1273 Cairo Station

[Finch]

Youssef Chahine established his international reputation with this masterpiece, which, though initially a commercial failure in Egypt, would become one of the most influential and celebrated works in all of Arab cinema. The director himself stars as Kenawi, a disabled newspaper hawker whose obsession with a sultry drink seller (Hind Rostom, known as the “Marilyn Monroe of Arabia”) leads to tragedy of operatic proportions on the streets of Cairo. Blending elements of neorealism with provocative noir-melodrama, Cairo Station is a work of raw populist poetry that explores the individual’s search for a place in Egypt’s new postrevolutionary political order.

Film Info
Egypt
1958
76 minutes
Black & White
1.37:1
Arabic
Spine #1273
BLU-RAY SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES
New 4K digital restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack
New 2K digital restoration of Cairo as Seen by Chahine (1991), a short documentary by Youssef Chahine, with an introduction by film scholar Joseph Fahim
New interview with Fahim
Chahine . . . Why? (2009), a documentary on the director and Cairo Station
Excerpt from Chahine’s appearance at the 1998 Midnight Sun Film Festival
New English subtitle translation
PLUS: An essay by Fahim

New cover by Mariam El-Reweny

[domino harvey]

Nice, I often hear this cited as one of the best films to come from this region

[Roger Ryan]

It's a good one. I was really surprised how it anticipates Taxi Driver!

[Red Screamer]

It’s a great, bold film that’s a no-brainer for wider discovery through a release like this. It was one of my orphans during our 50s list:

Cairo Station (Youssef Chahine, 1958) Rivals Pyaasa for the most peculiar director-star turn I’ve seen this decade. While I found that film’s lead performance off-putting for the director’s smug role as a misunderstood poet too pure for this world, Chahine casting himself as a creepy and unlikable antihero is amusingly morbid. It's like if Michael Powell cast himself in Peeping Tom. The whole film is bold and bursting with energy, starting with its lively use of setting. I couldn’t figure out the exact combination of sets and locations used, but Chahine uses the space and objects of a train station to spice up everything, from shot-reverse-shots shouted across several tracks to an audiovisual train innuendo that outdoes North by Northwest's. His direction ranges from psychological montage to more classical blocking and fuses elements of union agitprop, psychosexual thriller, and doleful melodrama before settling into a noirish vein somewhere between Drive a Crooked Road and The Sound of Fury if that makes sense. Apparently some people call this neo-realist, which I think is a stretch, but Chahine definitely learned a thing or two from Italian post-war cinema. It’s fast-paced and packed at 77 minutes and if it fizzles out a bit towards the end when it loses some of its earlier loosenesses, it’s still quite a ride to get there.

[ryannichols7]

I've never seen this but I feel like I've seen it several times in DVD copies at various libraries, impressed it never got a more substantial release. glad it's finally here, and a new country off the map for Criterion! been awhile for that, especially if you exclude WCF boxes

[mteller]

It's one of my all-time top 100. Too bad it's not on 4K, but either way this is a wonderful surprise.

[ryannichols7]

I'm guessing they licensed this from something instead of it being a Janus acquisition, it feels like something they would've announced/toured already

[paulm]

I'm guessing they licensed this from something instead of it being a Janus acquisition, it feels like something they would've announced/toured already

There's a big group of restored Youssef Chahine films (done in 2019ish?) that showed up on Netflix for a few years, and after leaving that have moved over to streaming (seemingly permanently) on the Criterion Channel. There was a 2024 screening at the Egyptian in LA of Cairo Station of a DCP credited to Janus Films.

[therewillbeblus]

My thoughts from the 50s thread:

Cairo Station is an intelligently-made hybrid of sociological examination and psychological thriller. The camerawork is incredible, especially the blocking in the stalking train car scene, where we see the obsessed clearly through the window as the targeted woman moves back and forth vigorously. I loved how the use of sound and visualized friction (i.e. trains grinding on the track) work to provide us with the detached understanding of the stalker’s dysregulated mental state. The actual scenes of violence predate slashers in tactics of tension even before many of the inspirations commonly cited, and the final gesture of affection for the mentally ill revealed as a ruse to divorce empathy from the curt practicality, prioritizing dangers of harm over humanism, is a brutal finish.

[brundlefly]

Wish they had enough confidence in this to release it in 4k, but blu is bound to be a massive jump from the DVD Typecast put out 15 years ago.

I'd hoped against reason that when they got his titles Criterion might sneak out a Chahine box, special features or no. Now I'm just hoping this does well enough for them that they'll release The Land sometime in the next decade.

[ryannichols7]

I'm guessing they licensed this from something instead of it being a Janus acquisition, it feels like something they would've announced/toured already

There's a big group of restored Youssef Chahine films (done in 2019ish?) that showed up on Netflix for a few years, and after leaving that have moved over to streaming (seemingly permanently) on the Criterion Channel. There was a 2024 screening at the Egyptian in LA of Cairo Station of a DCP credited to Janus Films.

after I posted that I realized they were all on the channel. I'm kinda stunned they didn't make a bigger deal of that? better late than never though with this release

[knives]

This isn’t even one of Chahine’s best films and it deserve every accolade.

[therewillbeblus]

What are his best films then?

[knives]

There’s still a lot I haven’t seen, but for now my top three are: The Land, Alexandria, Why?, and Saladin. I can’t remember if I posted this before or not, but here’s some thoughts I wrote up about two years ago edited a little bit.

The Land
The Land has the same basic concept and structure as his earlier Shariff starring struggle films that are on the channel making the evidence of Chahine’s growth all the more evident. Replacing their noir melodrama genre based storytelling is an expansive Pontecorvo type ensemble that truly feels like a biography of a region and way of life. He really digs into what daily life means and while he never foregoes the momentum of narrative it never rules the film with characterization being king.

Also color truly makes Chahine stand on his own as a unique stylist. In black and white he felt familiar, but with color he paints the terrain and faces in a way that highlights how this is a story for Alexandria alone. It is now clear to me how and why Chahine managed to become the representative of Arab cinema for the wider world.

Alexandria, Why?
My original comments on this one were eaten up, but this is a kind of Busby Berkeley autobiography. His typical political machinations are afoot here including in a subplot that I still don’t know how to take, but the sheer unexpected force of the film which is a sort of transitional piece makes a lot of criticisms pointless.

Saladin
You can really tell when this was made as it’s first and foremost a propaganda piece. Here Saladin’s defense was the call for a pan-Arab state as the only way to defeat these foreign invaders who want Jerusalem for unclear reasons. The first act dealing with the Byzantines is particularly histrionic, but even with material that should have no life to it Chanine remains too good a filmmmaker and too invested on making an entertainment to let that be the primary mode. Rather as with the best of propaganda this is a fun adventure with a nuanced take on its central purpose. The visuals, intrigue, and characters all build an emotionally satisfying case.

[therewillbeblus]

Thanks, knives!

[Peacock]

I caught this in the cinema before the DVD came out (which I missed). It’s an interesting film, not least because if you go in expecting something Egyptian and exotic you’ll be very disappointed… Chahine wears his European cinematic influences on his sleeve in this very 1950s melodrama. Chahine himself is great in a slimy role. But I am curious to see more of his work. Maybe this will encourage another label to take a punt?

[spectre]

Seconded on The Land, which I wrote about here – it’s well worth a watch. Another very good Chahine film is a musical he made in Lebanon, The Ring Seller (sometimes titled Auliban, the Seller of Jokes – here’s a short review). It’s a very strange and unique film – part slapstick comedy, part melancholic romance – and I’d love to see a remastered version of it.

[mteller]

Cairo Station is definitely my fave, but The Land is a solid #2 for me. #3 would be Siraa Fil-Wadi (The Blazing Sun). I've only six of his films, all were worthwhile.

[hearthesilence]

FWIW, here's a write-up by Jonathan Rosenbaum on Destiny and I think later on he may have singled it out as his favorite of Chahine's films. (Review also covers Aktan Abdikalikov's The Adopted Son.)

[aox]

I have to agree with the thread that this is one of the magnificent movies of 1950s cinema. I watched it during the Pandemic as I was burning through my stack of "I'll get to it cinema", and it shocked me that this wasn't as canonical as it should be. But, as we globalize, that's the point of these discoveries. Don't trust me. Watch it. And, you might have a favorable opinion.

[CSM126]

Beaver Station