In the land of movies, Hollywood, the time when the movie preview issue of Entertainment Weekly hits the newsstand is just about the only way to tell in Los Angeles that the seasons are changing " since the weather resembles Cairo's weather, just less dirty and dusty. This issue is, in sense, a promise by the studios that this is when you can expect to be entertained, provoked or let down. In the world of film-viewing, it's difficult to live without expectation. There's always that moment when you first hear about a film or see a trailer that you can either become “for” it or "against" it. People's expectations of films in a land where films are an important and prominent part of the cultural landscape are significantly higher. Thus, people talk in great length about the film, discussing it, and how one could become disappointed in it, or how passionate they might become about it. The film almost becomes personal, and for some it is indeed personal. It's hard not to walk into a movie expecting something, but since Egyptian films perhaps have the worst trailers ever produced for a country with film business, the expectation becomes foggy. Many go see a film because it's a star vehicle, like the upcoming Adel Imam's Eid film Zahaemar (Alzheimer's) where trailers pretty much gives us nothing to expect, except that the protagonist playing the afore-mentioned star suffers from the disease. As for most other films that aren't star driven, people will go and watch them solely based on some dirty jokes that are mentioned throughout the trailers. However, the lack of expectations doesn't have anything to do with badly made trailers, although that doesn't help, but rather, it's mostly due to the lack of passion for the art itself. In the upcoming Eid Al-Adha Holiday, several films will be getting released, since the holiday serves as one of the few big events for films releases as well. It's hard to describe the feeling of anticipating a film to anyone who has never had that experience before. For example, this anticipation might involve: “the previews gave you thrills; the wait drove you crazy; finally, after all that, the opening weekend arrived and you were among the first to get a ticket. You grabbed popcorn, found a great seat, and smiled as the lights dimmed. And then it sucked.” Even the feeling of disappointment is so grand that itís sad that even feeling of great disappointment is not experienced. There is nothing worse than a movie that shows great promise, then fails to deliver. If it's just bad, you regret the money and time wasted. If it's terrible, you wish you could erase the memory from your brain and punish those responsible. In Hollywood, there have been many, many films like that, such as: "Godfather Part 3" (1990), "Godzilla" (1998), and the one that takes the crown for the biggest disappointment: "Star Wars Episode 1: The Phantom Menace" (1999), it's hard to describe the intensity of the anticipation for this movie before its release, and to overstate the crushing disappointment with this film once it hit the screen. It was the prequel to the most iconic and beloved film trilogy of a generation. People camped out for months in front of theatres to have good seats for the premiere. It's almost as sad not to experience the let down people have felt for this movie. Let's take a look at some semi-anticipated Egyptian films for the last two years. There was Khaled Youssef Dokkan Shehata (Shehata's Store, 2009), which was solely anticipated to see Haifa act, or even to just see her on the screen in general. There were also Ahmed Helmy's films 1000 Mabrouk and Asal Iswid ("A 1000 Congratulations" 2009) and ("Black Honey" 2010). Both films weren't, per se, letdowns, but they weren't definitely "ground-breaking" and in retrospect they are overrated. That's another side effect of the lack of anticipation for great films: even films that aren't ground-breaking or amazing on any level are considered great when compared to the limited competition. Anticipation, sometimes, makes films all the more great. At end of every year in entertainment magazines, we get list of the most anticipated films of the year. Thus, we should take a look back at the films that we had anticipated, and rate them after viewing, but unfortunately, there is no such list. As 2010 approaches its end, and we think back on all the big films of the year, we must take time to look forward to what is to come. That is exactly what film critics and film lovers do. So, let's look at what we have to look forward to in the last two months of 2010, or even what we have to look forward to in 2011. If you really think about what we have to anticipate about these as movies, just as movies itself, despite who is going to star in it or who is going to direct it, we have basically nothing. We know there is going to be a Mohamed Henedi film, an Ahmed Helmy film, a Khaled Youssef film, and so and so forth. There is not going to be "A Paranormal Activity 2" equivalent film with no big-name stars or an audience which is only anticipating a good scary story. Another example is the upcoming film "Black Swan", which stars Natalie Portman who is a wonderful in her right, but she doesn't have that type of following which shouts "let's go see Natalie's Portman's next film". However, even before the film premiered at the Venice Film Festival last month, people were already salivating for the film because of the posters and the intense drama present in the psychological-thriller trailers. So, arguably because of the aforementioned, tickets have already been sold online for a film that will be released in the US next month. One of the greatest directors of all time, Alfred Hitchcock, once said, "There is no terror in the bang, only in the anticipation of it." With Egyptian cinema, there is rarely bang; we're lucky if we get a muffled thud.
