Chico Honoured as Hurghada Youth Cinema Festival Opens Its Fourth Edition

The Egyptian actor and screenwriter Chico was honoured at the opening ceremony of the fourth edition of the Hurghada Youth Cinema Festival, according to reports carried on Friday by Youm7, Al-Watan, Sada El-Balad, Al-Masry Al-Youm, Veto, Al-Bawaba News and Ahram Gate.

All seven outlets reported the tribute from the opening night. Al-Watan said the honour recognised his career in both acting and screenwriting, while Ahram Gate described him as crowned with the edition's honours.

He is the latest name attached to this edition. Hurghada News reported earlier that the festival would honour the actor Mostafa Khater as its fourth edition opened, that the actress Sherry Adel is due to be honoured on 10 September, and that the programme includes two graduation films by Karim Abdel Aziz.

The festival is staged in Hurghada city itself rather than in the resort enclaves up the coast, and it is one of the few screen events on the Red Sea calendar aimed at young film-makers. Further north, El Gouna's own film festival has been postponed twice this year, which leaves the Hurghada event as the coast's main cinema fixture of the early autumn.

What the reports do not give is almost everything a visitor would need: none of the seven named the venue, gave the closing date of the fourth edition, listed the competition line-up or jury, or said whether screenings are open to the public and at what price.

For residents, it is a rare week of red-carpet activity in the city rather than in Cairo. For visitors already on the coast, the festival is running now — but with no published schedule in any of these reports, attending means watching the festival's own announcements.