السيد البلطي (1967)

Wissenswertes

Sayed al-Bolti is an Egyptian film released in 1969 directed by Tewfik Saleh, who was also the co-writer along with Saleh Morsi's contribution to the screenplay and dialogue. The film was based on Morsi's novel زقاق السيد البلطي, starring Ezzat El Alaili and Soheir El-Morshidy, and produced by the General Egyptian Film Organization. The events in the film take place in the 1930s in a primitive fishing village where a rich resident's motorboat threatens the villagers’ livelihoods, including that of the titular Bolti family.

Production and reception

Three films directed by Tawfiq Saleh were shown in Egypt in 1968 and 1969, including The Rebels and Diary of a Country Prosecutor. All three take place under the monarchy, but Sayed al-Bolti fits squarely into the context of Egypt's defeat in the Six-Day War in 1967. Saleh directed the film only three months after June 1967, but release was postponed by censors until 1969, ostensibly over a mourning tone deemed too sensitive for the moment.

The film criticism website Bidayyat writes that “Saleh shot the film in September 1967, that is, three months after the Six-Day War.” The presumptive disappearance of Sayed al-Balti leaves him a fallen legend, and Hanafi seeks the mirage for his guidance in filling his father's shoes since “the burden is heavy.”

In an article in the newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat, the following is written in summary:

It is an important film, not necessarily for any political perspective but for the unflinching depiction of the peasant class and its concerns. Every social nuance of the interactions, small and large, is captured by cinematographer Wadid Sirry’s use of natural lighting [as opposed to the spotlights and Hollywood techniques used in mainstream Egyptian cinema of the time].

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