At the age of 50, the Swedish Tarik Saleh entered the holy of holies of world auteur cinema, alias the Cannes competition, in May with his fourth feature film, The Cairo Conspiracy. The film is, in fact, as original as it is seductive, organizing, from the sudden death of the Grand Imam of the Al-Azhar religious university in Cairo, the greatest Sunni authority in the world, a narrative in the form of a web of spider around the political stakes of the choice of his successor and the various protagonists who, in mute, clash violently there.
This film confirms, if need be, the talent of the filmmaker, unexpectedly brought to international attention five years ago with Confidential Cairo, pure thriller organized around the violent death of a singer in Cairo shortly before the uprising in Tahrir Square, and where the amazing actor Fares Fares already distinguished himself in the role of Inspector Noureddine. A Swede, just like the director, from Lebanon. Which leads us straight to the Saleh mystery, knowledge of which generally stops at the viewing of these two films with an Egyptian tropism. The questions abound. What links connect this native of Stockholm to Egypt? What previous life did this late director have?
Answer here, after we cooked it in the bar of a hotel in the 10e district of Paris. Tarik Saleh was born in 1972 in Stockholm. His father is Egyptian, an animated filmmaker who settled in Sweden at the end of the Six-Day War, because he had little taste for Nasserist nationalism and refused to serve in the army. His mother is an artist from the progressive Swedish bourgeoisie. “You couldn’t have dreamed of a more explosive encounter, says the director. My father came from a poor and very religious background, very modest. My mother from an enlightened and progressive family, little concerned with religious taboos. »
We note in passing the picturesque memory of a grandmother who, he says, “was cleaning my childhood room in a state of complete nudity”. And the one, much less funny, of a “domestic nightmare” which results in the rapid separation of the couple. The mother remarried very quickly. The father remains in Sweden to be able to assume his role. Tarik will go live with him at the age of 15.
Renowned graffiti artist in the 1980s
This family discord, but also cultural, throws the future director into a search for identity that will never cease to torment him. Belonging to the Muslim world and the Egyptian dream play a preponderant role. The first contact with the country takes place at the age of 10. A shock : “I came from one of the richest places in the world and I discovered a broken country, emerged defeated from the war. »
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