El Callejon de los Milagros
- Midaq Alley

El Callejon de los Milagros - Midaq Alley

Starring: Salma Hayek, Emesto Gomez Cruz, Maria Rojo

The movie script is set in the old downtown section of the Mexico City of today. It is adapted from the novel of the Egyptian Nobel prize winner Naguib Mahfuz, which takes place in the Cairo of the 1940's.

The events that take place in the original story have been divided into four parts. The first three (Rutilio, Alma, Susanita) are movie plots in some way autonomous. that depict the personal drama of each one.

In these small stories, that all began on the same Sunday afternoon, you find the intense conflicts of each one of the characters:

• Rutilio, the owner of the bar where the men of the neighborhood meet, is a family man in his fifties, who one day gets a sudden feeling of homosexuality, which becomes a domestic catastrophe.
• Alma, a beautiful young girl that falls in love with Abel, the barber. Abel goes to the United States to make enough money to come back and marry Alma.
• Susanita, the landlady of the neighborhood where they all live, is a typical spinster who dream of getting married.

The fourth part of the film gathers the three stories two years later and finds them together. Susanita marries a waiter, Rutilio is back with his family. Alma ends up as an elegant prostitute, and when Abel the barber returns. their love is no longer possible.

The Book and the Movie:

First published in 1947 in Arabic, Midaq Alley is about the Egyptian residents of hustling, teeming back alley in Cairo in the 1940's. The attempts of several residents to escape the alley and move up in status end with dream broken and unfulfilled, but the book captures a great slice of life in the Cairo of the first half of this century.

In 1994, Midaq Alley was adapted to screen by Mexican filmmaker Jorge Fons and won a Special Mention at the 45th Berlin International Film Festival.

El Callejon de los Milagros - the filmmakers

Director: Jorge Fons

Producer: Alfredo Ripstein Jr.

Written by: Vincent Lenero

Story: Based on the novel "Midaq Alley" by Naguib Mahfouz

Photography: Carlos Marcovich

Music: Lucia Alvarcz

Sound: David Baksht, Ultrastereo© Digital Surround Sound

Edited by: Carlos Savage

Production coordinator: Daniel Birman Ripstcin

Production: Alameda Films, IMCINE, Fondo de Fomento a la Calidad Cincmatografica, Univcrsidad de Guadalajara

A Northern Arts Entertainment release.

Laboratories: Consolidated Film Industries, NT Audio

Cast

Ernesto Gomez Cruz: Don Ru

Maria Rojo: Dona Cata

Salma Hayek: Alma

Bruno Bichir: Abel

Delia Casanova: Eusebia

Daniel Gimenez Cacho: Jose Luis

Claudio Obregon: Don Fidel

Luis Felipe Tovar: Guicho

Tiare Scanda: Maru

Margarita Sanz: Susanita

Juan Manuel Bernal: Chava

Esteban Soberanes: Jimy

Abel Woolrich: Zacarias

Gina Morett: Doña Flor

About Cine Mexicano: Mexican Film Series

With the Cine Mexicano: Mexican Film Series, The San Diego Latino Film Festival hopes to reach a wider range of the Latino population here in the San Diego/Tijuana region than ever before.

Historically, large numbers of the movie going public have resisted going to film festivals for a variety of reasons; either they felt out of place or felt that it would be too expensive, or difficult to figure out what was playing, or for gosh sakes what would they wear? While many times these fears were unfounded, we at the SDLFF have decided to program a series that will hopefully erase all of those fears and match rare screenings of Mexican films with a larger audience than might have seen them in the past.

We want to bring the films directly into the community like never before.

Welcome to Cine Mexicano: Mexican Film Series!