Love in Karnak

Dervish Dance, a photo by ibischild on Flickr. This is the Luxor Folk Art Group, directed by Ahmed Abdel Razik, performing on the opening night of the Luxor Egypian and European Film Festival.
[For more Festival photos, click here: Luxor Egyptian and European Film Festival, 2012 - a set on Flickr]

No, your blogger hasn't found romance! But on Wednesday night I had the opportunity to time travel to ancient Egypt--1965! Nearly fifty years ago, and a different world.

As part of the the Luxor Egyptian and European Film Festival, the movie Gharam fi al-Karnak (Love in Karnak) was shown on Wednesday night. It was so pleasant to sit on the roof terrace of the Rowing Club, together with a diverse audience of locals and foreigners, and enjoy the show.

To see a trailer for the film, click here: Gharam fi Karnak - YouTube Typically 1960s, typically Egyptian. A lighthearted romantic plot. And plenty of music and dancing throughout. A fantastic feelgood movie. The entire movie is available on youtube (with a link currently posted on the Ibischild Facebook group page.)


The other highlight of my week was the opening of the Festival, last Monday evening. This featured a showing of Salmon Fishing in the Yemen. This movie had a certain poignancy for many in the audience, thanks to all-too-recent antics of a few extremists in various countries.

It was thrilling when Amr Waked stepped onto the stage. He is the movie's Egyptian star. (I'm sure it was not easy for a contemporary Egyptian to pretend to be a Yemeni sheikh!) He and the movie's producer, Lasse Hallstrom, made a few remarks.

This was quite a week. The actors I saw aren't A-list Hollywood stars (in the case of Amr Waked, NOT YET), but it was exciting to see them in person. And fun to see some movies in movie-starved Luxor!