The only adaptation I know of Dostoyevsky’s Crime and Punishment that is spoken in Arabic, and in fact, it is a remarkable film for its flashes of German expressionism, especially during Ahmed Hosni’s stabbing of the old moneylender Mehlaal and the strangling of his unfortunate sister – not to mention the sinister nod of the cat. Of course, it strips away Dostoyevsky’s psychological drama and focuses instead on the sociological peculiarities of the time relating to the economic precariousness in which the student Ahmed, originally from the Ammar neighbourhood, lives. These hardships make …
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