Angels of Egypt

An 80 year-old Egyptian servant struggles to disengage his Greek master from a delusional past that verges on the absurd.

Team

Adrianos Georgantas

GreeceFilm Director

Anastasia_Nataly Douka

GreeceProduction

synopsis

1996, Cairo, in a dilapidated mansion: Naguib (85) is an Egyptian servant who has worked his entire lifetime for Eugene (80), the last of a great Greek family who, despite his financial wounds and poor health, refuses to abandon his birthplace. He regularly locks himself into his office, writing his memoirs, and ever so often attempts suicide. Naguib willingly contributes to the imaginary preservation of a luxurious past. One day, a letter announcing the deadline of a dept settlement and confiscation of all assets, overwhelms them both. They fight and Naguib finally abandons Eugene. Only to find a publishing house who would deal with Eugene’s memoirs, to set up yet another fake reality in order to convince his stubborn former boss to leave the house and go to a retirement home. On his return he finds Eugene in another suicide attempt. They fight and suddenly secrets burst out: about Mireille, their common love and a letter by Naguib’s sister, sent 30 years ago, which Eugene had hidden. In this moment of truth, both men reconcile. They leave together, sailing the Nile, packed among a felluca’s cargo. When Eugene dies in Naguib’s arms, he knows that he is dying in his friend’s arms.

Director’statement

I have been haunted by this story since I was a small child. Dark skinned children in my neighbourhood alleys or sitting next to me in class and adults at the homes of distant relatives. I could not understand why they were referred to as “the Egyptians.” Later, as I was growing up, I came to understand that they were the Greeks who left Egypt after the revolution in 1956. They were, and still remain, reticent people. They disclosed few details about their “previous” life because no one understood them and they were always nostalgic about their brilliant past which was forever lost since returning to their ancestral homeland. I was enchanted by the stories of their life in Egypt. I collected them religiously and made them mine, adding my own details to fill in the gaps. I created my own imagined world; of mansions, cotton plantations, servants, with visuals, sounds and even scents about the lives of those who refused to abandon the country of their birth. Today, many years after I first learned about “the Egyptians” and as I observe most of them on the verge of leaving life itself, I couldn’t resist the temptation to once again imagine what life would be like now for those that stayed in Egypt. What became of them? How did they live? How did they deal with their glorious past? Was it worth hanging onto their past? Did they regret not leaving with the others? It was not difficult for me to imagine the lives they might now lead. For my character, his life has turned into a prison. He is an aging man, living in isolation in a dilapidated mansion with his equally ancient servant. Their two existences on this planet have been so different, yet at the same time, in essence they are very similar. The filming approach I want to use is one of great sensitivity and respect to capture the spirit of their wrinkled faces, their desperate gazes and shaking hands. Their lives will be echoed by the use of sharply contrasting imagery and careful lighting. For example, the darkness of the solitary mansion is illuminated by violent lightening penetrating from the outside or the soft light of the day will be a metaphor for hope, reconciliation and love. Sounds will also play a leading role in the story. In the silence of solitude, the sounds of today and the past, the external sounds of the wind and the rain, will all take part in the dramatic development of the film.

TFL PROGRAMME:

Interchange 2012

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