The election of a new Grand Imam at Al-Azhar, Cairo’s leading Islamic institution, touches off a ruthless struggle between the State security apparatus and the clandestine Muslim Brotherhood. Caught in the middle is Adam, a devout but innocent young man who becomes a pawn in a deadly high-stakes game of murder and betrayal.
Tarik Saleh, exiled from Egypt, shot this film off-shore and he certainly pulls no punches in this slow-burning political thriller which carried off the Best Screenplay award at Cannes for its tough-minded approach to the clash between the state and religion.
“boldly anti-clerical, juxtaposing the spectacle of faith with a hidden reality of corruption and hypocrisy” (The Guardian)
A labyrinthine but satisfying thriller… an ambitiously complex story of religious espionage” (Screen International)
Presented by
Tarik Saleh
Tarik Saleh started as one of the top graffiti artists in Stockholm in the 80’s. He directed and wrote the screenplay for The Nile Hilton Incident that won ‘The Grand Jury Prize’ at Sundance 2017, received a Guldbagge Award for ‘Best Film’ in 2018, was nominated as ‘Best Foreign Film’ at the César Awards and was a box office hit with more than 400,000 tickets sold in France. He directed action thriller, The Contractor (2022) with staring Chris Pine, Ben Foster and Kiefer Sutherland. Several episodes of the futuristic HBO-series Westworld (2018) and Showtimes-series Ray Donovan. The thriller Tommy (2014) with Ola Rapace, Moa Gammeland singer-songwriter Lykke Li for whom heal so directed the music video I Follow Rivers that have about 80 million views onYouTube.
His film debut came with Metropia (2009), a dystopic animation with Stellan Skarsgård, Juliette Lewis, Vincent Galloand Udo Kier. The film premiered at the Venice Film Festival as the opening film for Critics’ Week. TarikSaleh also directed the documentaries Gitmo: The New Rules of War (2005) and Sacrificio: Who Betrayed Che Guevara (2001) together with Erik Gandini. Tarik Saleh founded the production company Atmo with producer Kristina Åberg.
Program Strand
World Cinema
Language
Arabic
Subtitles
English
Director
Tarik Saleh
Producer
Kristina Aberg, Frederik Zander
Writer
Tarik Saleh
Cinematographer
Pierre Aïm
Editor
Theis Schmidt
Music
Krister Linder
Cast
Tawfeek Barhum, Fares Fares, Mohammad Bakri
Genre
Drama, Religious
Tarik Saleh
Tarik Saleh started as one of the top graffiti artists in Stockholm in the 80’s. He directed and wrote the screenplay for The Nile Hilton Incident that won ‘The Grand Jury Prize’ at Sundance 2017, received a Guldbagge Award for ‘Best Film’ in 2018, was nominated as ‘Best Foreign Film’ at the César Awards and was a box office hit with more than 400,000 tickets sold in France. He directed action thriller, The Contractor (2022) with staring Chris Pine, Ben Foster and Kiefer Sutherland. Several episodes of the futuristic HBO-series Westworld (2018) and Showtimes-series Ray Donovan. The thriller Tommy (2014) with Ola Rapace, Moa Gammeland singer-songwriter Lykke Li for whom heal so directed the music video I Follow Rivers that have about 80 million views onYouTube.
His film debut came with Metropia (2009), a dystopic animation with Stellan Skarsgård, Juliette Lewis, Vincent Galloand Udo Kier. The film premiered at the Venice Film Festival as the opening film for Critics’ Week. TarikSaleh also directed the documentaries Gitmo: The New Rules of War (2005) and Sacrificio: Who Betrayed Che Guevara (2001) together with Erik Gandini. Tarik Saleh founded the production company Atmo with producer Kristina Åberg.
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