With the longest-running film industry in the region, and one of the oldest in the world, Egyptian films have exported culture and language for over a century. As a result, while Arabic speakers often struggle to understand each other’s dialects, everyone understands the Egyptians.

When the legendary actor, director, producer, and screenwriter Aziza Amir produced the first Egyptian feature film Laila in 1927, she reigned in the Golden Age of Egyptian Cinema. Movie theaters sprouted across downtown Cairo, then called Hollywood of the East; the most famous cinemas were located on Emad El Deen Street where each venue had its particularities.

“In 2014, I came back to Cairo from studying abroad and noticed a gap and a need for independent film screenings,” shares Youssef El Shazli, Director of Cairo’s beloved independent cinema Zawya, in an interview with OkayAfrica. “I used to attend the Panorama of the European Film Festival which, at the time, was Cairo’s only film event showing interesting, high-quality, cinema. There was an audience eager to watch indie films on the big screen, so we had the idea to set up a permanent space and see where it takes us.”

The Zawya team set out to develop a cultural hub for film enthusiasts in the small auditorium of downtown’s Odeon cinema. “We slowly built an audience and understood how to run and program a space. Our brand picked up quite fast and we took over the Panorama of the European Film Festival. All of a sudden, we had a small operation going,” he remembers.

In 2018, Zawya moved into Cinema Karim, one of Emad El Deen’s iconic spaces from the Golden Era, and established itself as a pioneer in Egypt’s independent cinema landscape, showcasing both local and international films that would not otherwise be screened in mainstream venues.

With a loyal following and a wide range of collaborators, Zawya is now celebrating a decade of achievements and challenges. “During the first few years, we had this ambitious project to screen our films in other cities, in collaboration with local partners,” shares El Shazli. While these screenings had a good turnout, handling permits became increasingly difficult.

Similarly, they launched a distribution company to represent local independent Egyptian films that other distributors would not pick up. “Even though we wanted to give these films a chance, there were very few outlets,” says El Shazli. “So we ended up releasing them in our own cinema, which is not really a distribution.”

Alternatively, Zawya also releases foreign films locally, trying to convince more commercial cinemas to screen independent productions.

Operating in a difficult environment, careful programming lies at the heart of Zawya’s success; the cinema invites audiences into new cultural worlds while catering to their diverse interests. “It starts with an accessible ticket price,” El Shazli explains. “Then curating the space, the films, and people you’ll potentially meet. Before Zawya, as someone who enjoys watching films, I’d have to go to a multiplex or a mall. It would often be in a context where the art is not respected. So the idea of Zawya is very basic: we offer a good experience to film enthusiasts.”

But “a good experience” is a humble description of what Zawya means to Cairo’s film community; it is difficult to imagine Cairo without Zawya.

El Shazli shares an interesting trend that emerged in the last two years: due to the pandemic, independent cinemas saw a lack of newly released films and struggled to attract viewers. Zawya’s team decided to screen new restorations of classics and cult films, and unexpectedly tapped into a new pop culture phenomenon.

“The Egyptian classic Hob Albanat (Girls’ Love) became a social media trend, because Gen Z knows all of its songs by heart,” says El Shazli. “We screened it on Valentine's Day and the online booking sold out in 50 minutes. There’s something powerful about seeing it on the big screen with everyone singing along, even though they’ve watched it many times at home.”

Zawya’s screenings consist of new releases combined with monthly curated programs, focusing on a director, a region, or a theme. “People definitely like watching local films,” says El Shazli. “But there are more films coming out of other countries in the region, like Tunisia or Lebanon. In Egypt, there’s a lack of funding and a problem somewhere in the cycle of making films.”

When asked for recommendations across the region, El Shazli suggests Hany Khalifa’s Flight 404 (Egypt), Mohamed Kordofani’s Goodbye Julia (Sudan), Kaouther Ben Hania’s Four Daughters (Tunisia), and Kamal Lazrak’s HOUNDS (Morocco).

Ultimately, Shazli hopes that Zawya’s vision can expand beyond its own space, to reach new audiences in other cities. “It’s mind blowing to know that we’re still the only ones doing it with that level of consistency. We had to prove a lot of people wrong in the beginning, who thought there’s no market for these kinds of films,” he says. “My hope is that this space is just the beginning and that others can continue the work that we do. Cairo and Egypt can absorb much more than just Zawya’s two screens.”

To celebrate Zawya’s tenth anniversary and ring in the next chapter of its mission to foster independent filmmaking and artistic expression, the cinema kicked off a year of special programming on Thursday, Mar 7, 2024. The programming is made up of a wide array of content, including screenings of the newly restored classic “Khali Balak Min ZouZou (Watch Out for ZouZou),” the 8th edition of Zawya’s short film festival, featuring the best of all previous editions, and a publication about Zawya’s journey, among others.