☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ½
Cairo
Station (1958) – Y. Chahine
Youssef Chahine directs and stars as
Qinawi, a disabled denizen of Cairo Station who sells newspapers to earn his
meagre living but seems to spend most of his time gawking at the other members
of the Station community. Chief among these is Hanuma, a sexy free-spirited gal
who sells illegal sodas to train passengers and who serves as a constant source
of sexual frustration for Qinawi. She is
set to marry Abu Serih who is a porter attempting to rally his colleagues to
the union cause and who is generally kind to Qinawi, originally a sympathetic
if weird and forlorn character. But
things turn quite dark. Chahine’s film
fits perfectly into the golden age of world cinema (50’s/60’s) with its
eye-opening and cinematic intro to another culture, however unlike the straight
humanism of, say, Satyajit Ray, instead we get a noirish look at obsession and
desperation, albeit within the family-like community centred on the train
station. It’s compelling all the way through.
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