Mohamed Diab, Film Director HARDtalk

Welcome to HARDtalk, I'm Stephen Sackur.

Freedom of expression is severely curtailed in Egypt.

Journalists, bloggers, civil society activists

and political dissidents have been locked up by the thousand

under the Sisi regime, which makes the Egyptian movie

Eshtebak - or the Clash - all the more important.

The much lauded film paints a remarkable picture

of the tumult in Egypt which led to the military takeover in 2013.

The director is my guest today, Mohamed Diab.

What has happened to the spirit of the Tahrir revolution?

Mohamed Diab, welcome to HARDtalk.

Thank you.

You are a movie-maker.

How big, how deep a breath do you have to take before making

a movie in today's Egypt?

Particularly in a movie that's are about politics,

society, culture in your country today.

I'm going to tell you what everyone around me told me before

making that film - don't.

Everyone told me, even my family, everyone knew this film's going

to explode in my face at the end.

Making a political film, or something that has

a political statement, it's almost suicide.

Not just because of the government or the regime, it's

because of everyone.

Everyone.

We're in the midst of a big division in Egyptian society almost amounting

to civil war.

The streets are not...

People are not killing each other these days but, at

some point, they did.

And the hatred extends to every family member.

So Egyptian families, the first rule of any family

gathering is - don't talk about politics.

So if everybody, your friends, your professional colleagues,

everybody said don't, and you did, would it be right to characterise

Eshtebak the movie as your sort of act of resistance?

I was part of the Egyptian revolution and I stayed

as an activist, traditional activist, for almost three years.

But I think the most and the biggest positive thing I've

ever done is Eshtebak, Clash.

Because it's talking about why we were in the streets

in the first place.

It's very evident when you see the film that it's praising unity

and it's praising...

It's anti hysteria, anti-division.

And there is no more message, a bigger message and more important

message than now in today's Egypt.

Well, it's interesting you say it's anti-division.

Egypt today is such a polarised society.

It's such a divided society.

Is it possible to make a movie which portrays those tumultuous

events of the summer of 2013 when the Morsi, Islamic Brotherhood

government, was in essence toppled by the military?

Is it possible to make a movie about that and not take sides?

It depends on what film, why you're making that film.

I'm making a film about coexistence.

I'm making a film against hysteria and division.

So the film is not trying to show any side as good or bad.

It's trying to show us all the human side in us.

But I mean, here's the thing, though - I, in the studio,

have talked to Egyptian officials, I've talked to Egyptian human rights

activists about what happened in 2013.

Because of course, it matters today to make sense of why

the military took over and why we have the government that you guys

have in Egypt today.

And the key question is, for many people, was it a coup

or was it not a coup?

Now, for you as a film director portraying those events of summer

2013, do you have to take a view on that?

I actually deliberately avoided talking about that in

the film because this is...

The question that you just asked, that's a dividing question in Egypt.

Egyptians are, like, half...

If you said the word 'coup', there is no conversation anymore.

And if you said the word 'it's a revolution',

there is no conversation anymore.

But isn't that a copout?

You know, you're a film-maker making a film about something deeply

controversial that matters so much to Egypt today and you're saying -

oh, but I just opted out of the key question.

No, it depends on what film are you making?

I'm making a film about coexistence.

I'm making a film about humans.

I'm trying to humanise the enemy.

Everyone is seeing the other as the enemy, dehumanise the other.

This is the first step in civil war and I'm trying to dissolve that.

I'm trying to make a film that counters that.

And in order to do that, I have to dehumanise everyone.

And in order to do that, I have to humanise everyone.

And that's what provoked the people the most, humanise the other.

And what is remarkable about your movie is that the device

you used to humanise the situation is so unusual.

You filmed pretty much the whole movie from the inside of

an eight-metre-square police truck.

Why did you do that?

It was a metaphor of the feeling that everyone in Egypt

is feeling right now - we are all trapped and we

are trapped together.

Are we are going to get out, are we are going to continue living,

what are we going to do?

And I wanted people to experience the full experience of getting

trapped inside a car like this, how brutal the situation is.

'Experience' is the word.

Let's give everybody watching a brief taster of the experience

of being inside that truck.

Let's watch a clip from the movie.

Sure, let's do that.

SHOUTING AND COMMOTION.

BANGING.

I find it riveting.

I mean, I have some experience as a foreign correspondent

of being in riots that have turned violent in Egypt.

That, to me, just looks so authentic.

But what's really striking about it is that all

the footage taken from inside the truck, it's all chaos.

You have no real way of knowing what the heck is going on.

Was that deliberate?

Maybe in those clips, it's hard to determine what's

going on, but in the film, it was mapped out.

How can we make the film understandable, especially

for a foreign audience?

So although the car has 25 main characters and outside,

there's at least another ten, it was very important for us to make

the film understandable for everyone and I think we did that.

Yet to me, the film's not about only the political situation in Egypt.

It's about the division that is sweeping the whole world.

You're going to feel that this film could have been about Brexit.

This film could have been about Clinton and Trump.

It doesn't matter.

And in the film, there is no political conversation of, like,

everybody is explaining his side.

It's just - there is a division between three sides, or two sides,

and that's what the core of the film is about.

It forces people who've been raised to regard the other as the enemy

to actually deal with each other as human beings.

Because there they all are stuck in the back of this police truck.

Whether they happen to be Muslim Brotherhood, Islamists,

or whether they happen to be supporters of the military,

whether they're young students, whether they're secular

or religious, they're all in this mess together.

Exactly.

And the film is just trying to remind us all we don't have

to agree on everything to coexist.

And unfortunately, right now in a crazy situation,

people think we have to agree fully in order to exist,

and that's completely wrong.

But one thing you do which I think is very difficult

to do in Egypt today, you humanise the Islamist.

They come in all shapes and sizes, literally.

There's the young girl, the teenager, who brings her father

along and she's inclined to support the Brotherhood.

There's the die-hard political activist from the Brotherhood.

There's those who were Brotherhood, but now have doubts about it.

But the point is, you humanise them.

You say to Egyptians and the people all over the world, don't regard

these folks as just terrorists or as people that have one

set of beliefs.

They're complicated, they're mixed, they're just like the rest of us.

That's actually the most important thing about this film to do this.

This film, this has been big research.

This is like a research study when you see that film.

It's the first time you see the difference between

the Muslim Brotherhood and the way they are,

the organisation from the inside.

You see the difference between a Muslim Brotherhood member

and just a supporter.

You see the difference between a Jihadi and a Salafi.

Those things, you need to understand in order to talk about, like...

At the end of the film...

I don't want to just say everything, but at the end of the film,

some people turn into Isis.

This film took place just before the rise of Isis.

So you need to understand, how did we reach that point?

Most of us in the West, most of the people in the West think

Isis grow on trees or something.

You need to understand, how did they reach that point?

And by the way, most of them - just like any heinous criminal

in the world - at the beginning, they were normal people.

The other thing that you do is, you portray the state in the form

of the security police who are obviously manning the van

and they're going out and grabbing people,

arresting them and chucking them into the back of the van.

And on one level, you're inviting us to take a pretty negative view

of the state as the heavy hand of authoritarianism that's depriving

people of their freedom, but you also humanise

some of the police.

You know, they're facing real dilemmas.

There's a girl who wants to go to the toilet.

Does the policeman let her or not?

Is that humane or inhumane?

And you suggest that even the police are complicated, that there

are divisions within them.

That there are some that are very humane and some who are not.

Some people in Egypt will say right now, the state is simply repressive,

and you haven't portrayed it as entirely oppressive.

It's the same argument I said about Islamists

or the Muslim Brotherhood.

How I portrayed them in the film is the same argument to answer

the police argument.

You think you don't have any friends who became police officers?

Were they really tough at the beginning?

Have things changed them?

Have they become more violent?

If someone killed a friend of theirs or a police officer.

There's a vicious circle of violence.

You need to understand where people are coming from.

And to portray people as just cartoonish characters who are just

evil, who just do bad things with no motives,

that is the most superficial portrayal of human beings and it's

not benefiting anyone.

Well, let's not talk about the state as fictionalised in your movie,

let's talk about the state as you have to deal

with it as a film-maker.

Let's talk about censorship.

You know, as I understand it, you're required as part of the deal

to get distribution and licence in Egypt to show the movie

in your home country, you're required to put some captions

at the beginning which read, "After the events of the June 30th

revolution, bloody clashes took place led by the Muslim Brotherhood,

which was seeking to stop the peaceful transition of power."

Now, that would strike many as state propaganda

against the Muslim Brotherhood, why did you agree to that?

It's 100% state propaganda and I didn't agree to it.

But it's on the movie and it's seen by Egyptians.

It's on the movie.

I don't have control over the movie in Egypt, as the producer.

And from day one, at the premiere of the film, I went on TV

and on every TV channel, I said, "People, this is wrong.

I'm completely against it."

Because the film is actually about coexistence.

It's not about propaganda to any side, so discard this.

But the producer had feel the ultimatum - either put this,

or there's no film.

I disagreed, he didn't.

Would you have pulled the film?

Um...

It's a very...

Obviously, not internationally, but would you have...

I'm going to tell you why we made the film in the first place.

We made the film in this time because this is the time when people

are fighting and killing each other.

It's the right time to tell them, don't do that.

I would have made the film ten years later with no problem.

People would have welcomed the film.

So to me as a film-maker, I was dreaming of the day that this

film gets released because it's not about cinema anymore,

it's about life and death.

So it's a hard choice.

Thank God I didn't have the final say in it.

But for me, from day one, I said, I denounce that,

I'm completely against it, and it's against the message

of the film.

Did you - and do you even today - feel intimidated by

the atmosphere in Egypt?

An atmosphere which sees impositions placed upon your creativity,

as we've just discussed.

But also - frankly, thank goodness - you're here in the HARDtalk studio,

but many dissident voices in Egypt today are locked up,

thousands of them.

Do you feel intimidated?

Definitely, I do.

I'm going to tell you what you just mentioned is the smallest things

that happened to the film.

A week before the release of the film, the distributor

of the film got a call.

I don't know what happened, but even though he put money

in the film, he backed off and he said he's not

going to distribute the film.

He scared every cinema in Egypt, they pulled off

all the posters of the film.

So it was actually...

And at some point, there was personal information about me

and the producer leaked in a way that made us look like spies.

During the Film Festival in Cannes, there was a ten-minute piece

about me on Egyptian TV accusing me of being a spy.

A Parliament member went on TV and said I'm a spy.

I have got some quotes here.

One of the official TV stations, state-sponsored TV stations

in Cairo, described you as somebody who portrays

Egypt as a moving prison.

It says that, through your works and social media accounts,

you promote ideas that are hostile to the state.

Essentially you are being accused of treachery.

There was one article that says art in the service of terrorism.

I think if the article was right I should have been in jail for 25

years or something.

When you read that sort of thing, do you think to yourself,

"I can no longer be my creative true self, I can no longer make

movies in today's Egypt"?

No, I know inside me it is going to be harder but I know

I'm going to make films no matter what, even if in my room.

I'm going to make films, I'm not going to quit.

I always had a back-up plan for this film if I didn't have enough

finances or I didn't have the permissions for it.

I would have shot it all in my house.

I would have got that car...

Where did you shoot it?

In the streets of Cairo.

And how much...

How can I put it this way?

How obstructive were some people to your efforts to actually film

on the streets of Cairo?

The biggest obstruction was the people themselves.

We were so scared that people mistake us for a real protest

with police, if they took sides they might shoot us,

if the police shoot the protesters, so it was a great amount

of organisation and preparation.

At some point we shot things like a flash mob.

We are going to shoot in the biggest street of Cairo with 1,000 extras,

we are going to show up on film until someone stops us.

And it happened.

An hour later the police stormed the place, one guy got stabbed,

the people attacked us.

It is so intense, and that proved to me that we are talking

about hysteria in the right time.

You have got to have such a passion, such a drive, such commitment

to keep doing this sort of thing in such a difficult situation,

which Egypt is today, and we will get back to Egypt today

in just a minute.

But just on the personal front, I'm wondering if you are always

convinced it is worth it.

Because I'm thinking about the earlier movie you made,

just before the Tahrir uprising, all about the violence directed

against women in Egypt today, sexual violence.

You called it Cairo 678.

Again, it's won acclaim internationally but the horrible

depressing truth is that even though the movie

was seen by some Egyptians, it seems to have made no

difference to that particular problem in Egypt today.

I completely disagree.

I'm going to tell you exactly how it made a difference.

Six years ago when I showed the film, the trailer itself created

a tsunami of people saying this is a fabrication and this

is completely fake.

Now six years later, the first step, and we say that

actually in the film, of curing anything is actually

admitting that you have a problem.

And now Egyptians, after six years, we started the conversation.

Six years.

Every Egyptian knows we have a pandemic called sexual harassment.

Have we found a solution?

No, but every Egyptian now, if you talk to anyone,

will acknowledge that we have a problem.

The power of the trailer is interesting.

Luckily enough we have got it so let's invite

everybody to take a look.

I mean it's interesting to reflect.

You made that film what, five or six years ago,

and yet today, if one looks at all the data from the UN

and from civic society groups inside Egypt, Egypt -

of all the countries in the Arab world -

still has the highest levels of sexual

violence against women.

Why?

It is very complicated.

It is not only one thing.

The way we look at women definitely, objectifying women, is one thing.

I think the film focuses on the shame that is put on women

if they report the case.

So silence is the biggest contributor to this pandemic.

Has that changed in any way?

Even if the stats are still terrible, is there actually more

space, if you like, for women to tell the truth

about their experiences?

Yes, I can see that during, when we made the film,

there was only one case of sexual harassment in the history of

Egypt reported.

One case.

So now we have hundreds, hundreds of thousands may be.

Women are now on social media, you can see how women and girls

are talking about sexual harassment, completely different,

and how their families and husbands and fiances

are taking it differently.

I remember some girls, women, telling me that she took her husband

to the cinema to show them 678, to explain.

She couldn't even bear to talk about it through the film.

So it is such a complicated film.

It is not only one thing, and you have to see the film

because the film for 90 minutes is trying to explain how are things.

There is a main character who was following everything

and he sees it from a male point of view, which is, it is a touch.

It is like Donald Trump, exactly.

It is a small torch.

He doesn't think it is going to change someone's life.

But it does, and you see that through the film.

A lot of this conversation has been about change, and how you change

people using art, not just politics.

You are not a politician, you are an artist.

I hate politics.

You hate politics?

Definitely.

But let's reflect on politics.

We talked about the activism you have engaged in,

in January 2011 and beyond, the Tahrir revolution.

We were all moved by what we saw on the TV screens, and yet here

we are five and a half years later.

There is a former general in power, the most extraordinary repression

which is seeing thousands and thousands of people locked

up for speaking out.

Do you actually believe that anything was achieved

by that Tahrir uprising?

I think it is very wrong to look at a particular time and say

the effect of things stop here.

If we did the same thing with the French Revolution,

going after three years of the French Revolution,

we would have said it failed.

Would people now say it failed?

No, but the civility was achieved after 75 years.

They brought the dictator three times.

Three times they brought an emperor back.

So we can just freeze a moment in time and say the effect today.

The effect of today is bad but people are willing to change.

We have a new generation that is aspiring for a new world,

a new life, a better life of freedom of speech,

democracy for everyone.

Until now, since five years we haven't been in power by the way.

There is in single person who was really someone who believed

in democracy at heart who is in power in Egypt yet.

But do you admit you were wildly optimistic

back in those days?

100%.

You went up, I remember the picture, you went up to receive

a Webby Award, one of the big global internet awards, on behalf

of the Egyptian people because of all the activism you had

done on social media, and you said then, you said,

injustice plus oppression plus social media equals revolution.

Well, you know, so much for that.

I'm learning, I'm growing, and I was naive definitely.

As I told you before, what we thought was just

like democracy is going to be easy once the dictator is out, no,

actually what we need to fight more than the dictator

in the regime is ourselves.

Most oppression right now is not coming from the military regime,

it's coming from the people who right now are actually

completely with what's going on.

And a final thought.

You talk about your own personal journey and no longer naive.

The danger is that you become jaded, you become resigned and wary.

One of the leaders of the April 6 protest movement said the other day

when he was talking about whether there could be a new revolt,

because someone on the web was talking about getting new mass

protests going on in Egypt.

He said, "No, forget about it, Egyptians are too tired and too

divided to revolt today."

Do you think that is true?

I think it is true but things are changing so fast and so rapidly.

The past six months, Egyptian currency lost

50% of its value.

I don't think anything matters except economy.

No one cares any more about human rights.

No one cares any more about torture, no one cares about democracy.

We care about one thing, Egyptians, about one thing

which is economy and economy is going to the worst place

that we ever saw in our lives.

And I can see from the people around me who used to support

the regime that things are not going so well.

And by the way, from someone who believes in the revolution 100%,

a revolution is a medical operation.

There is a better way, and a way that we all wish

that we don't go to a medical operation, which is pills,

any kind of medication.

So that's reform.

So we wish and pray for reform before the next revolution

is going to be a bloody revolution.

Everyone around me that I know is escaping the country,

fearing that day.

We have to end there.

It is a bleak thought to end on, but, Mohamed Diab, I thank you very

much for being on HARDtalk.

Thank you very much.

Hello there.

For a good portion of the UK, as we head deeper into the week,

conditions will settle down as high-pressure builds in.