Tag Archives: The Other

An Egyptian Perspective on the Cinema of Youssef Chahine Part IV

The podcast can also be listened to on Spotify here: https://open.spotify.com/show/2zWZ7Egdy6xPCwHPHlOOaT

and on itunes here: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/first-impressions-thinking-aloud-about-film/id1548559546

Hussein returns for a fourth episode to offer us a fascinating Egyptian perspective on the last epoch of Youssef Chahine’s career, beginning with Cairo as Seen By Chahine (1991) and talking us through The Emigrant (94), Destiny (1997), The Other (99). We also touch on The Choice (1970), Silence, on tourne! (2001) and other of his works, though they do remain peripheral to this particular discussion. Hussein offers us a historical and cultural perspective on these later works and also tells us about their reception in Egypt. At the end of the podcast, Hussein presents  us with an extended discussion on what he sees as recurring concerns in the cinema of Youssef Chahine: The first can be characterised as labour but is inclusive of Labour unions, the worker, the ‘ordinary person’, the downtrodden; another recurring concern, appearing sometimes as a main subject, sometimes as a throwaway is The Algerian War; lastly, a third major strand is the concern with travel, displacement, immigration, liminality: an exploration that takes on different shape within different films. We are very grateful to Hussein for fleshing out so many of these ideas for us, articulating them so clearly, and giving us many more things to think about when considering Chahine’s ouevre. 

The discussion on The Emigrant with Martin Stollery referred to in the podcast can be found here

Also, Hussein provides us with the following links referred to in the podcast:

The song from Destiiny

The song performed by Mounir just a few weeks ago on a popular Egyptian tv program
The emigrant sound track, one of Hussein’s favorites in any Chahine film
Enjoy!

José Arroyo

The Youssef Chahine Podcast No. 24: L’autre/ The Other (Youssef Chahine, Egypt/France, 1999)

After a brief gap, José Arroyo and Richard Layne return for the 24th episode of the Youssef Chahine Pocast, an extended discussion of L’autre/ The Other, a film about Orientalism, Imperialism, Terrorism; an examination of class structures with a gender analysis; a film about a land and its people…yet one that also recalls popular melodramatic and glitzy works like Dynasty. Not quite top Chahine but a film that’s nonetheless made us think and that we’ve grown to love. Edward Said starts off the film with a delicious lecture/advice/framing paradigm:

 

The following excerpts are discussed in the podcast and should be of interest:

The discussion with Edward Said:

The fantasy sequence:

The hommage to Duvivier’s Carnet de bal

The sexual violence:

The end:

 

Disco scene:

Hacker Scene:

Connection to Dynasty:

 

Some of you may also be interested in this conversation with Marianne Khoury,  Youssef Chahine’s niece:

José Arroyo