“Cake is the greatest invention in human history,” a character exults. But there’s nothing great about cake for the nine-year-old girl who has been ordered to bring one to school.
The occasion? President Saddam Hussein’s birthday. All of Iraq is supposed to mark this milestone. So what if Iraq is reeling from poverty that is exacerbated by American sanctions? So what if the orphaned Lamia (Baneen Ahmad Nayyef), who lives with her grandmother, sometimes has nothing more than an apple for lunch?
Lamia is in no position to refuse the teacher who has chosen her to be the cake supplier. It’s Lamia’s national duty to arrange for flour, eggs, sugar and baking powder, failing which she will be reported to the authorities.
Iraqi director Hasan Hadi’s The President’s Cake is an engrossing elaboration of the “Let them eat cake” aphorism misattributed to French queen Marie Antoinette. Like the Italian neo-realist classic Bicycle Thieves (1948), The President’s Cake explores poverty and powerlessness by burdening its characters with an impossible task.
The cake becomes a symbol of everything that is rotten in early 1990s Iraq. By following Lamia and her classmate Saeed (Sajad Mohamad Qasem) – who has been given a similar target – the director reveals the survival strategies and resilience of impoverished Iraqis. The added ingredient in The President’s Cake is the role played by propaganda in an autocratic regime.
The school teacher – a Saddam Hussein lookalike – threatens his students to fall in line. Salutations to Hussein and pledges of loyalty to the dictatorship are all around as Lamia and Saeed scrounge for money and favours. The children put themselves in considerable peril as they navigate a world in which deprivation has eroded empathy and generosity.
Hadi’s debut feature, which won the Camera d’Or award at the Cannes Film Festival in 2025, is out on Netflix and can also be rented from BookMyShow Stream, YouTube Movies, Prime Video, Apple TV+ and Google Play.
Mostly non-professional actors enact scenes that are occasionally tinged with black humour. The story has flashes of tenderness, most strongly felt in Lamia’s bond with Hindi, her beloved cockerel.
As Lamia’s ordeal wears on, the movie stops trying to be tragicomic. Hindi bears witness to Lamia’s agonising struggle and her grandmother’s despair. A simple cake becomes like a mountain that refused to be scaled.
The scenes involving the children are heart-wrenching, especially in the climax. Lamia and Saeed, memorably played by the child actors, display a stoicism that is admirable but concerning too.
When and how did children learn to be so brave and resourceful? While The President’s Cake is simplistic and a bit predictable in its plotting, the film is powerful and poignant in its understanding of hunger caused by unfeeling rulers and worsened by the West’s indifference.
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