Desert View

Daniel Kötter I Constanze Fischbeck

 

a film by:

Daniel Kötter, Constanze Fischbeck and the Barakat family

HD, 93 min, 2018

arabisch mit engl. UT

 

with: Amal, Asmaa, Feris and Mahmoud Barakat

 

camera:                           Daniel Kötter, Constanze Fischbeck, Amal,

                                         Asmaa and Mahmoud Barakat   

edit:                                 Daniel Kötter, Constanze Fischbeck

sound:                             Mohab Ezz, Ziad Ezzat

sound design and mix:  Jochen Jezussek

color grading:                 Thomas Ballschmieter 

production:                    Inas Elwakil, Dalia Fakhr, Hussein Elshafei

translations:                   Kamila Metwaly, Mona von Hefni, Inas Elwakil,

                                         Dalia Fakhr 

 

production by Johanna Keller / Goethe-Institut Kairo

 

 

The film 'Desert View' is dedicated to the study of building and living in the semi - built satellite city Madinaty, located in the desert east of Cairo. The title 'Desert View' alludes to Hollywood-inspired names of compound architecture around Cairo and the much-vaunted view from the masion window, which in the gated communities always points to the artificial landscapes indide the compound and never to the actual desert landscape of Egypt. Madinaty is a fully privately owned city that, unlike a gated community, claims to be an open but self-contained and secure city. All public services are not provided by the state, but by the Arab real estate company Tallat Mustafa.The movie 'Desert View' was made during a four-week residency, to which the filmmakers had invited the three-generation Barakat family from ashweyat (informal residential district) Bashtil as sort of cinematic diary. The temporary residents of Madinaty, filmmaker and Barakat family, captured their observations and experiences of architecture and their use from their respective perspectives and cameras. Two external perspectives on the desert dreams of the Egyptian middle and upper classes.