Khalf Aswar Al Jamea'a (Behind University's Walls) (1981)

Three impoverished students from the country enrol on different courses at Cairo University. As Hassan, Sanaa' and Michel arrive in Cairo with great aspirations, their dreams gradually dissipate as they are continually challenged with brutal hardships in the big city. At first unable to find accommodation that they can afford, their luck turns around however when perchance they meet a broker named Ahmed, who incidentally is also pursuing studies at the College of Arts in which Hassan and Sanaa' are enrolled. Despite being quite busy with his studies and taking care of his mother and nine young siblings, Ahmed helps the students find modest rooftop accommodation at a certain Sitt Nabawiyyah's house ('Sitt' is the Egyptian term equivalent to the German 'Frau'). Sitt Nabawiyyah is reluctant to rent it out to the students at first, but out of pity for Hassan's blindness she eventually yields to their urgent need. Sitt Nabawiyyah being a lonely widow, she becomes enamoured with Sanaa', and dotes on the three friends by occasionally providing complimentary food just for Sanaa's sake. At some point, Michel finds it hard to cope with the exorbitant fees required to continue studying Medicine, hence reluctantly considers transferring to the Arts. Meanwhile, the Oxford-educated Dr. Ramzy returns from England to join the English Literature faculty in Cairo University, but finds it increasingly difficult to impart knowledge to his college students, most of whom seem apathetic and unresponsive to his lectures on Shakespeare's works. The four students, including Ahmed, later find themselves unwittingly embroiled in the murder and burglary of an elderly beggarwoman residing in the basement of Sitt Nabawiyyah's house, the consequences of which will eventually bind their fate with that of their landlady's and professor's.