Born in Alexandria in 1930 and dying in Cairo in 1986, Shadi Abdel Salam trained as an architect and became a production designer for Egyptian and international films, including Cleopatra and Chahine's work. He directed one feature, The Mummy (Al-Mummia, also called The Night of Counting the Years, 1969), based on a real discovery of a cache of royal mummies in 1881, in a slow, hieratic style with great attention to costume and light. It was restored by Martin Scorsese's World Cinema Foundation and is considered one of the greatest Arab films.
Filmography
- The Mummy (1969)