The film is all about Cairo. About the past and the future colliding, and the people that get crushed in the middle.
Three days before principal shooting was to begin, the Egyptian State Security closed us down. We had to move the production to Casablanca.
I was devastated, but then I thought of Fellini and “Amarcord.” The people in his home town of Rimini could swear they recognized streets and houses in the film. But he had shot it in Cinecitta, It could be done!
But to recreate a city you have to capture its soul. I wanted to recreate Cairo in its futuristic dystopian glory. High contrast, not black and white but yellow and black. I don’t want to tell a story. I want to take the audience on a journey. It’s not one of those tours where you never leave the bus. here we actually make stops, eat the food and get sick from it.
It’s never what happens–but HOW it happens. Noredin is our guide, a prince of the city. he will teach you the art of bribery. The social codes with cheek kisses and addressing people according to their social status.
Then there are the hands, changing money, small gestures. you will learn the beauty of power and the ugliness of truth.
The fiction of “The Nile Hilton Incident” was constantly changing into reality. at times it scared me, but to be honest, this is why I do this–to make my dreams come true.