Draft:Abo Zaabal 89 (2024)

أبو زعبل89 (Abu Zaabal 89)
Directed by	Bassam Mortada
Written by	Bassam Mortada
Produced by	Kesmat Elsayed, Anke Petersen
Starring	Sayed Ragab
Cinematography	Maged Nader
Edited by	Ahmed Abo el-Fadl
Production companies	See Media Production, Joyti Films, SEERA Film GmbH
Distributed by	See Media Production
Running time	1h 23m
Countries	Egypt, Germany
Language	Arabic

Abo Zaabal 89 (Arabic: أبو زعبل89 ) is a 2024 documentary feature film, written and directed by Bassam Mortada. A co-production between Egypt and Germany, it portrays the director’s journey in repairing his relationship with his parents and comprehending his family’s story and how it ties to historical, social and political contexts in Egypt.

The film premiered at the 45th Cairo Film Festival and received three awards: Best Documentary Award, Special Jury Prize and Special Mention in the International Critics’ Week Competition. It was also part of IDFA’s Luminous Section 2024.

Synopsis

In August 1989, Bassam's father, Mahmoud Mortada, is arrested and sent to the infamous Abo Zaabal prison in Egypt. Upon his release, he flees to Vienna, leaving Bassam and his mother alone. The director of the movie Abo Zaabal 99 interviews his parents, friends and activists to piece together the story of his past. Using archival footage and reproducing early family life, Bassam reflects on themes of forgiveness, abandonment and family bonds. Bringing together the individual and the collective, Abo Zaabal 99 explores the plight of Egypt and those fighting for its future, as well as the injustices seen on both a personal and historical level.

Director

Bassam Mortada is an Egyptian director and producer. He graduated from Jesuit Cairo Cinema School. Bassam is known for working with civil society organizations and being an active participant in the 2011 Arab Spring movement. In 2012, he directed his first feature film ‘Althawra... Khabar’ (‘Reporting...a Revolution’) that toured many festivals, including the Berlinale Film Festival. His other works include short documentaries Fi Entezar Alaaed Men Algabal (Waiting for His Descent) (2014) and Searching for Ghazala (2019). Mortada is also a co-founder and producer at the SEE MEDIA.

Cast and Characters

Abo Zaabal 89 (2024) is a personal nonfiction documentary that intertwines intimate recollections with political history. The cast primary appear as themselves:

Bassam Mortada - The writer, director and central figure in the film. Mortada embarks on a karmic journey to reconstruct his father's incarceration and its impact on his childhood. Both archival interviews and reenactments are used to explore familial trauma.

Mahmoud Mortada - Bassam’s father. A left-wing activist who was arrested, imprisoned, and tortured at the notorious Abo Zaabal prison in 1989. His experiences are the core of the emotional film.

Fardous - Bassam’s mother. A fellow social activist and single parent. She provides insight into the suffering and resilience during Mahmoud’s imprisonment, as well as the aftermath.

Supporting voices - Friends of Bassam whose parents were involved in the same case in the late eighties contribute to the sentiment of collective memory and broader political context.

Reviews and Analysis

Cineuropa (Ola Salwa)

Ola Salwa praises and acknowledges the film to be a “poignant doc”, observing how Mortada charts how his father’s imprisonment crumbled their family’s structure–”the constituent parts never came back the same way again”.

The Film Verdict (Adham Youssef)

Youssef reflects on the documentary as a “personal odyssey”, and highlighting its dual focus on intimate and personal trauma, to the political oppression in modern Egypt. He emphasizes its significance within Arab documentary cinema, noting its festival success and anticipated international reach.

The Maneater (Maya Bensaoud)

Bensaoud underscores the documentary’s innate focus on generational trauma and its recreation of Mahmoud’s father’s prison cell, which allows Bassam to viscerally relive and understand his father’s suffering. She contextualized the story within Egypt's larger history of state violence and oppression.

Personal and Political Reconciliation

Mortada’s film is as much therapeutic to him as it is a documentary. He pieces his childhood experiences together; from entering Abo Zaabal prison at the age of five to wrestling with the emotions of his father’s changes post-incarceration. He navigates this deeply personal terrain in pursuit of not only healing, but understanding.

Narrative and Techniques

The documentary blends archival footage, reenactments, as well as present day interviews. Most notably, Mortada reconstructs his father’s cell on camera, prompting an embodied recollection and allowing viewers to witness memory becoming performance, and vice versa. This method of immersion reinforces the emotional gravity of generational trauma.

Socio-historical Reflections

While deeply intimate, Abo Zaabal 89 situates the Mortada family’s story within the cyclical pattern of political repression in Egypt. Critics note that the documentary becomes a mirror for countless families marked by civil rights violation and oppression, exploring “the intergenerational impact of state violence” and illustrating how personal grief intersects and connects with historical experience.