When the trailer for the Egyptian feature film Al‑Molhed (The Atheist) dropped in July 2024, a work that had quietly secured a censorship licence months earlier was suddenly propelled into a full‑blown culture war over faith, offence and the limits of cinematic storytelling.
Written by prominent journalist and commentator Ibrahim Eissa and directed by Mohamed El‑Adl, the film follows Yahia, the son of a hard‑line preacher whose authoritarian religiosity pushes his child into a crisis of belief and ultimately into open atheism, using family conflict to probe the social pressures surrounding doubt and dissent in contemporary Egypt. That premise alone was enough for conservative preachers, TV personalities and digital activists to brand the film an attack on Islam before most of them had seen it, framing it not as a drama about extremism and conscience but as an attempt to “normalise” apostasy and spread “atheistic ideas” among young people.
From licensed film to boycott campaign
What makes The Atheist stand out in Egypt’s long history of religiously charged censorship cases is that the film had already navigated the official regulatory process and emerged with an authorised screening permit before the storm broke. The Censorship Authority for Artistic Works, backed by culture bodies, confirmed that the movie was granted a public screening licence in 2023, reportedly under number 121/2023, after a review in which regulators and a committee of religious scholars demanded changes, cuts and clarifications to ensure that the final version would not be read as a direct insult to Islam. Yet even with this prior state vetting, the film’s August 2024 release date was abruptly postponed and then postponed again, as social‑media campaigns calling for a boycott gathered steam and religiously framed outrage turned a licensed work into a lightning rod for polarisation.
Mortada Mansour takes the fight to court
The backlash soon moved from the online arena into the courts when high‑profile lawyer and former Zamalek SC president Mortada Mansour filed an administrative lawsuit demanding that the state withdraw the licence and ban the film’s exhibition in Egypt and abroad. In his petition, Mansour argued that The Atheist “undermines the foundations of Islam” and promotes atheism in violation of censorship rules and public morals, echoing older legal strategies used to target books and films under the banner of protecting religion. A report by the State Commissioners Authority appeared, at one stage, to vindicate that approach: in late 2024 it recommended revoking the screening permit on the grounds that the film contained “atheistic ideas” and criticism of divine religions, and questioned whether Al‑Azhar had properly approved the work before licensing. Producers and supporters countered that the Commissioners had not actually seen the film and accused Mansour of using the case to generate media attention, while calls for a boycott from hard‑line groups continued to frame the debate in moral and religious terms rather than as a question of artistic freedom.
Supreme Administrative Court affirms the right to screen
In November 2025, the legal tide turned decisively when the Administrative Court, followed by higher administrative courts, dismissed the lawsuit and affirmed the film’s right to be shown, stressing that no individual plaintiff had legal standing to overturn a valid screening licence. Citing Article 67 of the 2014 Constitution, the court underlined that the suspension or confiscation of artistic works is the exclusive prerogative of the Public Prosecution and cannot be triggered simply because a citizen or lawyer claims to be offended by ideas expressed in a licensed film, a reasoning that echoed earlier jurisprudence protecting Eissa’s 2017 film Mawlana from similar religiously framed challenges. The ruling obliged the authorities to respect the existing permit and cleared the way for The Atheist to reach cinemas, with reports indicating that the censorship board and distributors moved to schedule a release around the end of 2025 after nearly two years of politically charged delay—transforming a would‑be ban into an unintended publicity machine.
A precedent in Egypt’s religion–art battleground
For Egypt’s cultural field, the Atheist case exposes the growing gap between formal guarantees of artistic freedom and the informal power of religious mobilisation, social‑media campaigns and strategic litigation to chill controversial works even after they have been cleared by the state. At the same time, the court’s reliance on constitutional protections and its insistence that licensed films cannot be removed from public space at the request of offended individuals sends an important signal that, at least in law, artistic expression enjoys a degree of institutional protection against moral panic, creating a precedent that producers, directors and writers are likely to invoke in future clashes over religion, belief and representation on Egypt’s screens.
Egypt’s film The Atheist has become a critical test case for artistic freedom and the power of religious outrage in the public sphere. After months of smear campaigns, boycott calls and a high‑profile lawsuit from lawyer Mortada Mansour seeking to ban the film nationwide, Egypt’s Supreme Administrative Court ruled that the movie can be screened because it already holds a valid censorship licence and is protected under Article 67 of the Constitution.
The decision sends a significant signal to artists, producers and human rights defenders: once a work is legally licensed, individual complaints of “offence” should not be enough to erase it from public space. At the same time, the campaign against The Atheist exposes how social‑media mobilisation, religious framing and strategic litigation are still being used to pressure cultural institutions and shrink the space for challenging narratives.
For advocates of artistic freedom, this is both a rare legal victory and a reminder that real access to expression depends on more than formal approval—it also requires resisting organised attempts to intimidate creators and audiences.
#ArtisticFreedom #Censorship #Egypt #FreedomOfExpression #Film #HumanRights #Mimeta #CulturalRights #AtheistFilm #StrategicLitigatio
References
– Ahram Online, “Cairo court rejects lawsuit seeking to ban screening of The Atheist film”, 19 Dec 2025english.ahram
– Tesaaworld, “The Egyptian Administrative Court Resolves the Controversy and Permits the Screening of the Film ‘The Atheist’”, 23 Nov 2025tesaaworld
– Egyptian Streets, “Film Al-Molhed Stirs Controversy Over Alleged Islamophobia”, 10 Aug 2024egyptianstreets
– The New Arab, “Egypt’s hardline Muslims call for boycotting ‘The Atheist’ movie”, 27 Jul 2024newarab
– Freedom of Belief and Citizenship Bulletin, EC‑RF, entry on Mortada Mansour and The Atheist case, 2024ec-rf
– MiddleEast24, “Egyptian Film ‘The Atheist’ Approved for December 31 Screening”, 31 Jul 2025middleeast24
– ScoopEmpire, “‘Al-Molhed’ Divides Opinion: Egyptian Film on Atheism Faces Lawsuit and Boycott Calls”, 12 Aug 2024scoopempire
– English Ahram / Arts & Culture, “Release of Egyptian film The Atheist postponed again amid controversy”, 2024english.ahram
– EC‑RF, “Freedom of Belief and Citizenship Bulletin – March 2025” (context on Article 67 and jurisprudence)ec-rf
– Sbisiali, “Egyptian judiciary officially permits screening of the film ‘The Atheist’ after controversy”, 2025sbisiali
