Yacoubian Building

"Yacoubian Building" is an Egyptian movie worth mentioning. Starring Adel Imam, Yousra, Nour El-Sherif, Hend Sabri, Khaled El-Sawi, Khaled Saleh and the new face Mohamed Imam. Directed by the first-timer, Marwan Hamed. The movie tackles many controversial themes like homosexuality, terrorism and adultery. Accentuating the life of different classes in Egypt and showing the interaction between them. The movie is based on Alaa El-Aswani's novel "Yacoubian Building".
People come and go but buildings are always there witnessing history. Yacoubian Building is one of the oldest buildings witnessing the Egyptian history. Built in 1934 by the millionaire Hagob Yacoubian- still standing till this day in Suliman Pasha street- was originally built for the Armenian colony, rich and high class society business men resided in this building, even some very rich Jews lived there. Nowadays, it is reportedly a little down-in-the-dumps.
The movie opens by telling the history of people coming and going to this building, focusing on the lives of the contemporary residents, of different classes of society, from the pasha to the door keeper. Dramatizing the life of the different classes in contemporary Egypt.
Adel Imam plays the role of Zaki Pasha, a womanizer who totally depends on his inheritance. He lives in the family house with his sister Dawlat. Problems start to rise between the two siblings and they turn against each other. Dawlat is very greedy and wants to kick her brother from the family house. He is trying to live the "western life style" as he called it. Having an open relationship with Yousra playing the role of Christine a pianist. Yet at the end he falls in love with Hend Sabri, Bosaina, a low standard poor girl, from the roof residents.
Nour El-Sherif plays the role of Haj Azzam, who rose from a shoeshine boy to a successful business man. His character is of great importance. He dramatizes the people who disguise behind religious masks, while their true natures are corrupt. He only rose that fast from low class to high class by drug dealing. His character also shows the risky life of business men who are involved into politics. Accentuating the dirty pressures performed by big governmental figures on successful business men. He also proves to be a non religious person driven by his lust. He gets married at very old age, to only satisfy his sexual desires, so he marries Soad, played by Summaya El-Khashab, a widow working hard to raise her child. He takes advantage of her bad financial situation, separates between he and her only son and forbids her from getting children. His injustice reaches it's climax when he heirs some gangsters to force her to abort the baby. Everything he does is completely against religion.
The controversial life of homosexuals is portrayed by the role of Khaled El-Sawi, playing the role of Hatem Rashid, the editor of "Le Caire" newspaper. The only son of a successful Egyptian lawyer and a French mother. In his childhood he was always seeking the attention of his parents but with no reaction from them, they always told him to go away and be quiet. He found no one at home to play with him except for Edris the servant, who introduced him to the underworld of homosexuals. Hatem never got Edris out of his mind. He was involved in many sexual relations with men. One day, walking in the street, wasted from drinking, he sees Abd-Rabo, a well built poor soldier, Hatem is attracted to him and immediately remembers Edris, He gives him money and invites him to a fancy dinner, then takes him back home with him. Abd-Rabo wakes up in the morning tortured by the guilt of the horrible sin, while Hatem, like a devil, comforts him and convinces him that what they are doing is not wrong at all.
Mohamed Imam, playing the role of Taha El-Shazly, the son of the door keeper, presents the fanatical extremism in religion. He works very hard to rise in the social ladder, yet he fails due to the oppression of higher classes. Although he has all the qualifications to be accepted in the police academy, he is rejected because he is the son of the door keeper. He loses all hope to improve his life and family financially and socially. At college he joins an extremist Islamic group and leads demonstrations against the government. Eventually he is caught by the national security. Presenting the inhuman treatment and torture of the prisoners during investigations in dramatic scenes, exposing the cruel and brutal methods used by the police officers, that has no limits from harsh beating to sexual harassment. His life represents the major causes behind extremism.
Yacoubian Building tackled the causes of many social problems facing Egypt nowadays. The taboo of homosexuality is openly discussed. Stating that silence alone will never put an end to this major problem, facing the whole world not Egypt alone. Money may be the cause the root of all problems facing the lower classes in Egypt. The sick perverts of the higher classes manipulate the bad financial situations of the poor, leading to adultery. The lower classes are obliged to sell their honor to be able to support their families. Even religion is manipulated, it is only a mask which corrupt people hide behind to bring them fame. The other face of religion is represented by the life of a religious oppressed person who shifts to extremism due to the shattering of all his dreams due to injustice. All the dirty work of the government on all levels, in prisons and business world is brought to light. The movie is a wake up call for the government to pay more attention in dealing with the public. Showing that oppression will only lead to the revolt of the oppressed.

The Da Vinci Code

The Da Vinci Code:

In this treatment I will not mention the controversial facts of the book, nor am I going to mention any of the shocking theories of Dan Brown, the author of "The Da Vinci Code". I will not even talk about whether the facts are historically correct or not, as all of this was covered in many debates and treated several times elsewhere.Instead,my treatment will balance between the movie and the book, and whether the movie was successful in fleshing the book or not.

"The Da Vinci Code" is an adaptation for Dan Brown's best seller novel "The Da Vinci Code". Just like the novel, The movie-in it's first week showing in the movies-is number 49 in the Worldwide Box Office rating chart, the movie made $470,606,000,although it is banned in many countries. The Cannes Festival opened with this wonderful controversial movie. The stars of the movie are as great as the novel and the movie itself. Tom Hanks who played the leading role of Robert Langdon was nominated four times for the Academy Awards, and two times winner. Audrey Tautou winner of best young actress award in the ninth Jeune Comedian de Cinema Festival in 1998 and best new actress in Cezar Awards in 2000.She costarred with Tom Hanks and played the role of Sophie Neveu. Sir Ian Mckellen, who was knighted by the queen in 1990, the winner of several awards like the Oscars and Academy Awards. Both the movie and the novel caused a big buzz worldwide.

Since the movie is an adaptation of a novel, then we must be fair to mention the fact that the novel would be more interesting than the movie, as the movie has limited time-two hours and 20 minuites.Yet the movie can compensate for this limitation by dramatizing the plot with advanced graphics and sound.However, the movie failed in keeping pace with the novel, due to out of hands limitations. The movie was shot in the Louvre Museum in France, the filming of the movie was only permitted at night, as equipments were not permitted during the opening hours, the crew was not permitted to shine light on the Mona Lisa nor blood nor mysterious writings were permitted on the wooden floor of the museum. To be fair these limitations didn't stand in the face of the brilliant director Ron Howard, and by the help of advanced technology he was able to film these scenes in the Pinewood Studios outside London.

Yet the limitation of time had a great effect on delaying the movie from keeping up with the novel. The movie is hard to follow for most of those who didn't read the novel, alot of incidents were not dramatized in the movie. At the Louvre, while Langdon and Sophie were checking the Mona Lisa, this incident didn't go as smooth as it went in the movie In the novel, there was a guard who recognized Sophie, in chapter 30, he tried to reach to the DCPJ through his walkie-talkie while pointing the gun towards Sophie and Langdon, in the moment Sophie grabbed the "Madonna of The Rocks" in front of her, so that he will not be able to shoot her and to obey her as well. May be this scene wasn't included in the movie because of the limitations in the Louvre,as they would never allow a Da Vinci painting to be used like that.

Another incident was when Langdon and Sir Leigh Teabing were explaining to Sophie everything behind, the Grail's story ,in chapter 61,Where Langdon is telling her about all the implied messages in art, like the Da Vinci's paintings, the works of Walt Disney like "Sleeping Beauty" and "The Little Mermaid", Victor Hugo's "Hunchback of Notre Dame". All these works that celebrate and glorify the Holy Grail. This incident Would have clarified more about the Grail to those who didn't read the book. In the movie they only discussed the idea of the Holy Grail through Da Vinci's painting "The Last Supper". There are many other incidents that if mentioned would have made it easier for those who didn't read the novel to follow the movie.

Yet Ron Howard was brilliant in tackling the most sensitive issue in Christianity. In the best scene in the movie, when Langdon and Sir Leigh Teabing were telling Sophie about the Divinity of Jesus, this was dramatized as a heated debate between both of them, to express how sticky and controversial the divinity of Jesus is-it is from the basics of Christianity, that no one should even doubt.

Finally, it's advisable to read the novel first before watching the movie, to enjoy every incident taking place, and have information about the roots of every single point and event. The movie, due to the mentioned limitations, only tackled the main important points in the plot of the novel, that only work on portraying the message and the theme of the novel in the simplest form, which made it hard for those who didn't read the novel to follow. For those who read the novel the movie is of a great success and serves as an excellent summary that will help the readers to live every moment of the novel.