Cairo Station (The Criterion Collection) [DVD]

Youssef Chahine established his international reputation with this masterpiece, which, though initially a commercial failure in Egypt, would become one of the most influential and celebrated works in all of Arab cinema. The director himself stars as Kenawi, a disabled newspaper hawker whose obsession with a sultry drink seller (Hind Rostom, known as the “Marilyn Monroe of Arabia”) leads to tragedy of operatic proportions on the streets of Cairo. Blending elements of neorealism with provocative noir-melodrama, Cairo Station is a work of raw populist poetry that explores the individual’s search for a place in Egypt’s new postrevolutionary political order.

DVD SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES New 4K digital restoration New 2K digital restoration of Cairo as Seen by Chahine (1991), a short documentary by Youssef Chahine, with an introduction by film scholar Joseph Fahim New interview with Fahim Chahine . . . Why? (2009), a documentary on the director and Cairo Station Excerpt from Chahine’s appearance at the 1998 Midnight Sun Film Festival New English subtitle translation PLUS: An essay by Fahim