Critic Mahmoud Abdel Shakoor says in his book "How to Watch a Movie", that dialogue in itself is a difficult art complementing the art of cinema, pointing out that Egyptian cinema in its golden age relied on giants specialized in dialogue, such as El Sayed Bedeir, Abul El-Saud El Ebiary, and Badee' Khairy, who were assigned to major works like the movies of Naguib Mahfouz.

The movie "Face to Face" comes from the young director and writer Walid El-Halfawi in his second cinematic work, reviving hopes for the return of films based on a well-crafted screenplay and intelligent dialogue, despite its affiliation with social comedy.

This is an important experience for the producer "not the actor" Ahmed Fahmi for a distinctive comedy different from the prevalent ones lately, such as the comedy of catchphrases and cartoon sketches.

The film belongs to the drama of one place and one night, a difficult genre that requires special skills in drafting the screenplay and dialogue to avoid boredom and maintain the dynamics of events till the end. Unlike theatre, cinema leans towards space openness and time compression.

Stripping the screenwriter or director of this feature necessarily puts them in front of a great challenge, perhaps the most successful Egyptian classical films in overcoming this challenge is "Between Heaven and Earth" by the late genius Salah Abu Seif.

"Face to Face" tells the story of a simple family dispute that erupts between the couple Sherif "Mohamed Mamdouh" and Dalia "Amina Khalil" regarding moving to a new marital apartment.

The dispute reaches its peak when each party resorts to calling their families and backup from friends to support them against the other party, but unexpectedly the door lock breaks and the quarreling guests find themselves forced to spend the night together in the same apartment despite the escalating conflicts and the breakdown of trust among everyone. How will the noisy night pass, especially when their child is deep asleep with the angels in his bedroom?

The idea is simple, touching the reality of newlyweds from the middle classes in Egypt, illustrating how family and society interventions negatively affect the relationship between the couple crushed in the mill of material life.

The difference lies in the skill of crafting intelligent, flowing dialogue between the characters, smoothly and quickly transporting us to their worlds.

El-Halfawi succeeded in precisely portraying his characters despite their multiplicity, giving each of them an active role in the events, thus providing every actor a good space to push the drama forward, unlike the recent trend in movies, where producers insist on gathering a large bundle of stars without a dramatic necessity, only for promotional and commercial purposes.

Following the approach of the book "Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus", the screenplay excelled in portraying the same situation in two different versions, from the husband's perspective at times, and the wife's at others, with each narrative offering a small detail that advocates for the logic of its speaker.

More importantly, the screenplay succeeded in avoiding the pitfalls of direct social advice or human development capsules, which usually happens when addressing these types of subjects.

On the direction and cinematography level, El-Halfawi and the director of photography Marwan Saber succeeded in exploiting the element of the place "the apartment" well, with the choice of shooting angles and camera movements effectively taking the viewers from their seats in the cinema to the heart of the home. Mena Fahim's successful montage managed to streamline the outdoor shots "outside the home" so as not to hinder the flow of events.

The execution of some scenes and clips was influenced by techniques and iconic scenes of international cinema, such as the door lock breaking scene influenced by the "Sherlock Holmes" movie or the bathroom scene, greatly influenced by the "Very Bad Things" movie, or even the technique of freezing the image with a zoom on the characters' faces when introducing them in their first scenes, a common old technique in Hollywood like "the bullet train" for example.

This is expected from a young director embarking on his journey to discover and create his artistic footprint, I wish him in the upcoming projects to undergo more calculated adventures in directing and cinematography techniques, more unique and bold to suit his new ideas.

I see, for example, that the film's scenario allowed for experimenting with relying on the "One Shot" technique in editing, which is an effective technique in integrating scenes into the narrative fabric.

Some of the action scenes in the last third, were marred by a disturbance in execution, and the quality of the visual effects.

The acting was the second element of success in my opinion, despite the success of Mohammed Mamdouh and Amina Khalil in portraying the main characters, their roles did not have a clear new challenge.

The clear distinction came from the majority of the supporting roles, Mohammed Shahin in the role of the loyal friend obsessed with his wife's friend, Khaled Kamal in the role of the gallant reckless friend, Ahmed Khaled Saleh, in the role of the cowardly brother who says what he does not do and threatens what he cannot.

Mahmoud El Leithy in one of his best roles, "Kahol", Donya Sami the discovery of the film in the role of the frustrated maid, the parents of the husband and wife, Bayoumi Fouad, Salwa Mohammed, Sami Maghawry and Anushka, all shone, in addition to a special appearance by some guests, the most notable of them was Mustafa Ghareeb in the role of the blacksmith.

The makers were not lucky, after a large part of its crew coincided with the successful Ramadan series "The Seventh Harsha" which is only "similar in atmosphere" to the movie's atmosphere, but despite that, the movie succeeded in presenting a huge number of distinctive creations, leaving a mark and a smile on the viewer's lips.

Its box office revenues also exceeded twenty million pounds and the showing is still ongoing both inside and outside Egypt.

In this, there is a message for filmmakers in Egypt:

That the equation of making distinctive cinema "I do not say elitist", commercially successful is still possible.

That the equation of artistic quality and commercial success is not zero-sum.

And that the success of a film that does not belong to the films of the rhyming titles and the comedy of the knight and the cheap catchphrases or the traditional thuggish action is not a mythical creature like the loyal vinegar!