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‘National Egyptian Film Festival’ Honors Young Talents

Egyptian actor Samir Sabri in 2016 at the 9th Muscat International Film Festival in Oman. AFP
Egyptian actor Samir Sabri in 2016 at the 9th Muscat International Film Festival in Oman. AFP
    Cairo - Intissar Dardir
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‘National Egyptian Film Festival’ Honors Young Talents

Egyptian actor Samir Sabri in 2016 at the 9th Muscat International Film Festival in Oman. AFP
Egyptian actor Samir Sabri in 2016 at the 9th Muscat International Film Festival in Oman. AFP

Young talents have bagged most of the prizes awarded during the 24th edition of the National Egyptian Film Festival in its two competitions: best feature film, and best short film, documentary, and animation.

The festival, organized by the ministry of culture to support the Egyptian cinema with money prizes worth 1.2 million Egyptian pounds, was attended by Minister Dr. Ines Abdel Dayem. At the beginning of the ceremony, the festival paid tribute to the late artist Samir Sabri, whose pictures were raised in the big theater, at the Cairo Opera House. During a keynote he addressed, Critic Kamal Ramzi said, “the late artist was indeed a man of festivals who supported all the cinema events in the country.”

The festival reflected the status of the Egyptian cinema in the past year on the level of production and quality. This edition saw the participation of 15 out of 24 feature films that were produced in 2021, while 92 movies competed in the short film, documentary, and animation contest.

The minister said the National Egyptian Film Festival is a major contributor to promoting the role of cinema in highlighting and addressing social causes and enhancing the national identity.

He said that cinema was and will always be a means to spread awareness and build a strong, coherent society.

In the beginning of the ceremony, as part of the ‘Eternals’ program dedicated to honor prominent artists, the minister paid tribute to four major figures in the Egyptian cinema: Rajaa Hussein, Abdelaziz Makhiun, and film editor Rahma Montaser, in addition to late director Abdul Qadir al-Talmasani.

The festival also released four books that highlight the journeys of the four figures.

Young talents won most of the prizes in the feature film contest overseen by a jury headed by Director Inas El Degheidy. ‘Al Aaref’ and ‘Abu Saddam’ won the biggest number of prizes; the first won five awards: best direction (Ahmed Alaa al-Deeb), best actress (Carmen Bsaibes), best montage (Ahmed Hafez), and best sound (Ahmed Abu al-Saad), in addition to the best production award.

The second won best actor (Mohammed Mamdouh), best supporting actress (Zeina Mansour), and the second-best production award. ‘Abu Saddam’ director Nadine Khan, daughter of late director Mohammed Khan, won the best direction of first work award.

Nadine expressed her gratitude for this tribute. “It’s very motivating. I dedicate this tribute to the Egyptian cinema, filmmakers, and to my father’s soul. I am so proud of his artistic journey; I learned a lot from him,” she told Asharq Al-Awsat.

The ‘For Rent’ movie won the best script award (Islam al-Sayed), and the third best production award; ‘Moses’ won the best cinematography award (Hussein Osr) and best production design (Ahmed Fayez); ‘Human and Mongoose’ movie won the best wardrobe award (Ines Abdullah), and best music award (Moudi Imam). Actor Ahmed Dash won the best supporting actor award for his role in “The Court” movie.

The jury also awarded a special prize to actresses Layla Elwi and Isaad Younis for their roles in the film ‘200 Pounds’.

Inas El Degheidy said the festival’s awards went to those who deserve them. “We didn’t give a prize to someone who doesn’t deserve it. We chose good works made by young filmmakers in their first or second experiences. They presented good movies with high artistic potential.

“But the common problem among all the participating works was the weak script. In fact, we considered suspending the best script award, but we didn’t to encourage the industry. We also noted the small number of participating movies, and the shrinking productions. We used to produce around 70 films every year in the past decades, which indicates a major problem that should be considered carefully.”

The short film awards, whose jury was headed by cinematographer Said Shimi, were also bagged by young filmmakers. Director Bassem al-Turki was loudly applauded when he took the stage to receive his best short film award for his movie ‘Illusions of the Locked Room,’ which he wrote, directed, and montaged despite his disability.

Director Nabil al-Shazly won the best long documentary award for his work ‘Crocodiles of the Nile’.

“I don’t mind screening my movie for free on cable channels to reach the widest audience. This is the true award,” Shazly told Asharq Al-Awsat.

The festival used to screen all the participating movies to the public before announcing the awards, however, this year, it only screened the winning works one day after its closing ceremony.

“We honor the winning movies by screening them to those who didn’t have the chance to watch them, and those who want to discover the reasons behind their success. We also planned seminars to discuss the winning works with their makers,” Kamal Ramzi, head of the festival, told Asharq Al-Awsat about the screening decision.

Ramzi said he ensured the competing movies get the best evaluation, noting that the awards were a happy surprise for the young filmmakers who are making their first steps in this industry. “We were also keen to honor fewer productions compared to previous editions, to add more depth and value to the tribute.”

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Varieties

Sharks Are Famous for Fearsome Teeth, but Ocean Acidification Could Make them Weaker

In this undated handout photo provided by Heinrich Heine University Duesseldorf in January 2026, a blacktip reef shark swims at Sealife Oberhausen in Oberhausen, Germany. (Maximilian Baum/Heinrich Heine University Duesseldorf via AP)
In this undated handout photo provided by Heinrich Heine University Duesseldorf in January 2026, a blacktip reef shark swims at Sealife Oberhausen in Oberhausen, Germany. (Maximilian Baum/Heinrich Heine University Duesseldorf via AP)
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Sharks Are Famous for Fearsome Teeth, but Ocean Acidification Could Make them Weaker

In this undated handout photo provided by Heinrich Heine University Duesseldorf in January 2026, a blacktip reef shark swims at Sealife Oberhausen in Oberhausen, Germany. (Maximilian Baum/Heinrich Heine University Duesseldorf via AP)
In this undated handout photo provided by Heinrich Heine University Duesseldorf in January 2026, a blacktip reef shark swims at Sealife Oberhausen in Oberhausen, Germany. (Maximilian Baum/Heinrich Heine University Duesseldorf via AP)

Sharks are the most feared predators in the sea, and their survival hinges on fearsome teeth that regrow throughout their lives. But changes in the ocean's chemistry could put those weapons at risk.

That is the takeaway from a study performed by a group of German scientists who tested the effects of a more acidic ocean on sharks' teeth. Scientists have linked human activities including the burning of coal, oil and gas to the ongoing acidification of the ocean, The Associated Press reported.

As oceans become increasingly acidic, sharks' teeth could become structurally weaker and more likely to break, the scientists found. That could change the big fishes' status at the top of the ocean's food chain, they wrote.

The ocean will not become populated with toothless sharks overnight, said the study's lead author, Maximilian Baum, a marine biologist at Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf. But the possibility of weaker teeth is a new hazard to sharks that already face pollution, overfishing, climate change and other threats, Baum said.

“We found there is a corrosion effect on sharks' teeth,” Baum said. “Their whole ecological success in the ocean as the rulers of other populations could be in danger.”

The researchers, who published their work in the journal Frontiers in Marine Science, performed their study as ocean acidification has become an increasing focus of conservation scientists.

Acidification occurs when oceans absorb more carbon dioxide from the air, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has said. The ocean is expected to become almost 10 times more acidic than it currently is by the year 2300, the German scientists wrote.

The scientists performed their study by collecting more than 600 discarded teeth from an aquarium that houses blacktip reef sharks, a species of shark that lives in the Pacific and Indian oceans and typically grows to about 5.5 feet (1.7 meters) long. They then exposed the teeth to water with the acidity of today and the projected acidity of 2300.

The teeth exposed to the more acidic water became much more damaged, with cracks and holes, root corrosion and degradation to the structure of the tooth itself, the scientists wrote.

The results “show that ocean acidification will have significant effects on the morphological properties of teeth,” the scientists wrote.

Still the ocean's top predator Shark teeth are “highly developed weapons built for cutting flesh, not resisting ocean acid,” Baum said. Sharks will go through thousands of teeth in a lifetime, and the teeth are critical for allowing sharks to regulate populations of fish and marine mammals in the oceans.

Many sharks are also facing extinction jeopardy, as more than a third of shark species are currently threatened with extinction according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature. Thankfully, sharks have a number of factors that can help them stave off the negative effects of ocean acidification, said Nick Whitney, senior scientist at the Anderson Cabot Center for Ocean Life at the New England Aquarium.

Whitney, who was not involved in the study, said the scientists' work on the shark teeth was sound. However, because shark teeth develop inside the mouth tissue of sharks, they will be shielded from changes in ocean chemistry for a time, he said.

And history has taught us that sharks are survivors, Whitney said.

“They've been around for 400 million years and have evolved and adapted to all kinds of changing conditions,” he said.

Ocean acidification could be a concern, but overfishing remains the biggest threat to sharks, said Gavin Naylor, director of the Florida Program for Shark Research at the Florida Museum of Natural History.

Acidification will bring many changes Naylor and others cautioned that ocean acidification is indeed going to pose many threats to the ocean beyond just sharks. Ocean acidification is expected to be especially harmful to shellfish such as oysters and clams because it will make it more difficult for them to build shells, NOAA has said.

It could also make fish scales weaker and more brittle. It's tough to say now whether that could ultimately benefit the sharks that feed on them, Naylor said.

For now, ocean acidification can't be disregarded as a threat facing sharks, Baum said. Some shark species could come close to extinction in the coming years and ocean acidification could be one of the factors causing that to happen, he said.

“The evolutionary success of sharks is dependent on their perfectly developed teeth,” Baum said.

Varieties

Mummified Cheetahs Found in Saudi Caves Shed Light on Lost Populations

This undated image provided by Communications Earth and Environment shows the mummified remains of a cheetah. (Ahmed Boug/Communications Earth and Environment via AP)
This undated image provided by Communications Earth and Environment shows the mummified remains of a cheetah. (Ahmed Boug/Communications Earth and Environment via AP)
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Mummified Cheetahs Found in Saudi Caves Shed Light on Lost Populations

This undated image provided by Communications Earth and Environment shows the mummified remains of a cheetah. (Ahmed Boug/Communications Earth and Environment via AP)
This undated image provided by Communications Earth and Environment shows the mummified remains of a cheetah. (Ahmed Boug/Communications Earth and Environment via AP)

Scientists have uncovered the mummified remains of cheetahs from caves in northern Saudi Arabia.

The remains range from 130 years old to over 1,800 years old. Researchers excavated seven mummies along with the bones of 54 other cheetahs from a site near the city of Arar.

Mummification prevents decay by preserving dead bodies. Egypt's mummies are the most well-known, but the process can also happen naturally in places like glacier ice, desert sands and bog sludge.

The new large cat mummies have cloudy eyes and shriveled limbs, resembling dried-out husks.

“It’s something that I’ve never seen before,” said Joan Madurell-Malapeira with the University of Florence in Italy, who was not involved with the discovery.

Researchers aren’t sure how exactly these new cats got mummified, but the caves’ dry conditions and stable temperature could have played a role, according to the new study published Thursday in the journal Communications Earth and Environment.

They also don't know why so many cheetahs were in the caves. It could have been a denning site where mothers birthed and raised their young.

Scientists have uncovered the rare mummified remains of other large cats, including a saber-toothed cat cub in Russia.

It's uncommon for large mammals to be preserved to this degree. Besides being in the right environment, the carcasses also have to avoid becoming a snack for hungry scavengers like birds and hyenas.

Cheetahs once roamed across most of Africa and parts of Asia, but now live in just 9% of their previous range and haven't been spotted across the Arabian Peninsula for decades. That’s likely due to habitat loss, unregulated hunting and lack of prey, among other factors.

In a first for naturally mummified large cats, scientists were also able to peek at the cheetahs' genes and found that the remains were most similar to modern-day cheetahs from Asia and northwest Africa. That information could help with future efforts to reintroduce the cats to places they no longer live.

Varieties

Vonn Launches Social Media Search Mission After Ski Pole Goes Missing

US' Lindsey Vonn crosses the finish line to win the Women's Downhill event of the FIS Alpine Ski World Cup in Altenmarkt Zauchensee, Austria, on January 10, 2026. (AFP)
US' Lindsey Vonn crosses the finish line to win the Women's Downhill event of the FIS Alpine Ski World Cup in Altenmarkt Zauchensee, Austria, on January 10, 2026. (AFP)
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Vonn Launches Social Media Search Mission After Ski Pole Goes Missing

US' Lindsey Vonn crosses the finish line to win the Women's Downhill event of the FIS Alpine Ski World Cup in Altenmarkt Zauchensee, Austria, on January 10, 2026. (AFP)
US' Lindsey Vonn crosses the finish line to win the Women's Downhill event of the FIS Alpine Ski World Cup in Altenmarkt Zauchensee, Austria, on January 10, 2026. (AFP)

Lindsey Vonn may be dominating World Cup downhills at 41, but even the US speed queen is not immune to missing equipment.

Vonn took to social media on Thursday with an unusual plea after losing a ski pole in Tarvisio, Italy, ahead of this weekend's World Cup event.

"Someone took ‌my pole ‌in the parking ‌lot ⁠today in ‌Tarvisio. If you have seen it, please respond to this. Thank you," Vonn wrote on X, posting a photo of the matching pole complete with her initials on the ⁠hand strap.

Vonn, a favorite for the speed events ‌at next month's Milano-Cortina ‍Olympics, retired ‍from the sport in 2019 and ‍had a partial knee replacement in April 2024 but returned to competition later that year and has been enjoying a fairy-tale comeback that has defied age and expectation.

Already the oldest ⁠World Cup winner of all time, Vonn continued her astonishing, age-defying form with a downhill victory in Zauchensee, Austria last week.

That triumph marked Vonn's fourth podium from four downhills this season, cementing her lead in the World Cup standings and her status as the woman to ‌beat at next month's Olympics.