The Egyptian comedy film Gawaz Bi Qarar Gomhuri (Wedding by Presidential Decree) includes a call for the president to change the regime for the interests of the working class in the country.
The call for the change has come through a love story between a young man (played by Hani Ramzi) who lives in a working class neighborhood with deteriorating economic and social conditions and his former neighbor (played by Hanan Tork) who lives in a top class area inhabited by newly rich families including her family.
The invitation extended by the bridegroom to the president to attend his wedding constitutes the core of the film which aims at uncovering the current circumstances and the regime’s defects. It also tackles the collusion of the working class neighborhood officials in their attempts to maintain their private interests at the expense of the public interests.
The invitation comes after the couple has forced their families to give the green light for the wedding under threat in view of the class discrepancy between them due to the girl’s family recent wealth.
The acceptance by the president of the invitation to attend their wedding has changed the lives of the couple at all levels. The bridegroom’s father (played by Said Saleh), originally an unknown artist becomes a movie star and his mother (played by Sanaa Younes) becomes member of social clubs. Also officials at the Foreign Ministry archives department where he works improve the way they treat him.
The bride becomes a symbol of pride for her parents and gets promoted in her job for the Ministry of Tourism after she penalized by her boss due to difference in opinion between the two. And so the status of each of them changes from a normal person into a star chased by local and international media. Also people in the working class neighborhood celebrate the occasion hoping to benefit from the president’s visit for the interests of their areas. So they embark on writing thousands of petitions about their complaints and deliver them to the bridegroom to hand them to the president during his wedding attendance.
The film ends when the couple hand the complaints to the president who appears in an editing camouflage combing the president’s face with the body of an actor.
Gawaz Bi Qarar Gomhuri is the second film directed by Khaled Yousef and scripted by Mohsen Al Gallad. The film was screened for the first time last Thursday and was attended by a large number of cinema stars, critics and journalists -- Albawaba.com
