The Nightingale’s Prayer: One of the Best Egyptian Films Ever Made
Words by Mayra Nassef
The Nightingale’s Prayer – Do’aa el Karawan – (1959) is undeniably one of the best Egyptian films ever made; released during what is now deemed to be the Egyptian Golden Age of cinema. This film was part of the 10th edition of the Berlin International Film Festival and was Egypt’s official entry for Best Foreign Language Film at the 32nd Academy Awards. Accolades aside, the film’s quality surpassed what was conventional at the time, with exceptional editing, cinematography, acting, and an excellent score by Andre Ryder. Its content, with its feminist undertone, was even more unconventional. Directed by Henry Barakat, it also catapulted the young Faten Hamama (who plays the main character Amna) further into fame after her steady rise into the spotlight, marking a long career of collaborations between the two, as well as a catalogue of films that addressed women’s rights.
Adapted from Taha Hussein’s equally iconic Egyptian novel of the same name, the film follows the story of two daughters and a mother who are banished from their town in Upper Egypt after it is implied that their father has committed a terrible crime (potentially adulterous in nature). The film starts in media res, with the events narrated by Amna. After they leave their town, the daughters manage to find jobs working in the city. Amna works as a maid for a wealthy aristocrat’s family, while Hanadi also works as a maid for a man who is only named “the Engineer” throughout the film. We do not see Hanadi’s perspective. Amna’s employment is going well, until it is implied that Hanadi was seduced by the Engineer.
Considered to be the highest level of dishonour, the mother and her uncle agree to return to the town. However, they are misled as the uncle kills Hanadi instead. Unable to cope, Amna decides to take revenge on the Engineer, and decides to work for him to try to avenge her sister (a concept called “tar”). All her attempts to murder him fail, and she ends up trapped in the same web as Hanadi, falling for the man who approaches her with multiple unwanted advances. In the end, the uncle returns to kill Amna on the grounds that she works for the bachelor Engineer. The Engineer dies defending Amna against her uncle.
The Nightingale’s Prayer approaches its female characters with empathy while delivering a scathing critique of Egyptian cultures of shame and honour; a message considered groundbreaking at the time. The men in the story never face the consequences for their actions, often committed out of rage and violence. The town is depicted as obviously cruel for their unfair treatment of their women, who always suffer the consequences of the men’s actions. Amna, Hanadi, and their mother are victims of an environment that makes it difficult for them to survive, where they must remain chaste, whilst the men can do whatever they please, even if it means killing in vain.
“It’s always the bird that gets accused rather than the hunter.””
Honor killings are clearly shunned as a display of male aggression especially after Hanadi’s death. When Amna asks why this has happened, the mother replies, “It’s God’s will.” Amna then retorts, “This is not God’s will, it’s my uncle’s will.” In fact, the concept of revenge is seen as cyclical and rooted in cultures of shame and honor. When Amna states that she will enact revenge, she says the word “tar” (تار) a word not readily translated to English. “Tar” is a concept – especially in Upper-Egyptian culture – whereby if a member of one family is killed by another, a member of that family can avenge that death by murdering a member of the other family entirely bypassing the legal system. While it does happen but very rare these days, back then it wasn’t, especially in small towns in Upper Egypt such as the one they lived in. The film’s condemnation of such a system is central to the plot. At the same time, the women often suffer as a result of a culture that shames them, and a system that bypasses legality and morality. As Amna states later in the film, It’s always the bird that gets accused rather than the hunter,” framing society’s treatment of women as inherently unfair.
At the same time, the film shows changing tides in the city, where the women are often more educated. Amna, whilst working for the wealthy family, bonds with the aristocrat’s daughter who teaches her how to read and educates her on all matters of arts and culture. Whilst this is also a commentary on Westernisation in education – the daughter’s home-schooling in French being particularly postcolonial – it displays the way in which women’s advancement in societies were often reserved for the more wealthy. Despite this, the fact that Amna and Hanadi could find work on their own was a step for them, as they are liberated from suffocating male shepherds – a small step is still a step.
The film employs a lot of voiceover narration by Amna, who narrates the entire story, as another way of adapting the book which heavily uses internal monologue and commentary. It flows rather well, and creates a wholly empathetic main character that we root for. As for the second half of the film, that’s where the book ending and film ending diverge. Alas, it could be interpreted in different ways. Perhaps one can see that the Engineer has redeemed himself by changing his ways towards the end as well as dying in place of Amna. At the same time, one can interpret it as Amna falling in the trap that her sister did, framing the Engineer as a miserable man who’s an abuser more than anything. In fact, Amna was about to leave him before the uncle returned. Despite this contested ending, the film displays a story with a strong female character at the front, and a commentary on archaic social gender imbalances present at the time. It is for that one of the greatest films tackling gender inequality in Upper Egypt, as well as a fine tragedy adapted from an author who was a modernist in his support of women’s rights and emancipation.