You’ve probably seen the poster. A lone figure against a backdrop of smoke, or maybe that iconic shot of Tahrir Square flooded with a million people. It looks like a Hollywood thriller, but The Square (or Al Midan) is anything but a scripted drama. It's a raw, bleeding slice of history that almost didn't get finished because the story kept changing in real-time.
Honestly, calling it just a "movie" feels a bit reductive.
Directed by Jehane Noujaim, this 2013 documentary didn't just capture a revolution; it became part of it. The crew was literally in the crosshairs, getting gassed and arrested while trying to figure out if the world they were filming was getting better or falling apart. Most people think of it as a "protest film." It's actually a study of heartbreak.
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Why The Square Still Matters in 2026
If you’re looking for a neat history lesson with a beginning, middle, and end, you’re going to be disappointed. That’s the point. History is messy. The film follows three main people who couldn't be more different if they tried. You have Ahmed Hassan, a charismatic street soul who basically becomes the heart of the film. Then there’s Khalid Abdalla, the actor you might know from The Kite Runner, who brings this intellectual, global perspective to the chaos.
And then there's Magdy Ashour.
Magdy is the complicated one. He’s a member of the Muslim Brotherhood. In any other movie, he’d be a caricature. Here? He’s a father, a friend, and a man torn between his loyalty to his organization and his bond with the secular activists in the square. Watching his friendship with Ahmed and Khalid fray as the politics get ugly is, frankly, one of the most painful things you’ll see on screen. It shows how "the cause" is easy, but people are hard.
The Netflix Factor and the Oscar Nod
The Square was a massive deal for Netflix. It was their first ever Academy Award nomination for a feature documentary. Think about that for a second. Before the era of Roma or The Irishman, this gritty, dangerous documentary from Egypt was the thing that put Netflix on the prestige map.
It won three Emmys. It swept festivals from Sundance to Toronto. But in Egypt? That’s a different story.
The film was never officially released there. Censorship is a funny thing—officials claimed they didn't "ban" it, but the permit just... never arrived. People ended up watching it on pirated links or hidden screenings. It’s a movie about the fight for a voice that was effectively silenced in the very place it was filmed.
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What Really Happened Behind the Scenes
Jehane Noujaim and her producer Karim Amer didn't just set up a tripod and wait. They shot over 1,600 hours of footage.
Can you imagine editing that?
The original version of the film actually ended with the fall of Mubarak. Everyone was celebrating. It was a "we won" story. But then the military stayed. Then the Muslim Brotherhood took power. The filmmakers realized the story they’d told was a lie, or at least a half-truth. They went back. They kept filming for another year and a half. They captured the second revolution, the ousting of Morsi, and the eventual rise of the military again.
The brutal reality of the footage
Some of the stuff in The Square is hard to stomach. You see Ramy Essam, the "singer of the revolution," after he was tortured. You see people being run over by tanks. This isn't CGI.
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- The Maspero Massacre: One of the darkest segments of the film.
- The Tents: The quiet moments where activists argued about what "freedom" actually looks like.
- The Cameras: How the activists realized that their lens was their only weapon against state media.
It’s easy to look back now and say the revolution failed. Many of the people in the film ended up in prison or exile. But if you listen to Ahmed Hassan toward the end, he says something that sticks with you. He says the revolution is a "shift in consciousness." You can clear a square, but you can't erase the fact that people realized they had power.
How to Watch The Square Today
If you’re trying to find it, Netflix is still the primary home for the film in most regions like the US and UK. However, licensing changes, so you might need to hunt it down on Apple TV or specialized documentary platforms depending on where you're sitting.
It’s worth the search.
Don't go into it expecting a political manifesto. Go into it to see what happens to a friendship when the world around it is burning. It’s a movie about the "conscience" of a country, and 13 years after the initial uprising, it feels more relevant than ever.
Next Steps for the Interested Viewer:
- Watch the "Final" Version: Make sure you are watching the 108-minute Netflix cut, which includes the 2013 updates, not the early Sundance festival cut.
- Follow the Activists: Look up the current work of Khalid Abdalla; he remains a vocal advocate for human rights and frequently discusses the film’s legacy.
- Context Matters: Read up on the Rabaa massacre (which happened right as the film was being finalized) to understand the somber tone of the ending.
- Check the Soundtrack: Listen to "Ya El Medan" by Cairokee and Aida el-Kashef. It’s the anthem that plays over the credits and captures the bittersweet reality of the movement.