Youssef Chahine

Youssef Chahine was born on Jan 25, 1926 in Egypt. Youssef Chahine's big-screen debut came with Baba Amin directed by Youssef Chahine in 1950. Youssef Chahine is known for Chaos, This Is directed by Youssef Chahine, Khaled Saleh stars as Hatem and Menna Shalabi as Nour. Youssef Chahine has got 10 awards and 22 nominations so far. The most recent award Youssef Chahine achieved is Dubai International Film Festival. The upcoming new movie Youssef Chahine plays is Chaos, This Is which will be released on Nov 28, 2007.

Youssef Chahine (born in Alexandria, Egypt, 1926) started studying in a friars' school, and then turned to Victoria College until the High School Certificate. After one year in the University of Alexandria, he moved to the U.S. and spent two years at the Pasadena Play House, taking courses on film and dramatic arts. After coming back to Egypt, cinematographer Alevise Orfanelli helped him into the film business. His film debut was Papa Amin (1950): one year later, with Le fils du Nil (1951) he was first invited to the Cannes Film festival. In 1970, he was awarded a Golden Tanit at the Carthage Festival. With Le moineau (1973), he directed the first Egypt-Algeria co-production. He won a Silver Bear in Berlin for Alexandrie pourquoi? (1979), the first installment in what proved to be an autobiographic trilogy, completed with Hadduta Masriya (1982)(La mémoire (1982)) and Alexandrie encore et toujours (1989).In 1992, Jacques Lassalle proposed him to stage a piece of his choice for Comédie Française: Chahine chose to adapt Albert Camus' "Caligula," which proved hugely successful. The same year he started writing L'émigré (1994), a story inspired by the Biblical character of Joseph, son of Jacob. This had long been a dream-project, and he finally got to shoot it in 1994. In 1997, 46 years and 5 invitations later, he was again selected Hors Competition in Cannes with Le destin (1997).