Gabr Al Khawater

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Directed byAtef El Tayeb
Written by
Gabr Al Khawater
جبر الخواطر
Directed byAtef El Tayeb
Written by
Produced byHany Gerges Fawzi
Starring
CinematographySamir Farag
Edited byAhmed Metwally
Music byYasser Abdel Rahman
Production
companies
United Artists for Cinema and Video
Distributed byTamedo Film Production and Distribution
Release date
  • May 18, 1998 (1998-05-18)
Running time
120 minutes
CountryEgypt
LanguageArabic

Gabr Al Khawater (Arabic: جبر الخواطر lit. “Forced Thoughts”) is an Egyptian film released on May 18, 1998. The film is directed by Atef El Tayeb, features a screenplay written by Bashir El Deek based on a story by Abdel Fattah Rezk, and stars Sherihan, Ashraf Abdel Baqi, Alaa Waley El Din, Hassan Mustafa, and Farida Saif Al-Nasr. The plot centers on a psychiatrist and a group of patients at a women's psychiatric hospital in Alexandria.

Synopsis

Dr. Mahmoud Shaker (Ashraf Abdel Baqi) is transferred out of his post as a prison counselor for sympathizing with prisoners and conveying their complaints to wardens. He ends up at a women's psychiatric hospital in Alexandria. He continues to support the inmates’ grievances here with the director, Dr. El-Meliguy (Hassan Mustafa), who is using his charges as guinea pigs for experiments on new treatments in the lab he runs with some foreigners. Gene therapy, involved with one of them, has killed at least one.

Mahmoud observes a wide variety of ailments in the asylum. Loza (Farida Saif Al-Nasr) has obsessive-compulsive disorder, which alienated her from her fishmonger husband. Farfoura (Sanaa Younes), who graduated from a cosmetology school, was spurned by a fiancé for her younger sister and became a pyromaniac. Nabawiya (Enaam Salousa), a school principal committed to the institution, thought the morning queue was necessary to live. Mambousia (Hend Akef) is a nymphomaniac. Finally, Nawal Ibrahim al-Saadi (Sherihan) is ostensibly a depressive schizophrenic after accidentally killing her infant son.

Dr. Shaker learns from his colleague Dr. Tharwat (Alaa Waley El Din) of Nawal's case history and sympathizes greatly, but Dr. El-Meliguy is equally interested in her as a test subject. Considering Nawal's behavior more rational than it has been labeled, especially in a university-age woman, he meets her mother (Galeela Mahmood) who appears to share El-Meliguy's pathological viewpoint. Nawal's maternal uncle Sadiq (Salem al-Laithi) brings in her younger sister Amal Lamiaa el-Geddawy, who tells Dr. Shaker that she and Nawal's father died when they were young. The mother was busy with her new husband Al-Bably, so Nawal took care of Amal.

Nawal's high school sweetheart Abbas (Tarek Lotfy) became a journalist but abandoned her after taking her virginity, and she married Imad, who discovered but accepted her having had sex before. Six after giving birth to her son with Imad, Adel (Muhammad Gawish), Nawal discovered that he had another childless wife whom Imad wanted to raise Adel. Nawal clutched her son so tightly as they reached for him that he almost choked; she was told that he had died and went insane, leading Amal to adopt Adel. Dr. Shaker discovers that Dr. El-Meliguy is paying Nawal's mother to experiment on the young woman, an arrangement that suits Amal fine to keep custody of Adel. Dr. Shaker stops the gene therapy session at the last minute by bringing in Adel to see Nawal and thus make her aware that her son is alive, beginning her true recovery.

Production

Director Atef El Tayeb died on June 23, 1995, at the age of 47 following complications from heart valve repair surgery. Gabr Al Khawater, his 21st film, was being edited at the time. Editor Ahmed Metwally completed the film, which was shown at the opening of the 1998 Alexandria International Film Festival.[1][2]

Reception

References

Related Articles

Wikiwand AI