Dhe Azhar University in Cairo is considered the most important institution of Sunni Islam. More than a thousand years old, it is introduced in Tarik Saleh’s film “The Cairo Conspiracy” as a “beacon of Islamic science”. The Swedish director stages a network of intrigues between the government, the Muslim Brotherhood and the religious leadership.
At the bottom of the hierarchy
The beginning is reminiscent of American college films. The fisherman’s son Adam, played by Tawfeek Barhom, receives a scholarship to study at Azhar University. The father would prefer the son to follow in his footsteps as a fisherman. But God’s will cannot be stopped, so he lets the son go to the big city.
There Adam has to come to terms with his roommates in the dormitory and quickly learns that as a shy newcomer you are at the bottom of the hierarchy. He admires the coolness of those who roll their own cigarettes and enjoys a brief moment of freedom in Cairo’s nightclubs, where multicolored dots of light travel across his body. “Your heart is still pure,” notes another student, “but it gets corrupted with every second you stay here.”
Hired to the spy
Shortly after arriving, Adam gets caught up in the power struggles. During a speech to the students, the grand imam coughs up blood into his handkerchief and soon dies. The Egyptian President wants to install a government-related successor as head of the important institution. Colonel Ibrahim (Fares Fares) is tasked with ensuring that the right man gets to the top. When his informant is exposed, he needs a new informer inside the university. The choice falls on the inconspicuous freshman. Adam regularly has to send the Colonel information about the Muslim Brotherhood and the scholars. The task soon overshadows his everyday life and draws him deeper and deeper into the intrigues.
The story takes place in Cairo, but Tarik Saleh had to shoot the film in Turkey. The director, who has an Egyptian father, wanted to shoot the thriller “The Nile Hilton Affair” in Egypt in 2017, but was expelled from the country after a few days. With a tricky story, you have to be careful not to become the next Salman Rushdie, Saleh recently announced. “The Cairo Conspiracy” was honored for best screenplay at Cannes last year.
Tarik Saleh stages impressive images in the magnificent walls. From above you can see a sea of red dots in the inner courtyard, the students’ hats, as a symbol of the conformity demanded of them. The film shows a world shaped by male authority. At home, it is the silent patriarch who whips his sons’ hands, and at the university, too, duty is paramount. The patriarchal power structures are so pronounced that women only appear in a single scene.
The clever and dutiful Adam is just a pawn at the beginning. His life is determined by others. First he obeys the village imam and his father, then the colonel, who blackmails him with his father’s health. Driven by fear, Adam obeys orders. But over time he will grow up. Circumstances require the courage to have your own opinion, or even the courage to use your talents wisely in order to survive. Independent thinking is only tolerated in the rigid power structure if it is camouflaged in religious parables, otherwise it is quickly seen as cockiness.
The plot is complicated. The viewer has to pay close attention to follow the various intrigues between the Muslim Brotherhood, the secret service and the scholars. Despite the fast pace of the narrative and the suspense that builds up, the film is remarkably calm for a thriller. In this silence lies his strength. Blood splatters only in a few scenes. Violence and authority rule silently: father and son are silent in the rowing boat. The family is silent while eating. Within the walls of the university, there is something reverent about the silence. Inside the marble-paneled walls of State Security, she has something dead. And finally, in the last scene in the fishing boat on the water, something melancholy.