Al karnak (الكرنك)

El-Leithy films

Mamdouh El-Leithy

presents...

Soad Hosni

Kamal El-Shenawy

Great Actor: Farid Shawky

Karnak

Written by great author Naguib Mahfouz

- Did you clean this glass? -Yes

Then clean over there

This is Cairo

Fellow citizens, this is decree number seven

of the General Command of the Armed Forces

on the 6th of October, 1973

In the name of Allah, Beneficent and Merciful

Our Armed Forces have succeeded

in crossing the Suez Canal along the front

and taking over the Eastern Bank of the Canal

Our forces are currently resuming the fight successfully

Our navy has also embarked

on protecting the left side of our forces on the Mediterranean

and striking important enemy targets

on the Northern Coast of Sinai

directly hitting the targets

Allah is great... Allah is great!

Oh, God!

- Lucky I lived to see this day - Thank God

Thank God, though I don't believe it

- What's wrong, Mr. Taha? - Nothing at all

- Great is the Lord's mercy - We must do something

- If I were fit, I'd donate blood - I must volunteer

They don't need you. Our youth are sturdy

Stop that tone; it gives me the creeps

Thank God we made a move

Your army and fleet the challenge meet

In your name, our land, with our own hand

Your army and fleet the challenge meet

Your land and crop, your sun and moon

Your poems and tunes, your Pyramids and Nile

Careful

Where to, sir?

-I want to enter - Have you a pass?

- I'm a doctor - Have you a pass?

I said I'm a doctor

Have you any ID?

No. Get me someone to talk to

I can't leave my post

- Please, I must enter - You can't without a pass

Zeinab

Zeinab

Ismail

Ismail

- Ismail - Zeinab

Tell them I'm a doctor

I want to go in. I want to work

OK, Ismail. I'll try to get you a pass

No way. We're at war and have no time

- But sir... - Dr. Zeinab, he's an irresponsible man

- Forgotten his theft of morphine? - But sir...

- It's over - Please, sir

Let me explain

Ismail went through tough circumstances, doctor

What he suffered was intolerable

You must give him another chance. I'm sure he's reborn

Starring: Nour El-Sherif

Mohammed Sobhy Shewikar

Salah Zul-Fugqar Emad Hamdy

Taheya Karioka Fayez Halawa

Mohammed Tawfiq Aly El-Sherif

Adly Kasib Younis Shalaby Wabhid Seif Ossama Abbas

Music Score: Gamal Salama

Set Designer: Maher Abd El-Nour

Editing: Sated El-Sheikh

Cinematography: Mohsen Nasr

Screenplay and Production: Mamdouh El-Leithy

Directed by: Aly Badrakhan

Helm Helmy. Well?

- Did you get the loan? - Wait for your luck

They need us to present evidence of our poverty

If we weren't, why borrow from the student bank? How embarrassing!

I'm not embarrassed

I'll advertise my poverty on TV

I'm poor everyone I'm poor, people

Don't make a scandal

He's right... it's like a riddle

To succeed you must study, so you need books, which cost money

Heaps of money

A book to explain the Charter costs 2 pounds. The Charter, 2 piasters

So to understand socialism, your dad must be a capitalist

How smart; it's good of them to even offer such a service

- Oh, yeah? - Ismail's right. Listen, Helmy...

Just give me a pen

Wait

Poor... three times over

Work hard. God be with you

- Let's walk home - Again?

- Won't you come to Karnak? -Yes

What's with this Karnak these days?

- Since when do you go to cafes? - It's not just a cafe

What then? A café-au-lait?!

No, an espresso; ask Helmy

- We attend Taha El-Gharib's seminar - The author?

- At a café with the likes of you? - We're not nobodies

You're not, but I'm coming with you

Fine, come with us

Ahly... Ahly

Me sitting at a café?

You'll love it. She's white and pretty with long lashes

- Who? - The Karnak, boy. The Karnak

I break my bones beneath the shadow of sorrow and pain

I beat the walls again and again

My hands shake like a leaf on a tree

The wall stands firm like destiny

Beyond the wall is my bliss, mute

Beyond the wall I'm lonely, destitute

Our white house with green window sill

No, no... in that place don't dwell

For like you I want to be

For like her I cannot be

- Hello, Mr. Helmy - How are you Lady Qurunfela?

Zeinab, lady Qurunfela runs the Karnak café and intellectual seminars

- Come in - We'll join Mr. Taha El-Gharib

Go ahead; Imam, add some chairs

- Welcome, Mr Helmy - Thanks, Gomaa

O travellers, if you return, let's sing

I want to build temples for worshiping

I want pleasure with purity

and unending enjoyability

I want us loyal to remain

I want everything existing. Am I, then, insane?

That's it; it's finished

The poem's finished

What do you think, Mr Taha?

- Forgive me, but why write it? - To express myself

To whom? People?

Your words are too hard to grasp Sorry

But they're metaphors, Mr Taha

You yourself use metaphors in your writings

I don't use metaphors

People read and interpret as they like

Please, Mr Taha. I have a response to your words

- We've not been introduced yet - Zeinab Diab

- Our colleague in Medical School - Hello

This is Rashad Magdy, a pensioner

- And Mohammed Bahgat, undersecretary - "Ex", if you please

Go ahead. At your service

You've never criticized politics outright

I always feel you're beating about the bush

That's the nature of art... indirect

That's how it differs from journalism

Articles say nothing nowadays

Ages ago, articles toppled ministers

Freedom, strong parties

Parties commercialized slogans for personal purposes

Pardon them; it's what they learn in Youth Organization

Not the organization... it's reality

Would parties have been able to form a strong army?

The High Dam? Free education?

Manufacturing? Agricultural reform?

Those are successful projects of the Revolution

But the real revolutionists should be in control

Not the bourgeois that prospered in the King's days

The Sheik Taha lesson will go on forever

If you don't like it, block your ears

- No, no - Calm down

Freedom is the ability to say no. If one can't say no...

- he'd die - God forbid. Rather your enemies

Why upset him, guys? Sit down God bless you

Liberty means responsibility. Since I chose to be free

I am responsible for my choice

That's what they call commitment

Commitment and liberty are inseparable

Qurunfela was queen of belly dancing in the past

- That's apparent - Know now why Helmy loves seminars?

Those are foreign ideas; you got them from Sartre

Right! Sartre, a French philosopher of 5 letters

Now, an Arab country of 4 letters, starting with M ending in R

- Qatar? Mother? - Magar? (Hungary)

Mother and Magar indeed!

Let's go. Misr (Egypt), man Misr, Hajj

Wait a minute

- Spell it. "S" or "C"? -"S" for soup

The Egyptian renaissance emerged from the café

where Gamal Eddin El-Afghani went

But at Taha El-Gharib's café, most attack the renaissance and revolution

- Haven't you noticed? -Yes

Yes, indeed! Speak your mind

The elderly are backward by nature. Let me write

Are youth backward too? They all profited by the revolution

If not for free education, they'd be unable to philosophize

What do you think?

Let me copy this... or copy it yourself

- You've eaten up all the pickles? -Yes

- What horrible handwriting -I'm in a hurry

What for?

So we can return the book to Helmy

Plus I was leaning on my knee. If only I had a desk!

You're a bourgeois, anxious to climb the social ladder

Me? Why?

Hadn't we agreed to serve people in the countryside?