''Terrorism and Kebab'' ( ar, الإرهاب والكباب, transliterated: Al-irhab wal kabab) is a popular 1992

Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Medit ...

ian

black comedy Black comedy, also known as dark comedy, morbid humor, or gallows humor, is a style of comedy that makes light of subject matter that is generally considered taboo, particularly subjects that are normally considered serious or painful to discu ...

film starring

Adel Emam Adel Emam ( ar, عادل إمام; born 17 May 1940 is an Egyptian film, television, and stage actor. He is primarily a comedian, but he has starred in more serious works and, combined comedy with romance especially in his earlier films, which ...

.Hedges, Chris (18 November 1992).
Cairo Journal; That's Entertainment. But Is It Blasphemy, Too?
''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

'', Retrieved December 13, 2010

Plot

The action primarily takes place in

The Mogamma The Mogamma (Arabic: مجمع التحرير, also spelled ''Mugamma'', roughly translated as 'the complex') is a government building in Cairo, Egypt. The Mogamma was the result of a series of master plans for the Qasr el Nil area (now Tahrir Squ ...

Cairo Cairo ( ; ar, القاهرة, al-Qāhirah, ) is the Capital city, capital of Egypt and its largest city, home to 10 million people. It is also part of the List of urban agglomerations in Africa, largest urban agglomeration in Africa, List of ...

, a well-known mammoth-sized government building that is a center of bureaucratic work.Eltahawy, Mona (13 September 2005)
The Real Surprise in Egypt
''

Asharq Al-Awsat ''Asharq Al-Awsat'' ( ar, الشرق الأوسط, Aš-Šarq al-ʾAwsaṭ, meaning "The Middle East") is an Arabic international newspaper headquartered in London. A pioneer of the "off-shore" model in the Arabic press, the paper is often noted ...

'', Retrieved December 13, 2010(2 September 1992)
Egypt's Media Target Islam With government backing, film and TV scriptwriters openly criticize religious extremism in their works
''

The Christian Science Monitor ''The Christian Science Monitor'' (''CSM''), commonly known as ''The Monitor'', is a nonprofit news organization that publishes daily articles in electronic format as well as a weekly print edition. It was founded in 1908 as a daily newspaper ...

'', Retrieved December 14, 2010Murphy, Kim (24 May 1993)
Woe Awaits in Tower of Babble
''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the U ...

'', Retrieved December 14, 2010 Adel Imam's character, Ahmed, queues up at the Mogamma one day to try to get a school transfer for his children, but gets bogged down. Endless lines of citizens march through the building and up and down its iconic spiral staircases seeking help. One government worker frustrates Ahmed particularly, because he is constantly praying in a show of alleged piousness to avoid getting any work done. This leads to a scuffle between the two, and eventually Ahmed ends up with a rifle from a guard and shots are fired in the resulting confusion. A mass spontaneous evacuation of the building ensues, Ahmed inadvertently takes the building hostage, and subsequently is assumed to be a terrorist. He is joined in his "takeover" by a few other "misfits," including Hind, a prostitute played by

Yousra Yousra ( ; ar, يسرا, ; born Seveen Nessim, ) is an Egyptian actress and singer. She is considered as a glamorous icon for the Middle East and is an influential voice in the region. Career Yousra participated as a main Role actress in alm ...

. Ahmed and his new compatriots negotiate with the

Minister of Interior An interior minister (sometimes called a minister of internal affairs or minister of home affairs) is a cabinet official position that is responsible for internal affairs, such as public security, civil registration and identification, emergenc ...

, who fears the building will be blown up, and he demands kebab for all the hostages, as meat is too expensive for most Egyptians. Writer Wahid Hamed has described the symbolic meaning of the demand: "People don't know what they want ... They are crushed, their dreams are impossible, they can't believe their demands can be fulfilled, so they ask for kebab."Abou El-Magd, Nadia (4 January 2001)
Wahid Hamed: Time and again
, '' Al-Ahram'', Retrieved December 13, 2010 As the film draws to a close, Ahmed orders the "hostages" to leave the building, and he will wait behind to meet up with the military police now ready to swarm the building, assuming he will be killed. The crowd, however, insists that he leave with them. Ahmed walks out unnoticed among his former "hostages", and the commandos find the building empty.(9 October 2005)
Red tape Mecca on its way out
'' Reading Eagle'' (from ''

The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...

''), Retrieved December 13, 2010Atia, Tarek. (29 July 1999)
Sherif Arafa: Movies on the way home
, '' Al-Ahram'', Retrieved December 16, 2010

Reception

The film has been described as a "classic Egyptian comedy about government corruption, bumbling and the good hearted nature of the sha'ab (people) of Egypt."Final Screening of the Middle East Film Series, Terrorism and Kebab (Irhab wa Kebab), Egypt
''

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of high ...

Center for Middle Eastern Studies'', Retrieved December 13, 2010 The film was a great success,Bronner, Ethan (31 January 1993)
Actors, writers fighting tide of fundamentalism in Egypt
''

The Dallas Morning News ''The Dallas Morning News'' is a daily newspaper serving the Dallas–Fort Worth area of Texas, with an average print circulation of 65,369. It was founded on October 1, 1885 by Alfred Horatio Belo as a satellite publication of the '' Galvest ...

'', Retrieved December 16, 2010 (" perhaps the past year's most popular movie") and has even been cited as the most popular Egyptian film of all time.Sardar, Ziauddin (2 April 2007)
What Egyptian cinema can teach us
''

New Statesman The ''New Statesman'' is a British Political magazine, political and cultural magazine published in London. Founded as a weekly review of politics and literature on 12 April 1913, it was at first connected with Sidney Webb, Sidney and Beatrice ...

'', Retrieved December 14, 2010 A 2007 poll of Egyptian critics taken by '' Al-Ahram'' newspaper listed the film as No. 15 on the 15 best Egyptian films of all time.(12 July 2007)
The best of Egyptian cinema
''

Daily News Egypt ''Daily News Egypt'' (''DNE'') is an English-language daily Egyptian newspaper established in 2005 and relaunched in June 2012. Under former owner Egyptian Media Services, it was distributed with the '' International Herald Tribune'' as a supp ...

'', Retrieved December 16, 2010

Cast

- Ahmed *

- Hind *

Kamal el-Shennawi Mohammed Kamal el-Shennawi ( ar, محمد كمال الشناوي, ; December 26, 1921 – August 22, 2011) was an Egyptian film and television actor An actor or actress is a person who portrays a character in a performance. The actor perf ...

- Minister of Interior * Ahmed Rateb - Shalabi

References

External links

*
DVD AT AMAZON STORE
{{DEFAULTSORT:Terrorism And Kebab Films set in Egypt 1992 films 1990s Arabic-language films 1990s black comedy films Egyptian black comedy films 1992 comedy films Films about terrorism in Africa