Lamia (Baneen Ahmed Nayyef) lives with her grandmother, Bibi (Waheeda Thabet Khreiba) in the Mesopotamian Marshes, a wetland in the south of Iraq, where people must get around using boats. One day, as Bibi is rowing them home, she tells Lamia a story from the Epic of Gilgamesh.
God told Gilgamesh: “Look into the water, and you shall see the face of love.” And god promised that the pure of heart shall see the image of their loved one in the water.”
“Bibi, which waters?”
“Here. The marshes.”
At one point in the epic, Gilgamesh undertakes a long and dangerous journey to discover the secret to eternal life. Little does Lamia know, in this moment, that she is about to undertake a long and perilous journey of her own.
Because it’s the 1990s in Iraq, a period dominated by the aftermath of the Gulf War. UN imposed economic sanctions impacted both the Iraqi economy and the population. Sadaam Hussein ruled brutally and demanded absolute loyalty. Images of him are everywhere in The President’s Cake, his image watching over people and reminding them of the need to be loyal to the regime. The film opens a couple of days before Sadaam’s birthday in July, which was a national holiday, requiring celebrations, and, as befits a dictator, tribute. A lottery will be held at Lamia’s school to determine which students will bring items for the celebration, and failure to do so will result in them being reported. The ultimate “honour” for the students is to be the one chosen to make the President’s birthday cake.
Lamia and her grandmother know this, and they know they cannot possibly afford the ingredients to make the cake. Bibi advises Lamia on how to avoid the draw: say a prayer, and then ask to go to the bathroom. Lamia tries, but her teacher is having none of it, and into the box goes the little slip of paper with her name on it. Of course, Lamia is the one chosen to make the President’s cake.
“Make us a nice big cake,” says her teacher, “and fill it with extra cream.” He tells Lamia she should be proud, but we can see how troubled she is – she who only had an apple to eat for lunch, which ended up going missing, perhaps stolen by another hungry student.
Lamia struggles over whether to tell her grandmother, but Bibi already knows. And Lamia worries that her grandmother is angry with her, even though she tried to get out of the draw. Later that day, Bibi tells Lamia: “Write down three eggs, eggs for fertility. One kilo of flour, for life. 500 grams of sugar, for a sweet life. And baking powder for a fluffy cake.” All the while that she is telling Lamia the cake recipe, she’s taking out what are obviously her precious keepsakes from a box. The next day they set off in their boat, Bibi, Lamia, and Lamia’s constant companion, her cockerel Hindi. Once ashore, they walk for a while, then get a ride with a man who waxes poetic about cake: “It’s the greatest invention in human history.” But what is so wonderful about cake when the person who must make it suffers to do so, and won’t even get to eat any of it? And when the risk of not making the cake is being punished, disappeared?
Bibi understands this. She tries to make arrangements quickly to have Lamia sent away to live elsewhere, but Lamia won’t have it. While her grandmother is distracted, she runs away, determined to find a way to gather the ingredients for the cake. Along the way, she enlists Saeed (Sajad Mohamad Qasem) to help her in her quest. The two of them are determined and resourceful – they try many ways to get the ingredients needed for the precious cake, but along the way they are constantly cheated by adults who should know better.
Lamia’s journey allows us to see Iraq in this era, to see how the system sets out to benefit those in power, to see the excesses of those who have power, and to see the hope of people who probably have no business being hopeful under this regime. A soldier who is blinded in American bombings before he can even get a glimpse of his wife, but who laughs and says that he won’t have to be concerned if she’s pretty or not. A grandmother who must barter with the only possessions she has in order to get some new clothing for her granddaughter. The President’s Cake focusses on Lamia and her journey, all the while showing us the breakdown of the social order under this regime. The authoritarian nature of the regime coupled with the scarcity suffered under the sanctions reveal an Iraq in complete social and moral collapse. In the end, the cake gets made, but the cost of making it is so great for Lamia.
The President’s Cake is the feature directorial debut of Hasan Hadi, with a script co-written by Eric Roth. It was filmed in Iraq, using mostly untrained actors, including Baneen Ahmed Nayyef who embodies Lamia with so much poise that it’s hard to believe this is her first film. Lamia is by turns feisty, determined, joyful and sad, and the challenges and losses she faces at such a young age are absolutely heartbreaking, so much so that at the end of the film I burst into tears – not unlike the time I sat in a darkened theatre and sobbed at the end of Isao Takahata’s Studio Ghibli film The Grave of the Fireflies. And like that film, The President’s Cake takes a national tragedy and distills it down to a personal level, making Lamia’s plight even more intimate and more poignant.