Marwan Hamed

Graduated from the High Institute of Cinema in 1999, Marwan Hamed started his cinematic career in 2000 as a Director Assistant in Souq Al Motaa film. While studying, he directed two short films and several documentaries, but what stood out from the crowd was his 40-minute Lilly, starring Amr Waked as a promising talent. Based on a short story by renowned Writer Yousef Idrees, the film was a great success, garnering various international awards including Prix du Public at Clermont Ferrand Film Festival, the Golden award at the Carthage Film Festival and Silver prize at Milano Film Festival for African Cinema.

Marawan’s first feature The Yacoubian Building was the gateway to his success and was considered a big hit in 2005. Considered the largest budget set to produce an Egyptian film to date, boasting an all-star Egyptian cast including the Arab megastar Adel Imam and Yousra, the film was distributed in 12 countries across Europe, South America and the Arab world. The film dominated the Egyptian box office for the entire summer season and received around 200,000 admissions in France. The film was screened in a number of eminently distinguished film festivals including Berlin Film Festival in the Panorama section, the AFI Film Festival in USA, the Cannes Film Festival, the London Film Festival in London, the Chicago International Film Festival in USA, the Marrakech International Film Festival in Morocco, and the Thessaloniki International Film Festival in Greece. The Yacoubian Builiding won numerous awards including the Best New Narrative Filmmaker award at Tribeca Film Festival in 2006, the Golden Eye award at the Zurich Film Festival, Bronze award at the Montreal Film Festival and Grand Prix at Festival du Monde Arab France.

Inspired by true events, Hamed’s second feature film was Ibrahim Labyad, which featured an array of Egypt's megastars including legendary actor Mahmoud Abdel Aziz, Ahmed El Sakka, Hend Sabry, and Amr Waked. The film grabbed the Egyptian audiences’ attention with its realistic portrayal of life in the slums and its abundance of violent details. The film was screened in Le Marche du Film at the Cannes Film Festival, Montreal Film Festival and Sao Paolo International Film Festival.

Marwan also directed the short film 19/19, part of the movie 18 Days, a collection of 10 short films about the January 25th revolution in Egypt, directed by 10 Egyptian directors. The film premiered at Cannes Film Festival in 2011 in the official selection for special screenings. In 2014, Marwan directed El Feel El Azrak (The Blue Elephant), which is adapted from Egyptian writer Ahmed Mourad’s Egyptian best seller novel in 2012 of the same name that was listed on the Man Booker Prize 2012 shortlist. Starring Karim Abdel Aziz, Khaled El Sawy and Nelly Karim, the film is a psychological mystery that delves deep into the world of the paranormal. The Blue Elephant was distributed in Jordan as well as the GCC states and reaped 30,000,000 EGP in 45 days.