100 years on the Hollywood of the east

Today from 100 years ago the first Egyptian National shots were taken in Alexandria and guess for what , for the visit of the Khedive Abbas Halmi the second "the ruler factor ,oh boy it is historical" , the famous Khedive who went and didn't return back to liberate Egypt till now was opening the scientific institute in the Morsi Abu Al-Abbas famous Mosque in Alexandria and since then the Egyptian Cameras started and never stopped rolling in thank God

But just for the record this wasn't the first time Egypt saw a cinematic camera as on 1897 or 1896 I can't remember some French people came and took cinematic shots for the Suez Canal as far as I remember

The first Cinema in the Middle east

The first silent Film in the Arab world "Zeinab"

The first spoken film in the Arab world "Zeinab" too

The first colored film in the Arab world

Surely it deserves its title "The Hollywood of the East" no other Arab country national cinema had achieved what it achieves from Success and here I don't talk about success in Film festivals like Cannes , hell no ,I am talking about the public respond ,the people acceptance is the most important factor

The Egyptian Cinema is the gate of stardom in the Arab world and despite all what is said about ,I am honored that we got something like it

Today the Egyptian critics chose the best 15 films in the history of the Egyptian Cinema and what a dull list , sad tragic dramatic films ,yes these movies are great but they are so ....so dull ,they can make you depressed,the only cheerful film in the list was "Ghazal El-Bant" a black comedy in fact

You know one of my favorite films is "Between Heaven and earth" which was directed by Salah Abu Seif ,the father of Egyptian realistic cinema and was written by Naguib Mahfouz in the early 1960s , a political comedy it reminds me with the Blake Edwards film

Another important political comedy also made by Abu Seif and Mahfouz "The start" or "Badia"

Now I will leave you with this music piece by Omar Kharyat "100 years of Cinema" and with this personal collection of Egyptian vintage posters ,enjoy your time

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Sources:

• From Al-Ahram

Technorati tags: Egypt, Egyptian Cinema, Film posters, Middle East, Culture, Art, Films, Movies, hollywood of the east, Africa

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