The Land + Q&A

This 1969 masterpiece is Egyptian filmmaker Youssef Chahine’s most beloved work in his home nation: a 1930s-set rural saga about a group of farmers attempting to save their land from feudal control. Adapted from Abderrahman Charkawi’s homonymous novel, the film was conceived as a reaction to the 1967 defeat to Israel. Both a passionate paean to peasant life and an examination of nationhood, individualism and masculinity, The Land remains an enduring classic.

Followed by a Q&A with writer Ahdaf Shoueif