Why Didn't "Captain Kabonga" Return?

Mostafa El-Kilany

At the El Gouna Film Festival, I watched "The Return of Captain Kabonga", the second film by director Amir El-Shenawy, following his brilliant documentary "Subterranean" (Kilometer 64), in which he presented the story of his brother Wael attempting to reclaim land along the Cairo–Alexandria Desert Road and the obstacles and failures he faced. That film stood out for its ability to transform a personal, geographically limited experience into a narrative about ambition, work, and the struggle against a hard-to-tame reality. "Subterranean" premiered at the Cairo International Film Festival in 2018 and won the Best First Work Award at the National Festival for Egyptian Cinema.

Because we fell in love with Amir El-Shenawy's camera, we expected a lot from his second film. However, the crisis of "Kabonga" begins as we get lost in the film without knowing what we are actually watching. Is it about Captain Kabonga, the man struggling through life and earning a living day by day? Is it about his short trip to the UAE? Is it about his presence at political celebrations and campaign rallies? Or about his search for advertisements on social media? These threads lie side by side without cohering, making it difficult for the viewer to find an entry point into the story or understand what the film wants to say.

Therefore, the phrase "Why didn't Kabonga return?" does not seem like a question about the fate of a hero who vanished and then returned. It is a question about a film that did not give us a clear journey into Kabonga's life and did not get close enough to him for us to feel his absence or his return. Where did he go? And why did he get lost in his own film?

Where Did Kabonga Go?

This film is not a return for Captain Kabonga, because the simple question it is supposed to answer—Where did Kabonga go?—finds no clear answer. In fact, the film does not give us enough to feel that he left in the first place, let alone wait for his return.

The film accompanies us on Kabonga's journey after he sells his ring to scrap dealers, but then crowds it with details about political celebrations and campaign rallies supporting the president or others, as well as political party conferences. Yet these scenes do not seem connected to the film's main narrative arc, nor do they help us understand Kabonga or his journey. They remain suspended within the work, as if imported from another film.

The paradox is that Kabonga's own life is full of stories worth telling: his humor, his relationship with his two wives, and the love each of them has for him. In a photo of him being honored in the New Administrative Capital, both wives stand together, holding hands—a moment that reveals a striking human relationship without fabricating conflict or searching for non-existent drama. There are also his children, his relationship with his mother, the people around him, and perhaps his brothers whom we never see. These are details capable of making a lively, intimate film focused on its protagonist, yet they are not given room to breathe.

Instead, the film piles up elements that neither introduce us to Kabonga nor reveal anything genuine about him. As they accumulate, the rhythm slows down, disappearing entirely in many places. We do not emerge with a clearer picture of the man, nor with the feeling that we have drawn closer to his story.

It seems that the director's desire to take a political stance interferes with the film's trajectory, yet that position itself remains ambiguous. Does he see Kabonga's participation in political rallies and parties as wrong? Does he support it? Or does he want to present it neutrally, leaving the viewer to form an opinion? The film does not give us enough to know. Even if a neutral stance was intended, the scenes are not arranged in a way that constructs a clear idea or a comprehensible point of view.

The film could have disagreed with Kabonga's choices, merely observed them, or left them open to debate. But it does none of these; it places them before us and then steps back, without connecting them to his story.

Why Did Kabonga Get Lost?

Kabonga is a documentary subject ready for a film—not because he is a superhero or because his life requires a scripted heroism, but because he struggles with life and life struggles with him. He has no fixed income, lives on the margins, and tries to find a way to earn a living with whatever is available. Even TikTok challenges, where he waits for a gift like a rose or a lion, are not a passing detail in his story; they are part of how he gets through the day, reflecting work and livelihood in a world where attention itself has become a source of income.

Yet the film does not get close enough to this story. It does not pause to examine Kabonga's ordinary day: How does it start? How does he earn money? What does he do when no income comes in? What do the gifts he waits for mean to him, and what do people see in him when he enters a challenge on TikTok? These questions could have guided the film deep into its subject's life, instead of leaving it scattered among stations and events that fail to reveal who he is.

There are many documentary films that chose to approach such individuals, not because they are athletes or celebrities, but because the details of their lives deserve to be seen. These films do not require their protagonists to achieve extraordinary feats; it is enough to observe how they work, how they face hardship, and what gives their days meaning. Kabonga's film could have done the same—accompanying him through the details of life and seeing his humor not just as a pleasant trait, but as a way of living, connecting with people, and coping with daily struggles.

When a film does that, small details become the narrative. Kabonga's relationship with his mother, his children, the people around him, and his two wives who love him and appear together at his honor ceremony without contrived rivalry—this is rich human material that could have given us a deeper picture of the man the film was made for.

However, we do not see enough of this life. Instead, we see many details that bring us no closer to Kabonga and reveal nothing about his daily reality, causing the story to lose its center and the rhythm to stumble. This is where Kabonga gets lost in his own film: not because his life lacks detail, but because the film does not know which details to choose, nor how to let them lead us to him.

When the rhythm fades and we drift off while people around us start looking at their phones, I recall one of the film's most charming scenes, when the director of Koshary Abou Tarek's commercial talks to the editor and asks him to follow the "Koshary policy in editing."

It does not seem that Kabonga ever left or returned. The film did not take us on a journey to understand what changed in him, nor did it get close enough to his life for us to feel his return. What happened was precisely what we feared: Kabonga had never left, nor had he returned.