19° TORINO FILM FESTIVAL
Tribute to Shadi Abdu Al Salam

Al zawgia al thaniya

The Second Wife
by Salah Abu Seif
Country: Egypt
Year: 1967
Duration: 110'


Uthman, the head of the village, and his wife can't have children. Uthman is taken with Fatma and marries her after forcing her husband Abu Al Ila to repudiate her. But the woman manages to avoid any physical contact with Uthman while she continues to see her ex-husband. When she tells Uthman she is pregnant, he has an ictus and dies. Fatma's son becomes Othman's sole heir.

"Although Al zawgia al thaniya, by Ahmad Rushdi Saleh, is a short story, I decided to make it into a film, the only one in my whole career that takes place in a rural environment. I have been unjustly accused of adopting a citified point of view towards this environment. But in fact, the film crew, the actors and I lived in the film's village, studying every detail. Moreover, Ahmad Rushdi Saleh is an expert of popular literature" (Salah Abu Seif, in the book Talks with Salah Abu Seif by Hashim Al Nahhas, 1996).

Biography

film director

Salah Abu Seif

Salah Abu Seif (Cairo, 1915-1996). Director, producer, author and editor, he began as a movie critic, and debuted in cinema as director's assistant for the film Tita Wong, directed by Amina Mohammad in 1937. He worked as editor for Studio Misr and has published theoretical texts on cinema.

FILMOGRAFIA

Al muassalat fi al Iskindiriyya (Il traffico ad Alssandria, doc., 1940), Yawm fi mu'askar hindi (Una giornata in un campo militare indiano, doc., 1940), Nimra 6 (Numero 6, cm, 1942), Daiman fi qalbi (Per sempre nel mio cuore, 1946), Al muntaqim (Il vendicatore, 1947), Mughamarat Antar wa Abla (Le avventure di Antar e Abla, 1948), Al saqr (Il falcone, 1950), El usstta Hasan (Il maestro Hasan, 1952), Raiyya we Skena (Raiyya e Skena, 1953), Al wahsh (Il mostro, 1954), Shabab imra'a (La gioventù di una donna, 1956), Il fitiwwa (Lo spaccone, 1957), La anam (Non dormo, 1957), Al tariq al masdud (La strada senza uscita, cm, 1958), Ana hurra (Sono una donna libera, 1959), Baina al samà wa al ard (Tra cielo e terra, 1959), Law'atu al hubb (Le sofferenze dell'amore, 1960), Al banat wa al saif (Le ragazze e l' estate, film a episodi, co-regia Izzuddin Zul Fiqar e Fattin Abdu Al Wahab, 1960), Bidaya wa nihaya (L'nizio e la fine, 1960), La tuttfi'i al shams (Non spegnere il sole, 1961), La waqta li al hubb (Non c' è tempo per l' amore, 1963), Al Qahira 30 (Il Cairo 30, 1966), Al zawgia al thaniya (La seconda moglie, 1967), Al qadiyya 68 (Il caso numero 68, 1968), 3 nisa'in (3 donne, film a episodi, co-regia Henry Barakat e Mahmud Zul Fiqar, 1969), Hammam el Malatili (I bagni di Malatili, 1972), Sana ula hubb (Primo anno d' amore, film a episodi, co-regia Niazi Mustafa, Atif Salem, Hilmi Rafla e Kamal Al Sheikh, 1976), El saqqa mat (Il portatore d'acqua è morto, 1977), Al Qadisiyya (1980), Al bidaya (L'inizio, 1986), Al muwatin massri (Il cittadino egiziano, 1991), Al sayyid Kaf (Il signor Kaf, 1994).

Cast

& Credits

Director: Salah Abu Seif.
Plot: Ahmad Saleh Rushdi.
Screenplay: Salah Abu Seif, Sa'ad Al Din Wahba, Mohammad Mustafa Sami.
Dialogues: Mohammad Mustafa Sami.
Director of photography: Abdu Al Halim Nassr.
Art director: Hilmi Azab.
Editor: Sa'id Al Sheikh.
Sound: Hasan Al Tuni.
Music: Fu'ad Al Dhahiri.
Animazioni: Abdu Al Alim Zeki, Farid Aweis.
Cast and characters: Su'ad Husni (Fatma), Shukri Sarhan (Abu Al Ila), Sana' Giamil (Hafidha), Salah Manssur (Uthman), Abdu Al Mun'im Ibrahim, Hasan Al Barudi, Mohammad Nuh, Suhair Al Murshidi.
Production company and Italian distribution: Ente Generale del Cinema.
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