Destiny Reviews

(Mu) Ambitious but weak, poor directed, poor acted. The plot tries to be a universal timeless message of tolerance against wisdom. Spanish Cordva was the center of the world, then.

I already saw this movie but, since it was such a long time ago and since it was available on Netflix, I thought i might as well check it out again. The first time around, I didn't know anything about Youssef Chahine at the time but he seemed to be a highly regarded movie director in France and since this movie was nominated for the Golden Palm at the Cannes Film festival, I went to se this movie in the movie theater when it was released. However, to be honest, I guess I was maybe too young back then but I didn't connect with this movie at all. Well, I'm glad I gave it a second chance after all these years. First of all, I have to admit that I didn't remember a single thing about the damned thing which shows how little impact it did have on me at the time. Well, the 2nd time around, I thought it was actually quite fascinating. Indeed, maybe at the time, I wasn’t aware or didn't care about the upcoming threat coming from Muslim fundamentalism but, more than 25 years later as this threat has become so huge, this movie developed such great ideas on this topic and really felt prescient. Basically, this kind of fundamentalism has in fact always existed, pretty much ever since the concept of religion had been invented. As displayed in this movie, it is very often based not really on religion but above all on ignorance and the best weapon against it is knowledge. I also think that it is based on hatred while religion is based on love but this movie didn't focus on that aspect. Anyway, I thought it was a really deep and smart movie, even if the acting was maybe not really impressive. Now, I really feel like rewatching 'Cairo Station' as well since it is considered as Youssef Chahine's magnum opus. Anyway, to conclude, even if I'm not sure if it is really a masterpiece, it is still a really good flick and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interested in Youssef Chahine's work.