Written and directed by Saleh, Boy from Heaven is his second feature set in Egypt after The Nile Hilton Incident, which won Sundance’s Grand Jury Prize: World Cinema Dramatic in 2017 and turned into a B.O. and critical success, notably in France where it sold over 400,000 tickets.

In his usual noir thriller style, the director tells another politically-charged David vs Goliath story.

Here the main character Adam, son of a poor fisherman is offered the ultimate privilege to study at Cairo’s Al-Azhar University, the epicentre of power of Sunni Islam. Shortly after his arrival in Cairo, the university’s highest ranking religious leader, the Grand Imam, suddenly dies. Adam soon becomes a pawn in a ruthless power struggle between Egypt’s religious and political elite.

The film was shot in Turkey, as Saleh is a person non-grata in Egypt since 2015, after the making of The Nile Hilton Incident.

Boy from Heaven was produced by Kristina Åberg for ATMO and Fredrik Zander, in co-production with Finland’s Bufo, Denmark’s Final Cut for Real and France’s Memento Production among others.

We sat down in Cannes with Saleh on Monday.

After The Nile Hilton Incident, this is your second film shot in Arabic, and set in Egypt, where your father comes from. Tell us about your urge to tell this story?
Tarik Saleh: I think my obsession with Egypt comes from the fact that my grandparents were originally from the Nile Delta and the first people from their village to get an education. My grandfather studied at Al-Azhar, then with my grand-mother, they both moved to Mansoura where my grandmother worked as a principal in a secondary school.

She got a certificate from the King [Farouk] that allowed her to work and get married. This is partly why I’ve always been fascinated by what an institution can do. Then both were sent to a fishing village to teach children. This is where my own father was born.

When I grew up, my father told me stories from Egypt, from this fishing village - they fed my imagination. I was only 10 when I went there for the first time. It was a shock to discover it for real and that experience has created a wish to capture Egypt on screens.

This specific story came after I had directed The Nile Hilton Incident, when I had re-read Umberto Ecco’s The Name of the Rose. I started to play this game - what if I told a similar story but set at Al-Azhar. Then I thought - why not add the Egyptian state security to the story, and perhaps turn it into a novel. I showed the script to Kristina [Åberg] and she immediately said we should make a film. I initially thought no, the scope would be too big. But then I felt I had to do it.

How much research did you do to make the religious references as accurate as possible? Coming from documentary filmmaking and journalism, you are obviously very attached to truth and facts…
TS: The tricky thing was not gathering the information but how to create a fiction work. I decided to place the action at Al-Azhar today but also to create a different historical setting. Today, Al-Azhar is still the foremost Sunni Islamic educational institution, but it is also very modern, the biggest university in the world, with over 300,000 students and 3,000 teachers. So to make it timeless, I set it in early 1960s, before women were first admitted [in 1962], and when Al-Azhar was the beacon of Islam.

The most difficult decision therefore was how much of it should be fiction.

What I did is use existing characters, like the head of state security Safwat El-Sherif as inspiration for the character of Ibrahim [played by Fares Fares] who was a legendary Minister of Information under [former President] Hosni Mubarak.

But the other characters - including the blind Sheikh, are invented. He was actually modelled after one of my favourite poets - Ahmed Fouad Negm who has been in jail under every Egyptian President.

Al-Azhar is an all-mighty institution, and you describe inner battles and the state security trying to infiltrate its inner circles to influence its leadership in a battle of power. Is it still the case today?
TS: What is fascinating about Egypt is that it’s a place where rulers have had to obey the bigger picture, because Egypt has been there for so long; you are only borrowing the chair. Today [Egypt’s current president] Abdel Fattah al-Sisi is there as long as he plays the game as Egypt wants. Sometimes politicians try to interfere, but ultimately, the religious institution has something you can’t get rid of - it is knowledge.

That said, the biggest threat was never the leadership [of Al-Azhar]. It was television and the introduction of the TV preaching Imam [in the 1970s]. All of sudden the most popular Imam in Egypt wasn’t from Al-Azhar but Islamic cleric Mohammed Metawali Sheik Sharawi, a TV preacher-like Billy Graham in the US. Then came internet-the YouTube Imams, an even bigger threat, as they say contradictory things to Al-Azhar but have 12 million followers on YouTube. What I find fascinating, is that people still want to rally around institutions, because they want stability. The question is how much should institutions adapt and change to modern times.

Could you tell us about your visual style?
TS: I always work with the same team - cinematographer Pierre Haim, set designer Roger Rosenberg [among others]. But the biggest difference compared to Nile Hilton is that the film was shot with only one 40 mm lens to give a feeling of intimacy and closeness.

You have an impressive cast. How did you cast Tawfeek Barhom in the title role, and the gallery of other top actors including Fares Fares?
TS: Yes they are all huge. It was thanks to Nile Hilton I could get them.

First of all, for the role of Adam, I could have cast a real son of a fisherman, in the pure Neo-realistic tradition. But I wanted a professional actor to show the character’s inner transformation. It takes a lot of discipline and Tawfeek is a wonderfully skilled actor.
Fares Fares is simply one of the best actors in the world and a long-time friend.

Mohammad Bakri who plays the General el Asktan, is a legend - the main character in Hanna K by Costa Gavras, who also played with the Taviani brothers [The Lark Farm]. I knew that I needed a guy who would own the room - as soon as he would appear on screen, although he plays a minor role.

Then another difficult character to cast was the blind Sheik. I was extremely pleased to get Makram Khoury. He was the first Arab actor to win the Israel Prize [highest cultural honour in Israel]. He’s played with Peter Brook, Steve Spielberg [Munich] and delivers a wonderful performance.

Your father who was an animator has been influential in your artistic development. Has he seen the film?
TS: No not yet. I am very close to him and he is my biggest supporter. I would have loved for him to come to Cannes, but he is quite old [78] and not in very good health. I can’t wait for him to see the film in Sweden in a cinema.

What does it mean for you to be in Cannes?
TS: It is mind-blowing and nothing can prepare you for this. I think it’s good that I‘m 50 - not 30, otherwise I could think that I’m another guy - just because I’m in competition in Cannes. I know that it is amazing, but I’m the same; I will go back home to my family, my children. I’ll go back to writing, maybe directing, although I find directing challenging. So maybe next time I will do a book!