In the late 1970s, Alexandria was gripped by a story that refused to die. People whispered about it in cafés, taxis, and along the quiet streets near the sea. Elderly Alexandrians still tell it today with lowered voices: the story of the “Ghost of El Shatby,” the mysterious girl in white who appeared beside the Christian cemeteries before vanishing into the darkness.
And from that urban legend came one of Egyptian cinema’s strangest and most haunting films: Ale’etraf Alakheer.
The Legend of El Shatby Ghost
The story began on a cold winter night in Alexandria.
A taxi driver was passing through Ibrahimia when a beautiful young woman stopped him. She wore white and spoke calmly, asking him to take her to Shatby. The streets were nearly empty, and the city carried that eerie Alexandrian silence that only appears after midnight.
When they arrived, she asked him to wait while she retrieved something from inside a large iron gate. Minutes passed. Then more. The driver finally stepped out of the taxi, annoyed and confused, only to freeze in terror when he realized the gate belonged to the Christian cemetery of Shatby. The girl had disappeared.
Some versions of the story go even further, as far as identifying the ghost girl. The next morning, he told other drivers what had happened. Some laughed at him. Others believed every word. But when they returned with him to the cemetery, the story took a darker turn.
Inside, they found a grave bearing the photograph of the exact same girl. Her name was Margaret Hanna. And according to the tombstone, she had died five years earlier.
The Murder Rumors Behind the Story
What terrified Alexandrians even more was what they later claimed to discover about Margaret.
Rumors spread that she had not died naturally. According to the story, she had been murdered inside her apartment during a robbery. The same place where she supposedly stopped the taxi that night was said to be the building where she took her final breath.
Suddenly, the story no longer felt like a simple ghost tale. It became part of Alexandria’s collective memory.
The quiet cemetery road, the lack of streetlights, and the sea fog drifting through Shatby all made the legend feel believable. People avoided the area at night, convinced the girl in white still wandered between Ibrahimia and the cemetery gates.
How Anwar El-Shennawy Used the Story in Ale’etraf Alakheer
Director Anwar El-Shennawy saw cinematic gold in the story.
Instead of recreating the legend exactly as it was told in the streets, he transformed it into something more emotional, psychological, and tragic in Ale’etraf Alakheer. The film starred Nour El-Sherif, Nelly, Nabila Ebeid, Salah El-Saadany, and Ahmed Badir.
At the center of the story is Adham, a man shattered by the death of his wife, Durriya. Then comes Samira — mysterious, calm, and strangely connected to his past. She confesses that she secretly loved him for years and reveals painful truths about his late wife’s betrayal.
But Samira herself is hiding an impossible secret. Little by little, Adham realizes he is chasing someone who does not belong to the world of the living.
Alexandria’s Atmosphere Added to the Fear
One reason the film felt so unsettling was because the city itself became a character.
Anwar El-Shennawy filmed scenes in Shatby, inside the haunting paths of Montaza Palace Gardens, and the famous Thousand Trees area. Alexandria’s winter atmosphere — fog, empty roads, old cemeteries, and fading streetlights — gave the film a realism that made audiences wonder where fiction ended and truth began.
The screenplay, adapted from a story by Anis Mansour, blended paranormal mystery with heartbreak, turning a local ghost rumor into one of Egyptian cinema’s boldest horror experiences of the 1970s.
The Legend Never Really Died
What made Ale’etraf Alakheer unforgettable was not just the horror — it was the possibility that somewhere inside the story, there might have been a grain of truth.
To this day, older Alexandrians still debate the same question:
Was Margaret Hanna only a myth born from fear and imagination?
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