Saturday, Feb 22, 2014
Cairo: Four years after struggling with Egypt’s censors, director Amr Salama was eventually given the go-ahead to make his controversial film Lamukhaza (Excuse my French), which hit the local theatres earlier this month.
The comic film tells the story of Hany, a Christian boy who is forced to leave his expensive private school for a governmental school after the sudden death of his father, a bank manager.
At the new school, Hany, played by child actor Ahmad Dash, conceals his Christian identity for fear of persecution from his Muslim classmates and teachers. “What’s your name?” Hany is asked by his Muslim teacher. When the child gives his name as Hany Abdullah, failing to mention his distinctive Christian surname, the teacher comments, “Thank God, we all are Muslims.”
Ridiculed by his classmates for his privileged background, Hany tries hard to get adapted to his new school. He cuts his long hair and asks his mother, played by actress Kinda Alloush, to stop driving him to the school. He attempts to impress his unruly colleagues by excelling in science and memorising parts of the Quran. He even wins the top prize in a school religious competition as a Muslim boy.
His secret is, however, uncovered when his mother shows up at school, sporting a cross around her neck. “Lads! Hany has turned out to be a kufta [meatball]!” shouts a Muslim schoolboy, using a derogatory term referring to Coptic Christians. In the following scene, Hany’s classmates and teacher look stunned at the news.
Days after the film, also written by Salama, was released, a lawyer requested it be banned, accusing its makers of inciting sectarian sedition in Egypt. No decision has been made yet on the request.
Christians account for around 10 per cent of Egypt’s mostly Muslim 86 million population. They have long complained about religious discrimination and attacks by radical Islamists.
Lamukhaza, one of very few Egyptian films handling relations between Egypt’s Christians and Muslims, has been a box office hit since its release, according to the market observers. It has also generated good reviews.
“It is unfair to say that the film only deals with religious discrimination in Egypt,” said Ahmad Farhat, a Muslim civil engineer, who added that he along with his family saw the film two times.
“It is an excellent work shedding light on deterioration of education in governmental schools and the wide gap between the rich and the poor in Egypt. These serious messages are made in a simple and amusing way.”
The film is partly the story of its Egyptian director, who is a Muslim. “I always felt I belonged to the minority,” Salama said in a recent TV interview. “As a boy, I attended a school in the Gulf where I was always called the ‘Egyptian boy’. When I moved to Egypt and was enrolled at a private school, I was called ‘the boy coming from the Gulf’. Later, I moved to a governmental school where pupils used to refer to me as ‘the boy coming from the private school’!”
By Ramadan Al Sherbini ?Correspondent
Gulf News 2014. All rights reserved.
