67th edition of Catholic Center Cinema Festival, concludes with awards

CAIRO – 16 February 2019: The 67th Egyptian Catholic Center Cinema Festival announced its awards during the closing ceremony on Friday, February 15.

The festival’s head Pope Botrus Danial honoured the jury committee members: The famed Egyptian actor Mostafa Shabaan, the Egyptian actor Magdy Kamel, the Egyptian director Adel Adeeb, diector of photoghraphy Mohamed Mokhtar and Script writer Mohamed Soliman.

Shaaban told Egypt today that he is happy with this honorary noting that the first award he received was from the Catholic Center Cinema Festival on his role in “ Fata Men Israel” ( A Girl from Israel).

The famous Egyptian actor Ahmed el Fishawy won the Best Actor award for his role in “Eyar Nary” (Gunshot) movie. “Yomeddine” script writer and director Abu Bakr Shawky won both the Best Script Writer and the Best Director awards.

The Egyptian actress Horreya Faraghaly won the Best Actress award on her role in Tale’ Senay” (Induced Labor). The veteran Egyptian director Yousry Nasrallah and the renowned Egyptian critic Tarek el Shenawy received the Artistic Creativity awards.


“Yomeddine” is the first time for a debut movie for an Egyptian director to participate in Cannes Film Festival's main competition.

The movie managed to grab the attention of all those who watched it. International media platforms were keen to put the spotlight on “Yomeddine”, writing extremely positive reviews about the movie, which presents an innovative mixture of tragedy, comedy, and condensed shots of emotions and sentiments.

“A man who has recovered from leprosy goes in search of the father who abandoned him in a sentimental drama that infantilizes its lead character,” wrote Peter Bradshaw in The Guardian.

“Recalling about a thousand other titles, with the Lynch films ‘The Elephant Man’ and ‘The Straight Story’ definitely near the top of the list, this is a picaresque road movie about two mismatched characters, with rookie director A.B. Shawky offering a motley and not entirely smooth cocktail of drama and melodrama, a dash of social critique and insight, some chuckles and a few tugs at the heartstrings, mainly by virtue of its near-virtuoso score,” wrote Boyd van Hoeij in The Hollywood Reporter.


It is expected that the nominations for the 2019 Oscars will be released on Jan. 22, 2019 as the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and the ABC Television Network announced.

Yomeddine recently won the best Foreign Language Contender Award at the Heartland Film Festival in Indiana.


“Tale’ Senay” revolves around an Egyptian couple that seizes the American Embassy in Egypt after being denied visas to enter the United States.

The feature film stars a group of talented Egyptian actors and actresses, including Rasha Gawdat, Maged el-Kedwany, Mai Kassab, Abdel Rahman Abou Zahra, Bayoumi Fouad, Horeya Farghali and Sayed Ragab. "Tale' Senay" is directed by Khaled Diab.

The movie screened for the first time on December 11, 2017, as part of the Dubai International Film Festival (DIFF).

‘’ Eyar Nary” revolves around a mysterious murder that connects the destinies of the protagonists and changes their beliefs about the concept of truth.

The movie stars Ahmad al-Fishawy, Ruby, Mohamed Mamdouh, Arfa Abdel Rassoul and Asmaa Aboul Yazeed, along with guest stars Ahmed Malek, Hana Shiha, Bayoumi Fouad, Ahmed Kamal and Safaa el-Toukhi.

“Eyar Nary” is written by Haitham Dabbour and directed by Karim el-Shenawy in his first feature film after many award-winning short films.