This is a great romantic film that touches your heart in a delicate manner unlike most other modern-day Egyptian movies. It is the collaborative work of the renowned director, Muhammad Khan, and his wife, the scenarist, Wisam Sulaiman. The love relationship of the newly married couple (director and screenwriter) reflects beautifully in the above film.
The film is the story of Nagwa, a beautiful shy woman in her late 20s, who travels from her hometown, Al-Minya, to Cairo (the capital city of Egypt) for the first time in her life only to look for her beloved childhood teacher, Tahany. Teacher Tahany had inspired Nagwa and her classmates in a nuns' school, a long time ago, with her talks about love and love songs. She (the teacher) was later kicked out of the school because of her alleged bad influence on children. For many years, Nagwa keeps in touch with her teacher through letters (conventional handwritten letters, not emails - you know, the ones people used to send by post!).
Nagwa arrives in Cairo only to find that her childhood teacher mysteriously disappeared from her flat in Masr El-Gideeda (Heliopolis - a large leafy suburb in Cairo), which is now occupied by a new tenant, Yahya, a handsome, practical, busy young man who works in the stock market. An interesting chain of events take place that result in Nagwa missing her train trip (back to her hometown) at least a couple of times and prevent her from returning with her colleagues as previously planned. A story gently evolves between Nagwa and Yahya, two characters who live in totally different worlds.
Throughout the film we listen to good old love songs of Layla Murad and Umm Kalthoum, and the beautiful piano music of Tamer Karawan. We hear the love stories and dreams of the young and old characters in the film.
The film is a 'cleansing' and refreshing experience - a temporal recovery from all the rubbish, violence and cheap material we are bombarded with on the silver screen. It is definitely one of those movies that will stay in your memory for a long time after you watch it, and you will be compelled to watch it again and again.
In modern standards, this is not your usual romantic movie. We don't see the typical love scenes, not even kisses! In fact, the only intimate 'bedroom' scenes in the film are for Yahya and a colleague of his, who used to drop by at his apartment, and with which he had no love relationship!
If you're after nudity or action, this film is not for you.
The script is in Arabic (Egyptian dialect). DVDs (at least the one I bought) will usually have subtitles in English and (possibly) other languages.
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