MohamedFawzy Reviews

Campus Code (2015)

Amateur Hour.. and 50 minutes!

[3/10 · 20 February 2017]

I will assume this movie was some sort of a school project, and given that Cathy Scorsese is Martin Scorsese's daughter, and god knows who Kenneth M. Waddell is, but he must be related to him as well, and that would explain why a few known actors, Ray Liotta and Mr. Scorsese himself, are all appearing in this amateur piece.

Though I will never know how Martin Scorsese could've read this script and not suggest any changes to it, it all starts with the weak script dealing with the theme of (SPOILERS: AI and being in a simulation :SPOILERS), something that has been done a million times before, but fails badly at this incarnation because of the weak script, with no tangible plot and lame characters.

Now comes the production, yes, it's shot on what looks like HDV, yes the production value is mediocre, but that's understandable with a small budget, but what is not excusable is the horrible editing, CGI, directing and sound production, this is the worst sound editing and mixing I've ever heard in my life in a "professional" project, I've seen YouTube videos with better production, and I've seen CGI done by kids that were miles ahead of the pathetic stuff done in this movie.

The Hedgehog (2009)

What Makes Life Worth Living?

[6/10 · 8 August 2010]

A movie that started highly interesting then started slowly, but steadily going south.

A unique movie starts with an 11 year old introducing herself in front if her Super8 camera and confesses that she's going to commit suicide on her 12th birthday which will take place in 169 days, and decides that her swan song be a movie she makes with that camera about life around her to show how absurd life really is that it's not really worth living, and thus goes on filming everyone around her.

What's really wrong with this movie IMO, is that at some point around the middle, it shifted the focus of the story from the little girl to the relation between the Japanese man and the Concierge Renee, and suddenly the young girl repressed to the background of the movie that we practically forget about her existence and her little secret plan.

The movie had lots of potential but the writer/director Mona Achache chose to take an adaptation that was a little bit off, with a non- uniform pacing and somewhat slow, yet sometimes very vibrant, character development, or rather the lack of in the case of the Japanese gentleman.

Dancer in the Dark (2000)

Because in a musical, nothing dreadful ever happens...

[9/10 · 20 July 2010]

This is probably the saddest thing I've ever seen, I'm heartbroken and I can hardly type those words.

Lars von Trier's extremely powerful, emotionally charged "musical" about a girl from Czech whose extremely fond of American musicals, moves to the US with her son, expecting it to be like a Hollywood film, but things turn ugly, and she faces it by daydreaming about her life being a musical.

This movie survives solely on the story, the script and the acting, I couldn't believe that Bjork could deliver such an amazing performance, but there were still 2 main negative aspects about the film for me..

The badly directed musical sequences, they should have been the highlight of the movie, but they were just terribly executed with very awkward framing of shots, it was like editing together the footage from various surveillance cameras.

The other being that the movie was shot on generic video cameras of the time on a DVCAM format, which means that the footage is video, I have no idea how that looked on the big screen, especially the one at the Palais des Festivals at Cannes, that combined with a sickening shaky camera-work.

Even though the movie had no visual beauty whatsoever, the story and the acting make it worthwhile.

Meetings with Remarkable Men (1979)

A Taste of The Experience That Forged A Remarkable Man!

[10/10 · 20 July 2010]

Meetings with Remarkable Men is the adaptation of part of the autobiography of George Gurdjieff, a mystic who lived between the 2nd half of the 19th century and the 1st half of the 20th century.

The movie is more like a docudrama, about his travels from central asia to Egypt, and back to central Asia once again in a pursuit for knowledge about the purpose of life and existence, and the movie focuses on the time span between his teenage years back in Georgia to his early adulthood and the discovery of the secret place of the Sarmoung Brotherhood.

The movie was well produced, and its purpose was not to tell a story as much as to enlighten those who are willing to receive the knowledge, which is why I gave it a full score.

Inception (2010)

Memento on Steroids

[7/10 · 18 July 2010]

From a wannabe auteur/art-house cinephile's point of view I'll say, "Nolan, you sold out...".

Nolan had a very original concept, but then he treated it in a way very close to Memento, and then mixed it with strong elements of The Dark Knight, which produced 'Inception' a.k.a. Memento on Steroids.

The product was a very generic Hollywood blockbuster due to the use of lots of action sequences and explosions, even if they served a purpose in the story, they underwhelmed the original concept, and made the movie pretend to be bigger than it really is.

The script took turns on your brain, just like Memento and The Dark Knight, even though it;s way less smart than the first, it's pretty much like the latter, and at times it tries so hard, but felt like Nolan didn't invest more time finessing it.

Cinematography was pretty much neo-noir, it worked at times, but at others didn't serve much purpose.

Yet, it's a pretty decent blockbuster, and could be easily a public's favorite, it has an OK story with lots of flash and a "smart" plot that'd simply dazzle the public and make them feel that it was worth their time.

The best thing about this movie is the hotel corridor sequence, it really was the highlight of the movie.

Khaltet Fawzeya (2008)

Fawzeya, and her secret recipe for happiness!

[9/10 · 17 June 2010]

It's one of those movies that come once in a blue moon, many people might disagree with me, but it's definitely one of the best Egyptian movies made over the past decade.

A bittersweet tale of a much-marrying woman, who is always looking for an affectionate, caring and tender man, but she almost never finds him until she meets "Houda", and yet she keeps a close friendship with her ex-husbands and fathers of her children, and they all eat and celebrate as a one big happy family who really care for each other.

Script-wise, it was great, characters were well written, introduced and developed, except maybe for "Wedad" (played by Nagwa Fouad) who was so great, but cut off abruptly, I believe she deserved more screen time.

When it comes to cinematography, Nancy Abdel-Fattah takes an A+, I really loved the visual style she chose that helped convey this sweet and warm feeling in a harsh and ugly reality, though the visual effects were executed badly, and that was probably the only negative thing about this movie for me.

As for the music, it was good and fitting, but it was a bit too outdated, and it could have been better.

When it comes down to the director, Magdy Ahmed Aly is one of Egypt's most locally underrated auteurs, he is definitely a great director who knows what he's doing, even though I might disagree with his choices at times, yet these are only artistic differences that couldn't possible stop me from appreciating his work!

All in all, this is a pretty, bittersweet hopeful tale of a woman who faces the bad cards she's dealt with hope and smile on her face and in her soul, and that is Fawzeya's "Secret Recipe" that helps her live with her daily struggle with harsh reality as if she's on top of the world.

Genainat el-Asmak (2008)

A Failed Experimentation With Realism

[8/10 · 23 March 2008]

I was one of the "fortunate" people that got the chance to watch this movie on its premier last night...

The main reason why I checked this movie out, despite my lack of fondness towards most of its actors, was to see what Nasrallah had to offer after the fantastic "Bab el-shams", and also to see if he had changed his old ways of weirdness and incomprehensible "artistic views". Also I wanted to see what Abdel-Rahmane is made of after watching his previous works, Chahine's mediocre "Heya fawda" and Khaled's dreadfully terrible "Heena maysara", knowing how these directors slaughter his scripts, I was trying to locate his true identity among the three movies, and I think I found a little glimpse of his potential among them that could blossom if he were to stop being bullied by the directors and made them stick to his original script.

This movie takes a stab at realism with some elements of expressionism, with long useless scenes and silences with some "artistic views" and hidden messages within the details, a blend that quite frankly, didn't work out quite well...

This movie is not for everyone, it will definitely flop at the box office for 2 reasons, one is the cast of the film, non of them appeals to the public, non of them would make you leave the comfort of your couch to go watch it at the theaters, the second reason being the film's quality itself, I doubt anyone who'd watch this movie would go out and recommend it to others, after all, Nasrallah himself said, and I'm quoting, that this film was not made to be comprehended in this lifetime, it'll be appreciated 20 year from now...

The only good thing about this film was the cinematography, which wasn't exactly mind blowing, but it was decent, plus the effort put into trying something new gives it some extra points for the adventurous spirit of the film's crew, and for the obvious skills of Nasrallah as a director.

The Prestige (2006)

It's not all that...

[5/10 · 21 February 2007]

Well, I've been interested in cinematography for the past 10 years of my life, I've watched all kinds of movies and I always seek the best, and please remember this is just my opinion...

I watched the movie expecting something HUGE after all that hype, and I have to say, I couldn't be more disappointed, the twists were so clear from the beginning, the whole story seemed so trivial to me, it really doesn't deserve the hype or the high rating it got, although I couldn't say anything but "Brilliant" about the acting, that was the highlight of the whole thing, the directing was just "Decent" at most, and the make up was "Horrible".

I gave this movie 5/10 only for the acting, the clothing and the decoration.

Harb Atalia (2005)

Back To Hollywood of The East

[8/10 · 28 July 2005]

I've always watched the Egyptian movies every summer, they were nice, but never good, until Mafia was out, a movie that has shaken Egypt and it was like a breeze of hope to finally have great cinema of our own, the net year it was Tito, which came out to be far better than Mafia I was thinking that Sakka would never beat Tito and that Tito was his top, I was absolutely wrong, this movie is far better than some of Hollywood's high budget movies of the same genre, i'm sure that if Americans themselves watched that movie they would just raise 2 thumbs up, this summer we had 2 great movies, Mallaki Iskandariya (Private Alexandria) and Harb Atalia (War of Atalia) it's not Italia (Italy), these movies assure that the Egyptian cinema is coming back and it's fully loaded, the only thing that ruined my summer was that stupid Bo7a (Boha) i was this Mohamed Saad stops before I kill him

Sphere (1998)

Genius But Full of Mistakes

[24 June 2003]

The Movie is containing a genius idea and the movie as displaying it well, but suddenly we are about to face strong and fatal mistakes, for example, when Dustin Hoffman discovered that 'Jerry' is 'Harry' and that the letters were not translated well that meant that all ther 'H' must be written as 'J' and all the 'E' must be 'A' so when 'Jerry' Said "I'm Happy" it must have been "I'm Jeppy", it contains other mistakes but that is the worst of them I guess