"World Cinema: Israel"

My book, "World Cinema: Israel" (originally published in 1996) is available from Amazon on "Kindle", with an in-depth chapter comparing and analyzing internationally acclaimed Israeli films up to 2010.

Want to see some of the best films of recent years? Just scroll down to "best films" to find listings of my recommendations.

amykronish@gmail.com

Monday, July 13, 2026

Good Morning, Gaza - a new Israeli TV documentary about the war in Gaza

Good Morning, Gaza is a hard-hitting documentary film, directed by Hanan Brandes and Matan Sacofsky, which premiered at the Jerusalem Film Festival this week.

Similar to its namesake (Good Morning, Vietnam), the film is mostly made up of radio or podcast interviews and broadcasts, edited with tons of visuals of raw footage from combat and from the destruction in Gaza.  The film is about normal reserve soldiers, especially in the tanks, serving in Gaza, during the first 2 months of the war, following October 7th. 

The Robin Williams character is Or Brandes, a reserve tank driver. Since he gets bored sitting in his seat waiting for something to happen, he begins to broadcast an improvised podcast to his fellow soldiers.  Nothing is left unsaid.  The soldiers talk about every subject.  There is a lot of charm and humor, and much sadness.

The soldiers talk about their fears, their experiences at the Nova and the friends they lost at Be’iri, they talk about people they know who have been taken hostage, they talk about issues of morality and revenge, and about combat. Our “talk show host” successfully talks one soldier through a crisis when he says he’s losing it. And they tell funny stories about their children and they joke around. 


With no spoiler intended, I want to say that the end of the film is a real knock-out.  These are real people, mostly reservists, who sacrificed so much during this war.

Good Morning, Gaza (documentary, 52 minutes) was produced by Lama Films for broadcast on Yes Docu. Watch for the Yes broadcast on Israeli TV during the coming months.

During the roll of credits at the end of the film, it is stated that some of the soundtrack was reconstructed by AI.  I suppose we are going to see more and more of that during coming years.

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