Directed by Youssef Chahine • 1986 • Egypt
Starring Dalida, Mohsen Mohieddin, Shwikar
This singularly arresting adaptation of a novel by renowned writer Andrée Chedid casts French pop star Dalida (in her final screen performance) as a married washerwoman trying to save the life of her stricken grandson in the midst of the 1947 cholera outbreak in Cairo, while simultaneously navigating the romantic advances of a charming, Gene Kelly–obsessed young organ grinder (Mohsen Mohieddin). Tragedy and comedy, reality and fantasy, melodrama and musical merge in a dreamily poetic cinematic fairy tale that stands as one of director Youssef Chahine’s most philosophically probing pictures—a meditation on the role of art in resisting despair and mortality.
Up Next in Directed by Youssef Chahine
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Saladin the Victorious
Directed by Youssef Chahine • 1963 • Egypt
Starring Ahmed Mazhar, Salah Zulfikar, Nadia LutfiConceived as an ode to Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser, this titanic super spectacle, set in the twelfth-century Crusades, is Egyptian cinema’s rebuttal to the Hollywood Christian epic. Ahmed Maz...
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Adieu Bonaparte
Directed by Youssef Chahine • 1985 • Egypt
Starring Michel Piccoli, Mohsen Mohieddin, Mohamed AtefYoussef Chahine’s rich and nuanced exploration of culture clash and connection centers...
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Alexandria . . . Why?
Directed by Youssef Chahine • 1979 • Egypt
Starring Naglaa Fathi, Mahmoud el-Meliguy, Farid ShawqiHaving spent the larger part of the 1960s and ’70s examining the rise and fall of Egypt’s first republic, director Youssef Chahine turned inwards with this kaleidoscopic, semi-autobiographical evo...
