Cinema is one of the most popular global entertainment tools that started in the nineteenth century. The increasing interest in the film industry found its way to the Middle Eastern through foreign, most often Western, filming companies. Egypt was one of the essential gates through which the Middle Eastern world is introduced to the global the film industry. This study will shed light on the attempts of localizing film industry in Egypt. The discussion will centralize the depiction of the national identity after independence, from 1923 to 1940. I will distinguish between two types of films: Egyptian films and Films about Egypt. The former represents the local identity and struggle while the second involves a colonial or a Western representation of Egypt. For example, the film In Tut Ankh Amon’s Country is shot in 1923 as a documentary film that reports the discovery of Tutankhamun's tomb. Although Mahmoud Qasim considered this film as Egyptian in his Encyclopedia of the Arab Cinema, 1994 edition, and Twentieth Century Films' Guide of Egypt and the Arab World, 2002, he announced later in The History of Egyptian Cinema that the film offers a foreign perspective about Egypt. He updated his encyclopedia in 2004 to start the Egyptian cinema with 1927 films: Layla and kiss in the Desert. In both, the theme of desert appears as a local setting and culture. Additionally, I will discuss the image of peasants as appeared in early films such as Zainab 1930 and an Apples’ Seller (feminized) 1939. The plots of the selected films centralize the straggle of Bedouins and peasants as a subject of spectators’ sympathy. The desert and the farm represent a geographical image and involve a trend of localization among film producers. This local setting and values appear as a means of identity formation.