Movie Poster Collecting

The Five Doors Bar [khamsa bab] (1983, Egypt)

2009-05-23T06:29:00.027-04:00

Fouad El-Mohandes, Adel Imam and Nadia El Guindy shown in an 11x14 still from Nader Galal's Five Doors Bar.

Plot Summary

This film is an Egyptian adaptation of Billy Wilder's 1963 film Irma La Douce starring Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine. In the 40s Kollu Mashi (Fouad El-Mohandes) owned the Five Doors Bar in Cairo's Ezbekiyyah quarter, where illicit relationships were allowed. The prostitute Taragi (Nadia El Guindy) worked with the pimp Abbas (Fouad Ahmed) who took a share of her daily take and protected her and number of the other girls of the night in the neighborhood. The police officer on duty was in the habit of taking a fee in exchange for not disclosing what was happening.

An upright officer named Mansur (Adel Imam) was transferred to the neighborhood; all the efforts to bribe him, as had been done with his predecessor, failed. One night he even took everybody to the police station. The pimp Abbas contrived a retaliatory scheme, with help from Taragi, to stash some narcotics in Mansur's room, then reported him to the police. Mansur was then fired from the police force.

Mansur began working as a ruffian laborer, dominating the neighborhood. He fell in love with Taragi. He tried to save money for her so she could live a better life and disguised himself as a rich foreigner who appeared occasionally as one of Taragi's customers. This is the plot's weakest element, for the viewer is asked to believe that Taragi is sleeping alternately with Mansur and his foreigner alter ego without realizing they are the same man!

Mansur knew Taragi was supporting an invalid son at a nearby rehabilitation facility and paid the boy's expenses. He married Taragi after she repented and gave up prostitution, and the pimp Abbas was arrested after a dramatic fight scene in which Mansur gave him a good clubbing with some sticks he found in an alley.

***********

This film was skillfully acted with the three lead characters played by some of the real giants of Egyptian cinema, Fouad El-Mohandes, Adel Imam and Nadia El Guindy. It had beautiful sets and high production values from Nader Galal, one of Egypt's great directors. The work provided the most wholesome sort of entertainment: a dramatic love story and a tale of moral restoration and evil vanquished.

Yet the film was banned, in all probabability due at least in part to the presence among the bar patrons of a male cross-dresser and dancer. This man, though prominently featured, was just an incidental character in the plot; but in 1983 Egyptian authorities might not have been ready for a public exhibition of gay behavior.

Since Egypt relies heavily on its police to maintain order and state control, it is also possible the film's portrayal of a criminal who outwits a policeman might have been deemed inappropriate as public entertainment.

*******

Clips showing the cross-dresser (he's in the background at the beginning)

Egyptian film poster for Nader Galal's The Five Doors Bar [khamsa bab] (1983)

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Contract to Print a Poster

2009-05-09T09:42:00.014-04:00

Most of us who collect film posters are interested in them because they are nice to display and perhaps also because they are investments. We usually realize those collecting ideas are transmutations. Most film posters were not made for collectors. They were made to perform a business function--to help sell theater tickets--and were considered part of a film's marketing cost. After being used in that capacity they were usually thrown out, at least in the old days. There is a greater tendency to hang on to posters now, but most of them are still practically worthless and probably deserve to be thrown out.

It is interesting, to add background and depth to the hobby, to look whenever possible at information about the transactions that led to a poster's design and production. I have here a rare pairing of an 33-year-old Egyptian poster and a contract for its production:

I Am Neither Rational nor Insane [ana la 'aqela wa la magnuna] (1976) - (Mahmoud Yassine)

Contract dated 10/4/1975 between Arabic Cinema Printers and Ibrahim Shusha Films to print the above poster

The film was done by Houssam El-Din Mustafa, one of Egypt's greatest directors, and stars Mahmoud Yassine, then a major leading actor in Egypt. It is based on a story by Ihsan Abd al-Qudus (1919-1990), renowned Egyptian novelist and journalist who edited the Cairo newspapers Al-Akhbar and Al-Ahram.

The contract is the only one of its kind I've seen so far, done by Gasour, the most famous movie poster printer and artist in Egypt. A contract signed by him is itself something special to have for a poster collector! The director of Arabic Cinema Printers is named in the contract as Hassan Mazhar Gasour, but the printer company logo on the poster itself has the name H.H. Gasour. I suspect it is the same person because I've been told the "H.H." are the initials of Mr. Gasour's daughters, Hala and Hebba.

The contract provides that Arabic Cinema Printers will design and print 7,000 one-sheet posters, 400 24-sheet posters and 1,000 lobby cards at a cost of 1,208 Egyptian pounds, which includes a fee of 100 pounds (about $250 at that time) for designing the posters and lobby cards. The contract also says the task of designing and printing the posters and lobby cards will be completed 25 days after the contract is signed, and gives a schedule of installment payments to be made to the printer. It is signed by Hassan Mazhar Gasour (with the Arabic Cinema Printers official rubber stamp) and Ibrahim Shusha.

Omar Sharif's Egyptian Films

2009-05-08T11:47:00.006-04:00

Omar Sharif was born in Alexandria Egypt in 1932. He is one of tne
of world's most famous actors, with more than a half century of
prolific cinematic production and success. His first film was
Mortal Revenge [siraa fil-wadi] made in 1954 in Egypt by the
late Youssef Chahine. His costar was the legendary Egyptian actress Faten Hamama, whom he married soon after the shooting. Sharif is the only Egyptian actor who has had a significant career both in and out of Egypt, but his Egyptian films are not as well known to
non-Egyptians. Here are some posters for Egyptian films that featured Omar Sharif (known in Egypt as Omar al-Sharif):

Struggle in the Valley aka Mortal Revenge [siraa fil-wadi] (1954) - (Faten Hamama)

Our Best Days [ayyamna al-helwa] (1955)

Dark Waters [siraa fil-mina] (1956) - (dir: Youssef Chahine)

My Love's Fault [ghaltet habibi] (1958)

Sleepless [la anam] (1958) - (dir: Salah Abouseif)

Lady of the Palace [sayedat al-qasr] (1959)

Scandal in Zamalek [fadiha fil-zamalek] (1959)

Struggle on the Nile [seraa fil-nil] (1959)

The Agony of Love [lawet al-hob] (1960)

Dead among the Living [bedaya wa nehaya] (1960)

My Only Love [hobi al-wahid] (1960)

Rumor of Love [esha'a hob] (1960) - (Omar Sharif, Soad Hosny)

There Is a Man in Our House [fi baitina ragul] (1961) Style A

There Is a Man in Our House [fi baitina ragul] (1961) Style B

There Is a Man in Our House [fi baitina ragul] (1961) Style C

There Is a Man in Our House [fi baitina ragul] (1961) Style D

The Mamelukes [al-mamalik] (1965)

Ayoub (1983) - (Omar Sharif)

The Puppeteer [al-aragoz] (1989) Style A

The Puppeteer [al-aragoz] (1989) Style B

War in the Land of Egypt [mowaten: masri] (1991)

Laughter, Games,
Seriousness and Love [dehk, we leab we gad we hob] (1993)

Hassan and Morcos [hassan wa morqos] (2008) - (Adel Imam, Omar Sharif)

Visit the Movie Poster Page!

Egyptian posters for films directed by Inas Al Degheidy

2009-04-29T05:19:00.007-04:00

Inas Al Degheidy was born in Cairo in 1954. She is Egypt's most successful woman film director, and also one of its most controversial public figures. She believes Egypt is a closed society that needs change and among other things has called for the legalization of prostitution in Egypt. Her films depict her social issues and also carry powerful dramatic impact. I have collected posters for most of her 14 feature films.

Excuse Me Law! Style A (1985)

Excuse Me Law! Style B (1985)

The Challenge (1988)

Forbidden Times (1988)

One Woman Is Not Enough (1990)

The Murderess (1992)

Lace (1993)

Disco Disco (1994)

Cheap Flesh (1995)

Lobster (1996)

Night Whispers [kalam al-layl[ (1999)

The Red Rose (2000)

Diary of a Teenager (2001)

Seekers of Freedom (2004)

Let's Dance (2006)

Visit the Movie Poster Page!

Hands of Steel Release in Egypt 1986

2009-04-28T15:46:00.006-04:00

Egyptian poster for the 1986 Sergio Martino film Vendetta del futuro, aka Hands of Steel.

This film, like all films shown in Egypt, had to get an official exhibition release permit from the Supreme Culture Assembly Office of Foreign Films Supervision under the General Office of Technical Works Supervision.

This is what the release permit looked like:

The form measures 6.5" x 8.5" inches and has lots of technical information about the film, including the weight (16.3 kg) of the 5 reels holding the acetate. On the back of the form, the supervisor of the Foreign Films Supervision Office (Madiha al-Garia) wrote a synopsis of the content of the film's fourth and fifth reels:

I think her synopsis was there to facilitate or justify a judgment that the film was ethically and morally fit for release, but this is only a guess. You don't find a synopsis on the back of every Egyptian film release permit.

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Work Incentive (Motivational) Posters Appraised

2009-04-26T12:28:00.001-04:00

From a 30 March 2009 Antiques Road Show; appraisal by Nicholas Lowry

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Dean Martin Echoed in Egypt

2009-04-14T17:33:00.003-04:00

Poster for 1985 Mohamed Abaza film "Watch Out for the Gang of Women" starring Sameer Ghanem

Poster for 1969 Phil Karlson film "The Wrecking Crew" starring Dean Martin

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Movie Memorabilia Appraisal

2009-04-13T21:34:00.002-04:00

Appraisal by Gary Sohmers from a 6 April Antiques Road Show

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Lucien Bernhard Maquettes

2008-08-05T17:48:00.003-04:00

From a 4 August Antiques Road Show; appraisal by Nicholas Lowry

19th Century Bicycle Posters

2008-07-20T08:50:00.003-04:00

From the 14 July Antiques Road Show; Appraisal by Nicholas Lowry

Egyptian Poster Variations

2008-07-14T05:04:00.019-04:00

Documenting Egyptian Poster Varieties

People collect things for a variety of reasons. They collect film posters sometimes because they need to make affordable investments. Sometimes they collect them because they like the graphic art, and sometimes these two motivations are combined. I like to collect Egyptian posters because they are beautiful but fragile remnants of a colorful history.

Whatever the reason for its existence, a film poster collection has more meaning if the collector is aware of the subtle variations that often exist for posters advertising the same film title. Film posters can vary because they were made for different reasons, made at different times, made in different locations, made with different equipment, or made with different designs.

One of the most enjoyable aspects of owning a film poster
collection is the research that goes into documenting and understanding these variations.

In Egypt, film posters sometimes change because the companies that distribute the films change. This may involve only a minor change in poster appearance such as blocking out the name of the old distributor in the bottom border and overprinting the name of the new one. This would happen in cases where the lithograph plates used by a former distributor are still available to the new distributor.

In other cases, if the new distributor no longer has access to the old distributor's printing plates (this seems to be the most common case), he will have a new plate made that resembles the old one as closely as possible. In both cases, artists draw the poster designs directly on the printing plate. Often the signed names of the artist or artists will be different for the old and new versions, but obviously at least one of the artists is a copyist.

Here is an example of a poster variation for an Egyptian film:

Version A

Version B

Posters for the 1967 Zoheir Bekir film A Crazy Man's Love Affairs, starring Farid Shawqi and Nadia Lutfi

Information printed on the posters tells us that this transition involved changes in distributor, printer and artist. The distributor for Version A was The General Company for Film Marketing and Distribution, while the distributor for version B was The General Egyptian Institute for Cinema. The printer of the style A poster was The H.H. Gasour Arabic Cinema Printing Company, the printer for the Style B poster was the Al-Nasr Printing Company. The artist for the Style A poster was Gasour himself, the owner of the printing company. The Style B poster is not signed by an artist. Based on the loss of detail in the Style B version, I conclude that the Style A is the earlier version, but no printing dates are given on either poster so I don't know exactly how much time passed between the two versions.

Here is a similar pair of poster variations for an Egyptian film:

Version A

Version B

Posters for the 1996 Samir Seif film Of Days and Dogs, starring Nour El-Sherif and Dalal Abdel Aziz

In this case the distributor did not change. The same distributor may have needed to print more posters after reusing his first litho plate for something else. Style A is signed by the artist Sami, and Style B is signed by the artist Walid Wahig. Neither poster tells us the printer name. Distribution was done by two companies, Farid Shawqi's Artists Union Company and Mohammad Hassan Ramzi's Nasr Films Company. The fact that two distribution companies were involved may explain the existence of two poster types, but if so I do not know how or why.

These varieties have nothing to do with anything that would be called a "rerelease." They were apparently brought about because of a change in distributor in one case and a poster stocking and printing requirement in the other.

I don't think "rereleases" as we know them in the US play much of a role in the Egyptian film industry. I've seen Egyptian distribution contracts where distribution dates were specified, but the ones I've seen haven't been for rereleases of films.

There is plenty of variation in these Egyptian film
posters, but it seems to be complex, small-scale and somewhat irregular.

Visit the Movie Poster Page!

WPA Posters

2008-07-07T21:15:00.002-04:00

Appraisal by Nicholas Lowry

Al-Helal's Egyptian Cinema Retrospective

2008-06-25T22:49:00.004-04:00

The volume shown above is a 100-year retrospective on Egyptian film, published last December by Cairo's Al-Helal magazine. It is an anthology of articles covering various aspects of film and the making of films in Egypt during that period.

In looking it over about a week ago I noticed that over 70 images from my Egyptian film posters website had been included, with no acknowledgment of source!

I sent them an email (helalmag@yahoo.com) suggesting it would have been nice if they had thanked me for doing all that work for them, but got no reply. This is because in Egypt publications apparently do not credit sources for published images. They were probably puzzled that they heard from me. I looked at a few other journals and saw the same practice was being followed in them too, on all images. They just print, sometimes have a caption, but never mention the source. A couple of examples of images taken from my site as they appeared in the Al-Helal anthology:

Hercules Unchained R89 Egypt

2008-06-24T08:47:00.002-04:00

The artist's name is Moaty

Son of King Kong

2008-06-22T13:39:00.001-04:00

But Which "Son of King Kong"? I'm mystified and can't find any information about this one.

"For a Fistful of Dollars"

2008-01-31T13:24:00.000-05:00

The Egyptian distributor who made this poster got the title wrong, confusing it a little with "For a Few Dollars More," or he may have just used "For a Fistful of Dollars" as a translation for the Italian title Per un pugno di dollari, but even though he used the incorrect English title, we are sure he used the poster to promote the film known in English as "A Fistful of Dollars." Thanks to Ed Poole of Learn About Movie Posters for pointing this out.

Shafiqa the Copt

2008-01-12T05:08:00.000-05:00

A popular 1963 film by Egyptian director Hassan Al-Imam is titled Shafiqa the Copt, starring Hind Rostom. This is the poster:

This video from the opening sequence shows Rostom doing the famous candelabra dance

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Unorthodox "15 Minutes"

2007-11-14T15:36:00.000-05:00

This poster looks like a standard theater poster, but with the help of close analysis by Ed Poole of learnaboutmovieposters.com, I've come to the conclusion that this is a cleverly assembled ad hoc one-sheet. The image differs from US and European official posters for this film, and some of the conventional ratings and logos are changed or eliminated. There are also several spelling errors, beginning with the work "Youk" in the title area and including two of the names in the credits. This suggests that the text on the poster was arranged to resemble a US or European one-sheet (size of the poster is 22.5" x 38.5"), but typed in manually without careful proofreading. Here's a close-up of the credits:

Here's an image Ed provided of the credits on the US one-sheet:

The differences in the way the credits are laid out, the non-standard image on the poster, the misspelled names for Edward Burns and the name of the director of photography, the absence of the ratings box on the left, the absence of the logo on the AOL keyword line and the distributor name "New Line Cinema" (which distributes only in the US), all suggest that this poster is a clever imitation done by a film distributor in Egypt (where I found the poster) who had the film but no posters!

Ed Poole sent me this picture of the still from the film that was modified to make the graphic in the poster design:

Most people collect what are called standard theater posters, but there are other interesting movie posters that don't fit that category!

Visit the Movie Poster Page!

Abel Salazar's 1957 "El Vampiro" French Poster

2007-11-06T16:45:00.000-05:00

The French title means "The Vampire's Prey."

The size is 46.5" x 62"

Egyptian Political Movie Poster

2007-11-03T17:25:00.000-04:00

Sorry We Are Being Tortured [maalesh ehna benetbahdel] (2005, directed by Sherif Mansour)

The poster is provocative, but not quite self-explanatory. I need to see the film.

Similar Designs--Coincidence?

2007-11-01T20:03:00.000-04:00

The Man Who Loved Woman (dir: Truffaut) (1977) French poster

Forest of Thighs [ghaba min al-siqan] Mahmoud Yassine) (1974) Egyptian poster

Mystery Persian Poster

2007-11-01T13:00:00.000-04:00

Mystery Poster

The language on this poster is Persian, but there is very little written information. The top line says "When my father returns" [vaqti pedaram bar migardad]. I take this as both a caption for the painting and the title of the film. In the painting the girl seems to be saying this to the boy. The characters in red on the right side say "Eastman color" and the black characters on the source line at the bottom left say "Product of Turkman Films" [mahsul torkman film]. The poster measures 26.5" x 38.5".

The painting and the source line suggest to me that this poster did not come from Iran, or at least represents a film that was not about anything that happened in Iran, which is the country of origin of every other Persian movie poster I've seen. The people by the railroad tracks at the bottom don't look Iranian, and they are in a cold climate on flat terrain. This might be Tajikistan, Kazakhistan, Iraq, Turkey, Afghanistan, some other part of Central Asia or the Caucasus. These are all places with cold plains areas where Persian is spoken by parts of the population and they are also places with Persian-speaking Turkoman minorities.

My hunch is that this is a poster for a film that was made in or about Tajikistan or Afghanistan.

Since I can't get much information from the written text (no cast or crew names, no director, no film location) I have to speculate about the film based on the information in the image. From their dress, it seems the children are from some Muslim tribal group. The pot and cup the girl is carrying on her back suggest the tribe is nomadic. The man on the crutches at the bottom is probably the returning father, who seems to have lost his lower right leg in fighting somewhere and is returning home by rail. He may have been fighting with the Soviet army in Afghanistan.

I would love to see the film! The poster was designed to make me feel that way.

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Japanese War Propaganda Movie Posters

2007-10-29T22:11:00.000-04:00

From a 29 October Antiques Road Show

Nicholas Lowry of the Swann Gallery explores aspects of a short-lived genre of English propaganda film posters issued by Imperial Japan in the Philippines during World War II.

Soad Hosny as Raquel Welch

2007-10-29T11:43:00.000-04:00

Soad Hosny on the Egyptian 2-sheet promotional poster for the 1968 Niazi Mostafa film "Eve and the Ape"

Raquel Welch on the Egyptian VCD cover for the 1966 Hammer film "One Million Years BC"

Egyptian Borsalino & Co. Poster

2007-09-22T14:50:00.000-04:00

Egyptian Borsalino & Co. (R1978) Film Poster

The red Arabic letters at the top are the Arabic title translation "Lust for Vengeance" [shahwet al-intiqam]. The blue Arabic letters just below the title are the Arabic transliteration for the name of the film's star Alain Delon. Note the color correspondences between the Arabic title and credit at the top and the English ones at the bottom.

Lower Right Corner of Poster

The lower right corner of the poster tells us the name of the distributor and the release date.

Movie Poster Collecting

The Five Doors Bar [khamsa bab] (1983, Egypt)

Fouad El-Mohandes, Adel Imam and Nadia El Guindy shown in an 11x14 still from Nader Galal's Five Doors Bar.

Plot Summary

***********

*******

Clips showing the cross-dresser (he's in the background at the beginning)

Egyptian film poster for Nader Galal's The Five Doors Bar [khamsa bab] (1983)

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Contract to Print a Poster

I Am Neither Rational nor Insane [ana la 'aqela wa la magnuna] (1976) - (Mahmoud Yassine)

Contract dated 10/4/1975 between Arabic Cinema Printers and Ibrahim Shusha Films to print the above poster

Omar Sharif's Egyptian Films

Struggle in the Valley aka Mortal Revenge [siraa fil-wadi] (1954) - (Faten Hamama)

Our Best Days [ayyamna al-helwa] (1955)

Dark Waters [siraa fil-mina] (1956) - (dir: Youssef Chahine)

My Love's Fault [ghaltet habibi] (1958)

Sleepless [la anam] (1958) - (dir: Salah Abouseif)

Lady of the Palace [sayedat al-qasr] (1959)

Scandal in Zamalek [fadiha fil-zamalek] (1959)

Struggle on the Nile [seraa fil-nil] (1959)

The Agony of Love [lawet al-hob] (1960)

Dead among the Living [bedaya wa nehaya] (1960)

My Only Love [hobi al-wahid] (1960)

Rumor of Love [esha'a hob] (1960) - (Omar Sharif, Soad Hosny)

There Is a Man in Our House [fi baitina ragul] (1961) Style A

There Is a Man in Our House [fi baitina ragul] (1961) Style B

There Is a Man in Our House [fi baitina ragul] (1961) Style C

There Is a Man in Our House [fi baitina ragul] (1961) Style D

The Mamelukes [al-mamalik] (1965)

Ayoub (1983) - (Omar Sharif)

The Puppeteer [al-aragoz] (1989) Style A

The Puppeteer [al-aragoz] (1989) Style B

War in the Land of Egypt [mowaten: masri] (1991)

Laughter, Games,Seriousness and Love [dehk, we leab we gad we hob] (1993)

Hassan and Morcos [hassan wa morqos] (2008) - (Adel Imam, Omar Sharif)

Visit the Movie Poster Page!

Egyptian posters for films directed by Inas Al Degheidy

Excuse Me Law! Style A (1985)

Excuse Me Law! Style B (1985)

The Challenge (1988)

Forbidden Times (1988)

One Woman Is Not Enough (1990)

The Murderess (1992)

Lace (1993)

Disco Disco (1994)

Cheap Flesh (1995)

Lobster (1996)

Night Whispers [kalam al-layl[ (1999)

The Red Rose (2000)

Diary of a Teenager (2001)

Seekers of Freedom (2004)

Let's Dance (2006)

Visit the Movie Poster Page!

Hands of Steel Release in Egypt 1986

Egyptian poster for the 1986 Sergio Martino film Vendetta del futuro, aka Hands of Steel.

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Work Incentive (Motivational) Posters Appraised

From a 30 March 2009 Antiques Road Show; appraisal by Nicholas Lowry

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Dean Martin Echoed in Egypt

Poster for 1985 Mohamed Abaza film "Watch Out for the Gang of Women" starring Sameer Ghanem

Poster for 1969 Phil Karlson film "The Wrecking Crew" starring Dean Martin

Visit the Movie Poster Page!

Movie Memorabilia Appraisal

Appraisal by Gary Sohmers from a 6 April Antiques Road Show

Visit the Movie Poster Page!

Lucien Bernhard Maquettes

From a 4 August Antiques Road Show; appraisal by Nicholas Lowry

19th Century Bicycle Posters

From the 14 July Antiques Road Show; Appraisal by Nicholas Lowry

Egyptian Poster Variations

Documenting Egyptian Poster Varieties

Version A

Version B

Posters for the 1967 Zoheir Bekir film A Crazy Man's Love Affairs, starring Farid Shawqi and Nadia Lutfi

Version A

Version B

Posters for the 1996 Samir Seif film Of Days and Dogs, starring Nour El-Sherif and Dalal Abdel Aziz

Visit the Movie Poster Page!

Laughter, Games,
Seriousness and Love [dehk, we leab we gad we hob] (1993)