Burdens of childhood

A sequence at the very start of Happy Birthday sets up the economic disparity pivotal to the film. A rich young girl, Nelly, talks about making wishes every birthday and how they turn out real for her, year after year.

- NAMRATA JOSHI

Her grandmother’s 8-year-old child maid and her best friend and companion, Toha, doesn’t even know what a wish is. “Is it something like a prayer?” she asks, adding, “I pray all the time, but nothing happens.” Even God, if there is one, appears to favour the haves rather than the have-nots. Egyptian-American filmmaker Sarah Goher’s debut feature about a child’s brush with the harsh reality of class divides and discrimination, premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival earlier this year, where it won three major awards—Best International Narrative Feature, the Nora Ephron Award (for female filmmakers competing in the festival) and Best Screenplay in an International Narrative Feature. It is also the Egyptian entry for the Best International Feature Film at the upcoming Oscars. The film starts off with Nelly wanting a party to ring in her ninth birthday, but her mother, Laila, with a divorce and a move of home looming large, doesn’t feel she’d be able to pull it off. Toha, who’s never had a birthday, wants to make it happen for Nelly. All she wants in return is to be able to blow out a candle and make a wish. But the class divide ensures th