Vintage and Foreign Movies

topic posted Sun, November 30, 2008 - 10:01 PM by  Nefabit
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Hi!
I've recently taken up an interest in vintage and foreign movies about or relating to belly dance. I've seen clips of old black and white movies on YouTube, but have no idea where they're from. I also like foreign movies about belly dancers, bollywood dancers, etc etc.
Anyone have any suggestions?

Thanks,

Nefabit
posted by:
Nefabit
Washington
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  • Re: Vintage and Foreign Movies

    Mon, December 1, 2008 - 6:57 AM
    Most of the Black and White dancer clips you see were produced in Cairo movie studios in their "Golden Age", focusing on the 40's and 50's. The Egyptian cinema produced a small range of genres, and most dancers are focused on the (mostly) musicals that feature dancers like Samia Gamal. There's a great article on dance in Egyptian Cinema in Belly Dance: Orientalism, Transnationalism, And Harem Fantasy ; it's listed at the top of an Amazon Book List I did a couple of years back:

    bit.ly/83y0

    There are a few caveats for collecting these movies, from what I know. Though there are a goodly number of movies with dancers, the scenes w/dancers are oftentimes depressingly sparse. Moreover, there are very few that focus on the dance, or on dancers per se. On top of that, few of these movies have been subtitled, much less dubbed. And that's without me knowing the actual issues w/obtaining these films.

    that said, there are some options if you want to just see the dancing. the best opinion is also the hardest to get -- Hossam Ramzy's THE STARS OF EGYPT video series:

    www.hossamramzy.com/store/home.php

    As it says, it looks like he's selling off the last of his stock. And it's on VHS. But he does a really good job of pulling dance scenes from these movies, and is comprehensive so far as I know.

    Perhaps a better starting place is THE LEGENDS OF BELLY DANCE DVD:

    www.thebellydanceshop.com/proddetail.php

    Which is a) relatively cheap, and b) available from many vendors.

    One final note. A lot of the dancing on these videos is very good -- but is, according to people I know who knew these stars, not always representative of their "real' dance styles.
  • Re: Vintage and Foreign Movies

    Tue, December 2, 2008 - 9:18 AM
    The Legends of Belly Dance is a great DVD, you can see an evolution of the style from the 40's to the 70's. Hollywood Music/Peko Records also has several DVDs of old Egyptian movies, they also have some compilations of Samia Gamal and Nadia Gamal and other dance legends.

    You can definitely look up lots of old clips on youtube, a bunch are there. Just type in Samia Gamal, Tahiya Kaioka, Fifi Abdo or Golden Age belly dance and you'll finds lots of good stuff.

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