Review: Tesbah Ala Kheir between induced dreams and schemes

CAIRO – 30 June 2017: Hosny’s character in the film wanted the best of both words, so will he have it or not?

“Tesbah Ala Kheir” (Good Night) is an Egyptian drama romance movie released on Eid al-Fitr’s eve, starred by Egyptian megastar Tamer Hosny, Lebanese actress Nour, Tunisian actress Dorra, and Egyptian actress Mai Omar.

It is directed and written by Mohamed Sami, while the producers are Walid Mansour and Talent Media Production. “Tesbah Ala Kheir” is a movie about a millionaire named Hossam el Khedawy portrayed by Hosny gripped by depression due to his wife’s infertility. A software professional portrayed by Omar, who invented a dream machine contacted him on her own to offer him a deal. Even though the deal seemed simple at first it later revealed a plot behind it. He would buy a dream machine from her in exchange for him to have induced dreams, yet he eventually fell in love with another girl and got addicted to the machine.


The director used several techniques to create the movie, but not all of them seemed to serve it well. Chief among them were the storyline, acting, script and language, settings and camera movement.

Storyline
The story starts with the millionaire Khedawy having depression, and ends up with him getting out of depression through living a dream life of a poor man name Hassan el-Laly, (also portrayed by Hosny) who falls in love with another woman who can give birth, who is not his wife. As the story develops, conflict start to arise between his reality and the dream world, which he became very attached to. It was apparent that he wanted the best of both worlds. Laly is a simple guy who got married to the woman he fall in love with. Yet when the dream was over and returned to be Khedawy he finds that his wife in reality suspects that he was having an affair.

In fact, the story beginning, middle and end do not match together. The beginning and the middle of the story move towards the direction of the idea of Inception film, because all of a sudden while he was in the real world he finds his wife from the dream world standing in front of him asking him for money. That is when towards the end he discovered that his wife in reality and the programmer were scheming against him to steal his money.

The storyline of the movie makes no sense; because the beginning and the middle of the film are not connected with the ending, they do not add up, it makes the viewer confused about the movie itself, was it really a dream or was it a scheme?
Acting

The acting of all the actors was pretty on point except Hosny, and Omar. Hosny's acting as a millionaire was like watching the same character that I watched in all of his films. While, Omar’s acting was not very convincing as a tomboy. Her clothes of the character displayed that she was suppose to be a tomboy, but she did not display very well the tomboy character. On the other hand Nour’s acting was very convincing and Dorra’s as well.

Script
The storyline is not the only thing that brought the movie down, in my view. The language and the script of the film were incredibly shocking and explicit. Sex-life is explicitly discussed; four-letter words are used in almost every single scene of the movie. Both are used in comic contexts; as if it was acceptable to curse and talk sex. Third, as the movie is not restricted for 18+, chances are that minors would learn those words. When it comes to the script the idea is not original, it seems borrowed and the ending is a disaster.

Film settings
While the settings of the movie were indoors, mainly inside houses, or closed areas (such as night clubs, homes, and work office), there were outdoor settings like the one on the beach or the two scenes on the road. However, with the settings mainly indoors, the director and the cinematographer controlled lighting and color. The setting complemented color control and helped the director make a good name by bringing creative techniques to the eyes of the audience...But the question remains: was the color as good as the setting to complement the film?

The color palette in "Tesbah Ala Kheir" added to the romanticism of the film and highlighted the protagonist’s depression. For example, when the lead actor was a millionaire he used to wear dull clothes and the surroundings were dull and dim in light and color. However, when he becomes Laly (the poor man) his clothes were always colorful and his hat was always red as a symbol of happiness. Watching the movie, I felt the director was influenced and inspired by Wong Kar-Wai color technique. Wong Kar-Wai is a Chinese filmmaker/director who is obsessed by colors in his films and all the colors in his films are figure of speech or message to the audience.

Camera movements
The director used many close-ups and medium shots. He mainly used close-ups to show emotions and facial expressions of the cast. However, it seems that sometimes there was no need for them in the first place. For example, there is conversation between the two characters the director used close-ups on only one actor and ignored the other. The director also used two extremely long shots to display the difference between the two lives and the two classes presented in the movie.
Is it worth watching?

I did not like the film’s story line or the script, but I was amazed by the editing and the cinematography. However, fans of Hosny loved it and they actually laughed in every single scene.