Cairo Station
Call me crazy, but the opening sequence, with voiceover narration setting the scene of the station and the hustle and bustle, called to mind Arabian Nights opening Aladdin, though you know, less orientalist. Having recently also watched Grand Hotel (for Col.'s month, but I didn't end up writing it up), there were also connections to see there of a film named for the location and observing the chaos that ensues. Cairo Station certainly has the hallmarks of Italian neorealism, but without so much of the realism, as it uses that style toward more of a pulp fiction narrative. And it is frequently a choppy one technically. It has the dubbing like Italian cinema that can often make the voices seem bodiless (especially shots with multiple people on them where I was too busy reading subtitles to see whose mouth was moving). There are some weird effect/cuts, like one moment when a boy is about to be run over by the train and the train seems to momentarily pause while the characters continue to move.
There is definitely a lot of toxic masculinity going on, from the I suppose relatively subtle version of labor leader Abu Siri, fiancee of Hannuma who hits and berates her for disobeying his request, or the man in the market who gets irate over Qinawi allegedly staring at his wife...and subsequently cursing his wife for not covering up sufficiently. But of course the maximal toxicity is in Qinawi's pursuit of Hannuma who is playful with him but always extremely clear where she stands. The one place you can sympathize with Qinawi is it certainly is easy to fall for Hannuma, with Hind Rostom's star power. My favorite scene of the film is where she and various other workers have a bit of a rock and roll dance party on one of the idle train cars, complete with the ever present sodas. It is a moment of pure delight that speaks to Hannuma's charisma. But justifiably falling for someone does not create any entitlement, and that isn't something Qinawi can process. On one hand, this kind of entitled/jealous violence is completely believable, but in the context of the film it still feels a bit contrived as it plays out. Still, it builds to another really great scene at the end.
For a 75 minute film, getting a couple great scenes, and one captivating performance isn't a bad result. It is one of those films that could stand to go longer to build out the structure/economy of the station (the union drive aspect doesn't really have a strong foundation other than knowing lower employees don't get much protection). That plus being smoothed out stylistically would be the two things that could make it more of a top film for me. But if you are having the conversation about what could make a film truly great, it's at least done a lot of the work. Better that then leaving the film not being able to imagine any way to make it great.