1942, Alexandrie. L’Egypte, sous la domination britannique, s’attend a la prochaine arrivée de troupes allemandes la bataille d’El-Alamein est imminente. Yehia, un adolescent pétri de cinéma americain, veut devenir acteur et prépare un spectacle avec ses camarades du lycée catholique.

Un film de Youssef Chahine

Année: 1978 – Egyptien – durée : 2h10

« Alexandria, Why? » marked a radical, newly introspective turn in Chahine’s active career, a sharp departure from his Fifties musicals and melodramas and his later epics and political films. The first of Chahine’s four film semi-autobiography, entitled « Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, » « Alexandria, Why? » focuses on a precocious adolescent whose dreams and colorful attempts to become an actor unfold against the vivid backdrop of Alexandria during World War II. A rich ensemble cast inspires Chahine’s young thespian hero with a wealth of dramatic subplots-at turns hilarious and touching-about wartime life. The autobiographical nature and nostalgic flavor of « Alexandria, Why? » make it one of Chahine’s most accessible works, a charming and entertaining film that also delivers a potently subversive and impassioned anti-war message.

Directed by Youssef Chahine.

With Naglaa Fathi, Farid Shawki, Ezzat el-Alaili

Egypt 1978, 35mm, color, 130 min. Arabic with English subtitles


Source:
http://hcl.harvard.edu/hfa/films/2009janfeb/chahine.html