Abo Zaabal 89+Bandido - ALFILM Arab Film Festival Berlin

In the organizer's words:

Abo Zaabal 89

Documentary, director: Bassam Mortada, Egypt, Germany, 2024, 83 min, AR, with EN st.

“I always felt he betrayed us by leaving me, my mother, and the struggle.” In search of understanding and healing, filmmaker and activist Bassam Mortada delves into the legacy of his father’s imprisonment and torture in Abo Zaabal prison in 1989, reconstructing the traumatic events that divided his family and finally led to his father departing to Vienna. While rooted in Egypt’s turbulent political history, the film remains a deeply personal exploration of a child trying to understand how his family was torn apart.

Mortada uncovers how his parents’ political activism shaped their lives as he films his efforts to renew and restore relationships with them. Through intimate conversations, archival footage, theatrical monologues and his father’s cassette tapes from exile, Abo Zaabal 89 shows the impact of the “big” history of Egypt on the “small” history of his family.

The film premiered in the International Critics’ Week Competition of the 45th Cairo Film Festival and was part of IDFA’s Luminous Section 2024. 

Followed by a film talk with Bassam Mortada and Mohamad El-Hadidi (director of Bandido).

Bandido

Fiction, director: Mohamad El-Hadidi, Egypt/Germany, 2024, 23 min, AR/EN, with EN st.

After fleeing from Cairo to Berlin to escape police prosecution, photojournalist Alaa (Omar Abo) meets Lia (Maéva Marie Mathilde Roth) at a party. A mutual attraction ignites, except Alaa doesn’t know who Lia really is. 

Followed by a film talk with Bassam Mortada (director of Abo Zaabal 89) and Mohammed El-Hadidi.