November 2 movie: Afrita Hanem (The Genie Lady). Santa Salsera invited me to watch this with her. It was a 1950 Egyptian romantic comedy starring Farid Al-Atrash, a famous actor & singer of the time, and Samia Gamal, a famous belly dancer. It was great! Very silly comedy, great songs, amazing belly dancing. There was a scene early one where Al-Atrash and his friends are riding in a car singing about how happy they are, which reminded us both so much of Amitabh's amazing motorcycle number in Muqaddar ka Sikandar.
My favorite moment in The Genie Lady was a dance number where Al-Atrash sings while Gamal is standing there wearing a big fur coat that barely covers her, and apparently nothing else. She just stands there looking sex kittenish, then suddenly opens the coat, a full length belly dancing skirt falls out of it, and she starts dancing. Va va voom! It was so hot we had to rewind and watch it again.
I couldn't find a Youtube of the number with the coat, but here's a great dance from the movie:
(direct link)
Interesting note: the comedy sidekick, wearing a striped robe in the youtube clip, looked different from all the other actors, spoke with a different accent, and occasionally spoke French. We wondered if he was supposed to be an ethnic stereotype of some kind?
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