Filmmaker’s connection to Cairo inspired film about its changing

To come to grips with his feelings about his hometown of Cairo, Egyptian filmmaker Tamer El Said made “In the Last Days of the City,” a movie about Cairo in 2009, as change was beginning to sweep the nation.

Central Ohioans can see the film on Monday at the Wexner Center for the Arts, where El Said is scheduled to appear at a screening.

El Said, 46, currently divides his time between Cairo and Berlin, but there is no doubt which city plays a larger role in his life.

“( Making the movie) came from a need to understand my relationship to Cairo, the city that made me what I am,” he said from Cairo during an online interview. “I’m very influenced by being a Cairoan. I think this is the key factor in me becoming who I am.”

The movie features Khalid, a filmmaker buffeted by change as Egypt. His father and sister have What: Where: Contact: Showtime: Admission: $8, or $6 for members, students and senior citizens

died, and his mother is bedridden in a hospital. His filmmaker friends have scattered, and his lover plans to leave Egypt. He must leave his apartment but can’t find another.

At the same time, the Egyptian people are beginning to protest the regime of President Hosni Mubarak. The movie intersperses street scenes from Cairo, ranging from people doing daily activities to protesters being beaten.

But Cairo, and not Khalid, is the center of the movie.

“He’s the figure that’s connecting the things together,” he said.

El Said began filming in 2009, in part to document the times.

“Because it was clear … something had to change,” he said. “We didn’t know the nature of this change, but we felt it coming.

“It was what you do when you feel like the world is collapsing around you, and you want to keep a memory from this era.”

The film took 10 years to complete. During that time, Mubarak stepped down and a new government was installed — a development that required a shift in viewpoint as a filmmaker.

“The thing was shot with a foresight ... and the editing was done with a hindsight,” he said.

El Said doesn’t call the film biographical, but he and Khalid share similarities.

Like Khalid, he lost a sister — when he was 5. Her death influenced his decision to become a filmmaker.

“I experienced loss at a very early age, at that age I didn’t understand what that loss means,” he said. “I could feel the heaviness of this feeling.”

By making movies, he said, “I believe that I wanted to save the people I love, that I feel so close to, and I won’t lose them.”

The work has also given him the opportunity to be introspective.

“Filmmaking has given me the possibility to go deeper inside me and to be in touch with my questions, wonders, doubts and how I see the world around me.”

“In the Last Days of the City,” which has screened at more than 140 festivals worldwide, isn’t preaching a point of view, El Said said, but just the opposite.

“It’s not our role as filmmakers to explain reality to people; it’s our role to reflect reality,” he said. “I’d like to think my film is trying raise questions, not to give answers.”

“In the Last Days of the City” Wexner Center for the Arts, 1871 N. High St. 614-292-3535, www.wexarts.org 7 p.m. Monday, with director Tamer El Said attending