camera: Studios and Cinematographers

In looking at the first studios and those who manned them, we initially meet the masters, who carried foreign – particularly Italian – names: Dorés, Mizrahi, Orfanelli, along with a host of foreign and local names. Together they collaborated by way of technical assistance in primitive studios that were a challenge to work in. Hagop Ohan, the Armenian working with Alvise Orfanelli, recalls in his memoirs working in studios that were originally garages, and Abdel Halim Nasr likewise states that equipment consisted of an antiquated camera, a few light bulbs and wooden frames covered in papier maché. Filming indoors was an ordeal and the genius of a director was measured by his ability to stage as many outdoor scenes as was possible to contrive, which was no less daunting with shots taken mostly on rooftops at the mercy of the weather and with the threat of the sets being blown to the winds.

Starting out as teacher and apprentice, foreigners and locals worked together until an industry was able to stand on its own feet with a wholly Egyptian crew of technicians and cinematographers. Until well into the first half of the twentieth century, xenophobia was hardly an issue, and integration was no threat. Accepting one another and respecting their differences, people accepted the other. Often, the other was the subject of hearty amusement, even if some claim that the other was portrayed unflatteringly, it was always out of candour and love. In his poem “Cosmopolitan Greetings” Allen Ginsberg says: “Candour ends paranoia” and, indeed, although one could laugh at an Ali el Kassar or a Shalom for their otherness, one loved them and went to watch them and they were no less game: acting, and producing, as in the case of Shalom, since for the true cosmopolitan minorities, and, for that matter, women too, there is no room for fundamentalism or chauvinism. Togo Mizrahi did more for Egyptian cinema than is commonly known and his enterprise attests not only to a keen business mind but also to a shrewd understanding of Egyptian nature, a feeling not possible without compassion and empathy.

Mizrahi quickly and early on realized that Egyptian audiences had a leaning for comedy on the one hand, and melodrama on the other. So with an eye on his audience and his money, he invested in films introducing Ali el Kassar and Fouad el Gazayerli and Shalom, creating a mix that would challenge the assumptions of any xenophobic.

If the Lama brothers produced their great Bedouin film inspired perhaps by Hollywood, Mizrahi’s inspiration came from the Egyptian people. However, both have given us what constitutes our early cinematic heritage. An interesting coincidence between Lama’s use of the word “kiss” in the title of his movie and Mizrahi’s penchant for comedy as a proven recipe for commercial success is demonstrated in later instances of cinema advertising. Posters would advertise a film by citing the number of jokes it had and the laughs it assured (in Arabic also referred to as effet) as with Ismail Yassin movies, and many others. Or citing the kisses by number as with Father up a Tree (Abi fawk el shagara) where the film boasts its 54 kisses and becomes the second largest grossing film in Egyptian cinema. Badr Lama and Togo Mizrahi were joined by a third, an Egyptian who seems to have known the trick of attracting an audience. With the first ever trick in Egyptian cinema, Mahmoud Khalil Rashed made an instant box office hit with Mustafa, or the Little Magician, which was hugely successful because of the special effects used. Later still Niazi Mustafa would find similar success with his series of The Disappearing Hat (Taqeyet el ikhfa) films following earlier less successful attempts by Ahmed Galal and Youssef Chahine.

A studio master like Alvise Orfanelli kept a low profile and worked hard at making a name but always kept his expenses so low that the young Abdel Halim Nasr was denied a raise even at the cost of leaving the studio, which he did. This brings us to a more obvious form of collaboration between Mizrahi and the young apprentice, for the role he played in furthering his career is unequivocal. We hear of instances later on when a foreign owner would deny a young Egyptian entry into his studio, commissioning him only to lesser jobs than that of filming. This is evident in the case of Gaston Madri and Wahid Farid, and of a young Egyptian averse to the patronage or the “import” of foreign technicians – but this was later in the century and historic events had begun to reshape the culture. Besides, this was happening in Cairo especially after World War II and bombardments had a hand in pulling the red carpet from under the feet of Alexandria. Already a new atmosphere was burgeoning and with it a new attitude. The typical Alexandrian ethos had been the passing on of the torch from the older generation to the younger local one.

A studio master like Alvise Orfanelli kept a low profile and worked hard at making a name but always kept his expenses so low that the young Abdel Halim Nasr was denied a raise even at the cost of leaving the studio, which he did. This brings us to a more obvious form of collaboration between Mizrahi and the young apprentice, for the role he played in furthering his career is unequivocal. We hear of instances later on when a foreign owner would deny a young Egyptian entry into his studio, commissioning him only to lesser jobs than that of filming. This is evident in the case of Gaston Madri and Wahid Farid, and of a young Egyptian averse to the patronage or the “import” of foreign technicians – but this was later in the century and historic events had begun to reshape the culture. Besides, this was happening in Cairo especially after World War II and bombardments had a hand in pulling the red carpet from under the feet of Alexandria. Already a new atmosphere was burgeoning and with it a new attitude. The typical Alexandrian ethos had been the passing on of the torch from the older generation to the younger local one.

One look at the credits of our old films shows the foreign influence of Mediterranean origin. From the music scores to the furniture stores, names like music composer Andrea Ryder, Isaac the dance trainer, those of furniture shops owned by Armenians and Greeks who would rent their furniture out to the studios, as well as carpet dealers, the Italian Salvi, scrolled down right to the end.

With Mohamed Bayoumi and Mahmoud Khalil Rashed we move into a more national Egyptian realm and the firsts that they pioneer are a pride to the industry. So too with Mohamed Karim, whose films provide the themes recurrent in Egyptian cinema to this day.

Bayoumi’s ups and downs created a small masterpiece that was Barsoum Looks for Employment, featuring a Jew and a Moslem both facing the same problem of poverty and hunger and ending up sharing the same plate of food. In one of its scenes, a picture of Saad Zaghloul is drawn on a wall side by side with one of Jesus Christ wearing the crown of thorns, and wailing by the wall were the protagonists, each saying his own prayer for a job and a crust of bread.

We have also charted the early documentaries relying mainly on Ali Abou Chadi’s book as our source. If any additional information came our way we would include it, but if not authenticated, we preferred a void to an untruth or an inaccuracy, even at the cost of the accusation of not being thorough.

With the cinematographers ends a chapter for which we chose examples. Three of the Egyptian moviemakers who made it abroad, in Hollywood, France, Germany, and in neighbouring Syria and Iraq were of Alexandrian descent. The three are rooted in Egyptian soil and have inhaled the Alexandrian sea air. Shadi Abdel Salam, Youssef Chahine and Tewfik Saleh are a perfect example of the versatile Alexandrian character, very different the one from the other, but at the end of the day, like the sun, setting in the same horizon.

Down the star walk of fame we were able to trace additional names who were born though maybe not bred in Alexandria, or who were not born in Alexandria but who lived there for a while and made it abroad rather than in Egypt, indicating that a tiny drop of Alexandrian blood running in the veins goes a long way. These names include Chirine el Khadem, Ibrahim Moussa, Ossie (Osman Ragheb), Mohamed Metwalli and the newest addition Mohamed Ali who won the 2006 Alexandria Film Festival Award for a well made film championing liberation and equality for women, and starring Tunisian born actress Hind Sabri. Breaking a frontier taboo and bridging a cross cultural gap seem to come naturally either as a belief or a second nature to the typical Alexandrian artist.

We can also mention Francesco Freda in Italy, Vassilis Vafeas in Greece, the Hakim brothers and Jeanne Sorel in France, Anne Freeway in Hollywood, Ibrahim Moussa in Germany and Italy, and Dodi el Fayed in England. And as a drop of Alexandrian blood did go a long way indeed to paint the Mediterranean with its ex-enclave minorities, we have a second generation “ex-Alexandrian” Maria Iliou whose mother lived in Alexandria and dictated the story of the daughter’s film romance. There is also Maria Klonaris whose father was born in Alexandria and was a practicing gynecologist, and seems to have had some remote-distance geographic and genealogical effect on his daughter. Apparently, while going through her father’s files as a child, the picture of a hermaphrodite, adding the paradox of androgyny to the Alexandrian paradox of polarity, became the emblem that shaped her cinematic vision, creating a whole trend in the 1970s, and receiving European and international acclaim. Interesting, too, is that the famous Futurist Marinetti for whom Futurism is “grounded in the complete renewal of human sensibility that has generated [our] pictorial dynamism” should have been born in Alexandria. Gregoire Solotareff now in France, son of Dr. Henri el Kayem who was once the medical attendant to the Egyptian crown prince, studied medicine like his father but then chose to write children’s books and together with his sister Nnadia to illustrate them using his mother’s Russian name. Solotareff’s books have been made into a series of five animated short films based on his picture book Loulou (1989). Others born in Alexandria and of renown for artistic achievement, we can cite Moshe Mizrahi born in 1931 and active in Israeli cinema, with a film echoing almost identically a later Egyptian film, both bearing the same title Father of Girls (Abou el banat).

To crown it with an Academy Award for technical excellence we have come across Fouad Said, the inventor of the “cinemoblie”, perhaps not born in Alexandria at all, although the possibility does exist. Fouad Said grew up in the studio of his maternal uncle by a name no other than Joseph Aziz – whether he was directly related to Aziz Bandarli of the very early period, or just an apprentice or whether the name is a mere coincidence, we do not know for sure. But the studio which later became Studio el Ahram was founded by the Armenian Hagop Ohan, himself a Cairene who trained and worked for a while in Alexandria and who may have brought with him some technicians from there. When it comes to cinematographers (photographers, technicians, directors – those who trained in studios) one seems to belong to an Alexandrian past either by descent or association or a blend of both. So those were formative years that shaped an outstanding technical achievement, earning Fouad Said material and moral returns and national pride for the country he left behind.

Romantically one extends an honorary, virtual, almost hereditary affiliation and citizenship valid long after passports and residence permits expire and nationalities change and geographic maps of nations are altered by history, for together we share a human heritage born of a common background. The same goes for the compatriot, or the son or one of even later descent – for in our culture we say that a blood affiliation will hold on for seven generations. It is in that spirit of the compatriot without rigid spatial frontiers that one embraces a Dodi el Fayed or a Hakim brother or a Vassilis Vafias or even a Maria Klonaris, and by association of proximity to Cairo, the possible legitimacy of a Fouad Said. Even a transient passage through Alexandria may leave its cinematic mark on an artist with such an inclination. Osman Ragheb, born in Nablus, Palestine, spent his formative years in Alexandria and made his cinematic debut in 1944 with Youssef Chahine while both were schoolboys at Victoria College, making together a short “film” called School Life. Now a German national, Osman Ragheb – known by the name of Ossie – has an extensive filmography including Schindler’s List in which he acted and others where he was assistant director and dialogue coach.

We adopt them all with open arms, and tend to over-trace the linealogy and to boast a kinship if we can, out of a natural desire for fraternity perhaps, but mostly because we can trace the crop to the original seed and to a memory undimmed by departure.

III. Before the camera: The Actors

From the early days, Alexandria had its fair share of actors, actresses and stars. They were pure Egyptians as well as pure foreigners, and often they were of mixed heritage and blood. Regardless of race, acting in the early films was neither sophisticated nor cultivated. It was basic, and very often naïve. The art was new and those who were drawn to it had a calling certainly other than money since it paid precious little. Besides, it was exhausting and shooting conditions, being primitive, were excruciating.

Silent movies, which had in part been created by women who demanded a certain standard, and which in turn had made stars of these daring and committed women, were soon succeeded by sound movies, which those stars could not survive. Their acting, which had hitherto depended on their eyes, generally quite expressive, became more affected and false. This may also explain another point: whereas there was a fascination with comedy, our three actress/producers (Aziza Amir, Bahiga Hafez and Fatma Rushdi) ventured on serious films with either patriotic undertones or serious social themes, as well as adaptations from literary works, whether Egyptian or foreign. There was almost an attempt at almost highbrow cinema with the women, none of whom produced any comedy. Some did have comic roles, but they were not the stars and often they could not qualify as divas, as with the ugly Bahiga el Mahdi (Henriette Cohen) or Badriya Raafat (Josephine Sarkis) who was fat.

As with the cinematographers, actors and actresses eventually left to Cairo or Europe and Hollywood. In addition to the well-known cases documented in this catalogue, we have traced those with some form of link to Alexandria. Ann Greenway, Jeanne Sorel, Dinos Iliopoulos, Sean Delon and Chris Maher were born in Alexandria. None of them, with the exception of Delon, has worked in Egyptian productions but have pursued careers abroad. Many of them, too, have worked in different specializations. Even those who ended up producing, or owning production companies, also did some acting.

Ann Greenway was born in Alexandria on August 15th, 1902, the daughter of the American ambassador to Egypt. She acted mainly in the theatre opposite Ed Wynn in Carnival and even starred in George le Maire’s Affaires. In 1929 producer William le Baron cast her as the ingénue lead in Half-Marriage, but her screen appearances remained limited. She died in California in June 1977. The Greek Dinos Iliopoulos – a great comedy actor – was born in Alexandria in 1915. His Peloponnesian father was a businessman and after the crash in 1929 Dinos left with his family to Marseille, then left them to continue his studies in Athens. In 1954 he formed a theatre group of his own with Mimis Fotopoulos, creating one of the best comic duos seen in Greece. He continued acting on stage and in the cinema well into the 1970s, receiving the King George I Award for his contribution to acting. He died in June 2001 of a lung infection. Jeanne Sorel was also born in Alexandria in 1913 before making it big in New York and England, both as an actress and a musician. Her origins are unknown but she is probably of Egyptian Jewish descent.

Foreign stars whose nativity in Alexandria is sometimes contested are Anna Magniani and George Raft. Some sources say Anna Magniani was born in Alexandria, while others cite Rome as her homeland, though conceding that her father was from Alexandria. Hollywood star George Raft is also said to have been either born, raised or lived for some time in Alexandria, but this has not been substantiated by any reliable record, so we cannot testify to the fact. An alleged birth name Raphtopoulos or Raftakis remains a matter for speculation. George Guetarie was most likely born in Alexandria but little is known of his years there. Strangely enough, we have encountered similar uncertainties with some of our Egyptian actors: a case in point being Abdel Fattah el Qossari, whose school days at a Freres school are sometimes specified as having been at Saint Marc College in Alexandria. However, in his case, the information is generally eclipsed by a keener interest taken in his alleged upper middle class background contrasting with his famous impersonations, as well as an understandable desire to appropriate the famous to one’s camp. With scrutiny the list gets longer, but we have tried to narrow our margin of error.

We have examples of actors who may have graced our screens once or twice never to repeat the experience, or with whom we lost touch when they went abroad. Of these, Ms. Elias Bondi, who taught at the EGC in her early twenties, took part in Wife Number 13 (el Zawgah raqam talatachar) starring Rushdi Abaza. Likewise, Corinne Negm Eldin had minor roles in a few Egyptian films, including one by Youssef Chahine. The same goes for some women actors from the upper middle classes who literally had a shot in front of the camera just once at the insistence of a producer or a director who was either a true admirer, or who hoped to promote their films by advertising well-known family names, as in the case of Kismet Chirine.

We have examples of actors who may have graced our screens once or twice never to repeat the experience, or with whom we lost touch when they went abroad. Of these, Ms. Elias Bondi, who taught at the EGC in her early twenties, took part in Wife Number 13 (el Zawgah raqam talatachar) starring Rushdi Abaza. Likewise, Corinne Negm Eldin had minor roles in a few Egyptian films, including one by Youssef Chahine. The same goes for some women actors from the upper middle classes who literally had a shot in front of the camera just once at the insistence of a producer or a director who was either a true admirer, or who hoped to promote their films by advertising well-known family names, as in the case of Kismet Chirine.

Examples abound, but not all have been mentioned unless they testify to theory or syndrome. But one thing is obvious; although cinema had become physically remote from the homeland of Alexandrians, the call could still be heard from afar and from overseas, and there seems to be an innate desire to answer that call.

IV. Film

THOMPSON: Well, Mr. Bernstein, you were with Mr. Kane from the very beginning…
BERNSTEIN: From before the beginning young fellow. And now it’s after the end.
Citizen Kane

The catalogue would not be complete without a list of the early attempts at making films: the early very short pre-documentary types, some of which could be compared to present day home videos or tantamount, at best, to video art in its earliest stages, through the longer feature films as we know them today. In compiling filmographies of actors or cinematographers, we relied mainly on Mahmoud Kassem’s and Magda Wassef’s monumental references. We did not venture to examine the documentaries, nor the Amon Newsreel, which was the brawn and brainchild of early Egyptian pioneer Mohamed Bayoumi. Unfortunately, acquisition of footage was not readily available and therefore historical and technical assessment would leave much to be desired were we to attempt a fleeting or purely theoretical discussion of them.

The catalogue would not be complete without a list of the early attempts at making films: the early very short pre-documentary types, some of which could be compared to present day home videos or tantamount, at best, to video art in its earliest stages, through the longer feature films as we know them today. In compiling filmographies of actors or cinematographers, we relied mainly on Mahmoud Kassem’s and Magda Wassef’s monumental references. We did not venture to examine the documentaries, nor the Amon Newsreel, which was the brawn and brainchild of early Egyptian pioneer Mohamed Bayoumi. Unfortunately, acquisition of footage was not readily available and therefore historical and technical assessment would leave much to be desired were we to attempt a fleeting or purely theoretical discussion of them.

Early cinema established patterns that remain evident to this day. It is to people like Togo Mizrahi and the early amateurs and entrepreneurs and their investment in the new medium that we remain grateful as Egyptians and even as dwellers of the larger Mediterranean. Even beyond the Arab borders, the first Greek speaking films were made in Alexandria by Mizrahi and Orfanelli. Greek stars found their way to Egypt to have their films produced and executed by investors and technicians and filmmakers in Alexandria. Those films would star Greek actors, such as La Vembo and Paraskevas, who reveled in the success such films would bring them. It is said that as late as the 1950s Cakoyanis made a film in Egypt and that his second film Stella (1955) was produced by the Greek Egyptian Milas.

Melina Mercouri, a former Greek actress turned minister of culture starred in Stella, and is reported to have also acted on the stage of a Greek theatre of variétiés in Ibrahimieh. Interestingly, the musical score of her famous film Never on a Sunday has provided the music of one of the signature songs about Alexandria, lyrics by Salah Jahine. Baha’ Jahine, the lyricist’s son, recounts how as a child he went to see the movie and was so struck by the music that his father wrote the lyrics that same day to set them to the music that had so enchanted his son. (The song tells of how Alexander lay on the shores of Macedonia and dreamed of Alexandria; incidentally, it was first sung at an Alexandrian Film Festival by Samir Sabri, also an Alexandrian). A similar interesting coincidence is when Alexandrian born Demis Roussous, son of dancer and actress Nelly Mazloum, teamed up once again with fellow Greek composer Vangelis to make a song set to the musical score of Alexandrian Dodi el Fayed’s production Chariots of Fire for which task the former Aphrodite’s Child Greek Vangelis was specifically assigned by el Fayed.

We are indebted, too, to early themes which still recur until now. The first film to demonstrate a major motif in Egyptian melodrama was Laila, and seduction is still at the core of our films to this day. Mohamed Karim likewise introduced in El Warda el Beida one of the core narratives of Egyptian cinema: the young and poor worker who falls in love with the daughter of the wealthy employer. Incidentally, just as films produced by pioneer Egyptian women had on several occasion political undertones, so too was a later film about Algerian resistance fighter Gamila Abou Hreid produced by Magda who also starred in the Chahine Jamila the Algerian. Interestingly Aziza Amir too had portrayed a Tunisian and a Palestinian, which may be explained as an unconscious desire to legitimize and glorify the otherwise perhaps frowned upon practice of flirting with a medium deemed unbefitting for either gender. So that those more serious and patriotic attempts would, as it were, elevate their films to a different status of respectability, and provide a raison d’être for their films.

So, as individuals and as a nation we remain indebted to those early times of cinema. Furthermore, the state’s appropriation of private networks especially after the later sequestration that led to the closing down of the businesses of Togo Mizrahi and Behna, for instance, would itself have been impossible without the early efforts. For without the early achievements, later filmmakers would not have had the technical know how, skill or expertise, or even the necessary audience support to sustain the industry.

So, as individuals and as a nation we remain indebted to those early times of cinema. Furthermore, the state’s appropriation of private networks especially after the later sequestration that led to the closing down of the businesses of Togo Mizrahi and Behna, for instance, would itself have been impossible without the early efforts. For without the early achievements, later filmmakers would not have had the technical know how, skill or expertise, or even the necessary audience support to sustain the industry.

V. Cinemas, the Screening Cathedrals

As the cinema business became more competitive, the number of cinemas expanded. The predictably reassuring incoming returns on investments and the interest in movie-going taken by more classes than those who had more readily caught on at first accounted for more eager venturing into the business of cinema ownership and renting. Cinema was no longer an exclusive entertainment solely for the upper and middle classes, nor for the foreigners or the mixed nationals, and demand exceeded supply in a movie-loving and movie-going city.

Cinemas were owned mainly by Greeks and Shawam whose keen sense of business drew them into the enterprise. Often owners of more than one cinema like Elie Lotfi or Fouad Haggar would give the right of utilization to others to run them. Sometimes, however, weak seasonal downturns would force a cinema to close for a short period of time, often to re-open by another name on the same street, or in a new location. Sometimes there would be several cinemas in different places carrying the same name. All of this made the task of locating some of the cinemas on the Alexandrian map somewhat arduous.

After the early period of imported movies, followed by that of the home made film, American and European movies were rented to cinemas by the metre for a fixed price with the “Alexandria market covering two thirds of local distributors’ costs and Cairo responsible for the remaining third”. It was a growing market second in the region only to British South Africa.

Branch offices of American and French distribution companies opened in Egypt and Universal Pictures had its Nnear East regional headquarters in Alexandria which served as a transit point. An orientation emanating from the European dominated free trade regime in Egypt since the 19th century made for relatively liberal trade policies, so that even after Egypt obtained tariff autonomy in 1930 when the last agreement with the European powers expired, film tariffs remained low and restrictions on film imports remained few. However, a closure of the market was an inevitable outcome of monopolistic tendencies and later of the sequestrations when a good deal of the business slowed down and many previously active distributors and cinema owners left the country or simply quit the business.

After the 1950s customs duties were raised on foreign films by 25% limiting the import activities of local distribution. In that respect, too, remnants of past liberalism remained for decades and well into the Nasser era, to whom we owe the release of the film A Little Fear (Shei’ men el khowf) which was feared by the authorities to be an offense to his person, for its depiction of a village led by a dictator with hints to Egypt under the Nasser regime. However, after viewing the film privately he asked for its release uncensored. Repeated calls for protectionist measures against the threat of competition from film imports made by Egyptian filmmakers and The Cinema Chamber were met with little response declaring “competition to be the heart of commerce”, and even the relatively high taxes imposed on the entertainment sector did little to restrict the flow of foreign pictures into the country: an open orientation adopted from the days of cinema’s tender age, and to which we are positively grateful. And so cinema audiences acquired a habit for something which, unlike other commodities, did not threaten to be abolished or boycotted and simply disappear from the entertainment routine of the average Egyptian into which it had gradually come to set in.

Movie houses were erected in different architectural styles: an accent on the status of cinema venue as a “building”, as architecture was the celebration of an institution taking root: Cinema Gaumont was advertised as a “Screening Cathedral”. A history of cinema theatres is certainly a thing of the future; there is already a distinct impression that the “logic by which they were often shaped depended both on the kind of product they offered and on their surrounding environment” which goes to explain the wide variety of venues Alexandria had, from the roofless summer cinemas to the cinemas in more or less popular or elegant residential areas of the city catering to varying audiences.

Cinemas whose plan derived from the theatre, with a grand front entrance, a spacious lobby, seats and stalls according to class, a screen and next to it, possibly a piano, if not an orchestra pit, is a thing of the past. However, the masonry construction suggests that the cinema is here to stay, to become a social reality, and a means of communication and entertainment boasting continuous production answering to settled demand just as the industry established itself as a reality with staying powers to challenge, like Talaat Harb with a shrewd business sense, the famous quote of Auguste Lumière that “cinema is an art without a future”.

VI. The Phoenix Rising from the Ashes: a Hundred Years On

If this is only a footnote to our research about the legacy of Alexandrian cinema in a hundred years, and a backward look that is not an elegy but a gaze, a few last points need to be addressed. The establishment of the cinema industry in Cairo was helped by the creation of Studio Misr, and was augmented by the outbreak of World War II, when thousands fled from Alexandria to Cairo escaping German bombs and the German threat advancing on Alexandria from Alamein. But if in 1939 the temporary exodus of Alexandrians was to Cairo, the nationalizations and sequestrations of the 1960s led to a final wave of exodus – this time beyond the borders of Egypt altogether, sounding the death knell of the cosmopolitanism that had given birth to the art. However, as a little Alexandrian blood goes a long way – as far as Cairo, Europe and Hollywood – the harking back to the city on the Mediterranean has been constant. Alexandria continues to figure as a site for nostalgia, as in Maria Iliou’s Alexandria (2000), but equally importantly, to nurture cinematic artists.

One observation remains relevant. Whereas the early pioneers undertook to produce and direct as well as act, very few modern ones such as Samir Sabri have considered the attempt, or rather, the adventure. With the cinematic seat established in Cairo, the move to the capital is itself the physical and psychological trip that the Alexandrian citizen considering a career in movies finds himself making. But with the experimental movies of the Jesuit Cultural Centre came a whole list of potential actors, producers and directors. Interestingly enough we see an Alexandrian woman funding the production of another Alexandrian female director Louli Seif, whose film Resurrection was produced by Wafa’ Wali, in the tradition of the pioneering mothers who broke taboos, and gambled with money and repute to go, like true pioneers, the unknown way.

With the studio in Amriyeh, and more experimental video art as encouraged by the various cultural centres, and with Alexandria gaining a certain reputation as a neo-incubator of young directors from abroad using local facilities including even those of a local studio – albeit primitively equipped – the hope to resurrect a bygone past in a technically and digitally enhanced present remains a bright prospect. With it, the man power both behind and before the camera is bound to come alive.

References

Internet Sources

www.cafearabica.com/culture/cultureold/articles/culshafiq2x3.html
www.imdb.com/title/tt0151416/
www.mediasalles.it/c_hist.htm
www.acmi.net.au/AIC/MOVIE_HIST_TIMELINE.html