Mohamed Hefzy and Layla Alwi Appointed to Cinema Industry Chamber

Producer, screenwriter and Film Clinic founder Mohamed Hefzy will be joining the Egyptian Chamber of the Cinema Industry. Along with Hefzy, Minister Mounir Fakhry Abdel Nour appointed four otheres to the board: actress Layla Alwi, former head of the Misr Company for Film Distribution and Theaters Mohamed Hassan Khafagy, former chairman of the Radio & Television Union Osama el Sheikh and Mohsen Alm Eldin.

Hefzy said he was very excited to be representing independent cinema in the chamber. Like all Egyptians but artists in particular, Hefzy's relationship to the government has undergone some complex repositioning following the military-backed ouster of Mohamed Morsi in July.

He told Variety in a profile they ran on him this summer, "I expect we will have a better chance with a more liberal government, of higher freedom of expression and possibly more funding for independent film production, depending on the economic outlook within the upcoming year or two."

Pointing to the multivalent pressures of production, Hefzy also told the magazine, "The challenge is to mix things up with a slate that includes commercial movies for the Arab market and auteur films that can play internationally, and to find ways to make them, despite economic and political problems."

Hefzy is now in Toronto with Ahmed Abdallah's " Fersh wa Ghatta," which he produced. It's their second trip to the festival after " Microphone," which screened at the Toronto festival in 2010 before being released in Egypt in 2011.

Despite somewhat distorting the full scope of Microphone's plot, the link is a good read. It rightfully paints Hefzy as an invaluable father figure ushering in a new era of Egyptian cinema that circumvents the conventions of a highly commercialized industry.