In many German schools there is a tradition that birthday children have to bring cake for the rest of the class – much to the delight of those who celebrate their day during the holidays and can therefore feed themselves “for free” throughout the school year. However, children from households where money is tight could get into a certain trouble because of the customs: you don't want to expose yourself in front of the class, even if it might be financially wiser. In Iraq under Saddam Hussein, school classes also celebrated birthdays with cake – but there the pressure reached frightening proportions:
Despite the food shortage, which was also fueled by the sanctions, every school class had to bake a birthday cake for the president. If the child who was given this “honor” by lottery did not obey, there was a risk of draconian punishments – including families being kidnapped. The Iraqi director and screenwriter Hasan Kadi now explores this historical footnote in the cleverly told, deceptively sweet and rousingly bitter “A Cake for the President”. For this it was deservedly awarded the prize for the best debut film at the Cannes Film Festival.
Of course, her beloved rooster is also there when Lamia (wonderfully, of course: Baneen Ahmad Nayyef) goes to the big city to buy ingredients…
Southern Iraq during the 1990s: Nine-year-old Lamia (Baneen Ahmad Nayyef) has to bake a birthday cake in honor of Saddam Hussein. There is such poverty in the region that even the few ingredients for a measly cake are almost luxury goods. Her best friend Saeed (Sajad Mohamad Qasem) is also supposed to get fruit. The inevitable trip to the nearest town turns into a real odyssey for the school children, Lamia's grandmother (Waheed Thabet Khreibat) and Haushahn Hindi. After this day nothing will be the same again…
Poverty and aesthetics are not mutually exclusive
According to Hasan Kadi, the plot is inspired by a story that was told to him by someone close to him. He himself also grew up in southern Iraq, which differs enormously from the dusty picture that (not only) Western films usually paint of Iraq. Instead, the central journey into the city is framed by scenes of deep blue waterways and turquoise skies: children rowing to school in small boats from their modest floating huts. Kadi and cameraman Tudor Vladimir Panduru find an impressive balance when they describe the poverty conditions without embellishment, but still show the region in an aesthetic, varied light.
Far away from the hustle and bustle of the city and the school plastered with Hussein propaganda, there are certainly picturesque sights in Lamia's life – and Kadi uses this in his debut for complex images that even some more experienced names could probably not orchestrate in such a complex way: Lamia does her homework under the starry sky, floating in a boat, while her beloved rooster Hindi is next to her gymnastics around, Saeed paddling towards her and warm orange small lanterns providing light. All of this in a shot that looks like it was painted and combines virtually all the unpredictability that filmmakers fear – children, animals, water and natural light!
Everyone cheers for the president while a nine-year-old girl wanders alone through the city just to bake another cake for the billionaire dictator.
But such peaceful moments offer no protection against the effects of an autocratic regime and the unequal distribution of goods: the teacher immediately threatens violence if there is the slightest disobedience, and when visiting the city, the disparity between rich and poor becomes clear in an often casual but no less humiliating way. And then, with the President's birthday approaching, euphoric regime supporters keep coming around the corner! Kadi stages the latter with impressive images of confusing crowds of people who soundly hijack this otherwise quiet film and act as an all-encompassing stream that pushes the main characters to other locations against their will. But Kadi not only knows how to use abrupt power of images and sounds effectively, but also knows how to sketch the harsh world in quieter vignettes:
War-injured people are casually shown several times. Once, with goosebump-inducing calmness, a grocer negotiated that a pregnant customer would have to prostitute herself for her purchase. And elsewhere, in the half-focus background of a prayer, a small drama develops in silence, which, thanks to clever blocking, turns out to be more nerve-wracking than most Jump scares. Kadi tells us almost all of this from the experience of the children's team: For little cinemagoers, this is an exciting mission, with whose elementary school heroes they can identify with to the maximum. Meanwhile, an older audience also understands the inhumane implications of what is often only touched on or even left completely unsaid.
Conclusion: “A Cake for the President” is a bitter film made with sugary sophistication, which, among other things, reveals the dilemma when sanctions imposed against a country only end up driving the weak and innocent into misery. At the same time, he emphasizes how scornful it is when people blinded by propaganda celebrate those who make themselves comfortable on their suffering backs and accept huge cakes as gifts, while a young student goes to incredible lengths for a few grams of flour and sugar.
We saw “A Cake for the President” at the Cologne Film Festival.