A Not-so-funny Comedy

Remember some of the bourekas films of the 1970s and 80s?  They were like eastern puff pastries – basically empty comedies created to poke fun at mizrachi men.  This week, I had the chance to see a new comedy, Forgiveness (Mechillah מחילה), directed by Guy Amir and Hanan Savyon.  This duo also wrote the script for the very successful sentimental comedy, Maktub.   Similar to that film, the premise of this film was a good one.  Unlike Maktub however, this film seemed to be empty and lacking in just the right amount of comedy and joie de vivre.

The story tales place on the background of bombs falling in the south of Israel and also during the ten days of atonement between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur when Jews are asking God and each other for forgiveness for their past deeds. 

There are two lovable heroes: Shaul has just sat in jail for having carried out a robbery. He returns home to his wife and daughter, finding that things are awkward after three years.  His not-so-swift buddy, Nissan, who got away with the cash, has become newly religious. But that hasn’t improved his analytical skills and now he can’t seem to find where he has buried the stash!

Here the Sephardi stereotypes are the basic gag line.  The film also casts its not-so-funny eye on women, Bedouin, superstition, ultra-orthodox, and the whole idea of forgiveness. 

On the Periphery of Society

Here and Now, directed by Roman Shumunov, is a sentimental and dark drama about Russian immigrants living in the slums of Ashdod.  Our four young heroes are burdened with trying to support themselves and their families and, at the same time, learning to adapt to Israeli life.  They are serious rappers and are dreaming of participating in an upcoming music festival. 

There are four tragic stories -- Andrei’s father has been hospitalized for a long period and he is left holding the bag, paying the mortgage and taking care of his little sister.  Things are not so easy and Andrei gets deep into debt.  Things seem to be spiraling out of control when his sister complains about school, they get harassed by the police for loitering on the streets at night, and he loses his job unloading crates at the port.  When the school social worker threatens to take his sister away and the bank threatens to foreclose on the apartment, Andrei realizes that he has to do something drastic to get himself out of this situation.

One of his friends is apparently homeless and misses his mother back in Georgia.  Another is living with the terrible memory of his sister being raped and murdered.  A fourth has gotten himself involved with the Russian mob. 

The film is a bit preachy and the acting leaves something to be desired. The best part is the rap music – although there wasn’t enough of it -- and the lyrics that clearly express the frustrations and humiliations of being a new immigrant young man on the periphery of Israeli society.

Here and Now is available from Go2Film and Laila Films. 

A Disappointing Film

There are lots of good Israeli films playing in the movie theaters in Jerusalem right now.  I highly recommend Foxtrot, Scaffolding, Longing and Maktub – all of which have been reviewed previously on this blog. 

There is one more playing right now – The Burglar (הפורצת) by Hagar Ben-Asher -- about a teenage girl, living in Arad, who discovers that her mother has suddenly left her. The girl begins to break into apartments to obtain money in order to pay the rent and to buy a motor scooter.  Things become weird when she uses the money to pay for a hotel room by the Dead Sea in order to attract a visiting German geologist.  It is too bad that the film suffers from a lack of depth and little character development, and therefore I would not put this on my list of recommended films.

Sentimental Comedy

From the trailer, you might think that Maktub, directed by Oded Raz, is a low-brow comedy about crime and violence.  But surprisingly, it is a sentimental story about good deeds and helping make people’s wishes come true!

Our two main characters are thugs who make a living collecting protection money from Jerusalem restaurants.  After surviving a life-transforming event, they decide to change their lives and do good deeds, helping grant people their wishes.  They set out to read the notes that people put into the Kotel (Western Wall), and then to figure out how to help them.  They put on a fancy bar mitzvah party for a single Russian Mom who can’t otherwise afford it.  They help a fellow put sparks back into his marriage.  And they help a woman who is having trouble getting pregnant. 

The film draws attention to so many issues in our contemporary world, including immigrants, cross-dressers, underworld criminals, chef restaurants, parental responsibility and lingering superstition. 

Our two main characters (played by Guy Amir and Hanan Savyon) are not the sharpest knives in the drawer, but they are loyal friends, sentimental, and good-hearted.  As Sephardi stereotypes, they sprinkle their vocabulary with a lot of Arabic slang.  The title of the film, “maktub”, means "fate".  We can interpret it to mean that it was fate or destiny that the people who put prayers into the Kotel would be helped by these two guys!!

Maktub is entertaining, and the violence is over-the-top, making it mostly not realistic (which is certainly preferable!). I certainly enjoyed this film!

Defense Files

Are you a late night fan of Law and Order -- trying to unravel the complexities of society through understanding its criminal element? 

This year's Israeli TV documentary series, Defense Files, is better than drama and better than reality TV -- it provides a fascinating and realistic glimpse into the world of the criminal justice system and a look at the challenges facing Israeli society today.  It also helps the viewer to understand the world of the public defender's office -- where the uniquely motivated lawyers are trying to help people who come from diverse backgrounds, some of whom have been wrongfully accused and others have made serious mistakes. 

Six Episodes  - Money, Women, Youth, Death, Rehab, Family

Youth -- The public defenders are working to help young people turn their lives around.  These are young people from difficult backgrounds.  Galina is a teenage girl, quick to anger, incriminated in a stabbing.  The public defender is impressive in his attempts to understand what's behind her anger.  Maor is a young man, already imprisoned, who talks about the temptations of crime and the risks of returning to crime when he is released.  David is part of a gang of soccer fans which beats up Arabs.  He already has seven indictments for attacking Arabs.  He explains how becoming religious and studying Talmud has calmed him down. 

Death -- Valentin lost control of his car and kills a pedestrian and seriously injures a second person.  Mama is an African immigrant, accused of negligence in the case of the death of a baby in a toddler nursery.   David, a tractor driver, is charged with negligent homicide in an accident in which a Romanian construction worker was killed.

Each episode explores three difficult cases, including the lawyer's meetings with the client and family, meetings with the judge, exploring different options for defense, the verdict and sometimes the appeal.  Produced in a minimalist yet realistic style, this series, directed by Moish Goldberg, is comprised of six documentary episodes, 35 minutes each.  

Defense Files is available from Go2Films.

A Tragic Side of Israeli Society

David Ben Gurion said that he dreamed of Israel becoming a normal nation like other nations -- with crime and prostitution.  No worries there -- we have become entirely normalized!  Liat Mer's documentary, Locked Down, provides a glimpse at life in a woman's prison in central Israel, Neve Tirza, which houses 200 inmates. 

 

Having viewed the TV series Orange is the New Black, I expected this film to include cruelty, exploitation and violence, and I hesitated before previewing it.  But none of that is seen here.  In fact, the opposite is true.  We see a prison where the young women are treated well, where they have a lot of their own personal possessions in their cells, and where getting an education is a primary objective.  The education officer, guards, and warden all seem compassionate and define their jobs as not necessarily relating to the crimes that these women have committed but rather to how they can help them in their lives in the prison and in adapting to the outside world after they are released. 

The film focuses on three young women.  The first is a lesbian woman who has taken a new name for her new identity.  She now calls herself Shawn.  She has been sentenced to two years for assault.  Shawn is a beautiful singer,  works serving food to the other inmates, and helps in the education wing.  Her only desire is to obtain early parole.  Maria has been sentenced to four and a half years for violently stabbing a girl who had threatened her grandmother.  She has an infant who lives with her in her cell.  As the baby grows, it's not so easy for Maria to come to grips with the fact that it isn't in the child's best interest to be brought up behind bars.  Nariman has been sentenced to three years and has to pay 10,000 NIS as part of the verdict.  She is trying to raise the money by telephone chatting with men from another prison.  

These young women have charm and want nothing more than to get on with their lives.  We learn about their daily concerns  -- dieting, paying for phone cards, wondering when they will have visits, worrying about the parole board and dreaming about their future.  At the same time, we are able to see another side of Israeli society -- a side that isn't written about so often, but is tragic nonetheless -- a powerful look at the ethnic diversity and the difficulties of life for young women who have gotten off to a bad start. 

Locked Down (documentary, 56 minutes)  is available from Ruth Diskin Films.

Sweets by Joseph Pitchhadze is a satire about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict

Sweets, directed by Joseph Pitchhadze, opened this week in movie theaters in Israel.  It is an intriguing satire about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.   Pichhadze offers a unique perspective in his analysis and portrayal of the spiraling violence between Israelis and Palestinians -- in this case, over nothing more than greed.  

Sallah (Makram Khoury) is an Arab Christian entrepreneur who is opening a new chain of candy stores in the Arab sector. His associate is a Jewish man, his wife is Russian, and his business partner is German with a French girlfriend (a statement about the fact that the conflict takes place in a multi-national reality).   When Klausner, the powerful Israeli tycoon who monopolizes the candy market, finds out about Sallah's plans, he compares Sallah's encroachment upon his turf to Hitler's destruction of Jews and Jewish life, as if a business struggle is an attack culturally and politically on Zionism itself.  As he works himself into a crazy frenzy, he hires a mafia hit man to "handle" the matter.  Things quickly spiral out of control, as they  escalate from the burning of the new store in East Jerusalem to the bombing of Sallah's car, and more.

The film includes a wide array of quirky characters.   For example, the Israelis in the film are violent, manipulative, and destructive.  Yet, there is a wonderful scene in which the hit man (Moni Moshonov) goes to the shiny, new candy store and he takes a moment to suck on a stick of candy before destroying the place!  I found Sallah's associate (Menashe Noy) to be the most compelling character -- a Jewish Israeli man who beautifully serenades his friends with Russian ballads in Hebrew, and interestingly enough, works so closely with an Arab businessman that he has almost become part of his family.  He is the epitome of the Israeli who cannot find his place within Israeli society because he is sensitive, modest, loves romance, and more than anything else, is somewhat crippled.  Obviously, people with physical handicaps have no place within normative Israeli society. 

The city of Jerusalem is the setting for this film.  Shot on location with the hills surrounding Ein Kerem as the background for many of the scenes, Sweets includes extraordinary and stylized sets, quirky characters, and a complex narrative which offers a metaphorical look at the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.  There is a heavy emphasis on good food, delicious baked goods, and sucking candy -- all a symbol for both Israelis and Palestinians wanting to just live a normal life.  But, it is obviously not meant to be.

Joseph Pitchhadze's previous films include: Year Zero (2004), Besame Mucho (2000) and Under Western Eyes (1996). 

• Besame Mucho -- winner of the Wolgin Award for Best Israeli Feature film at the Jerusalem Film Festival (2000).  Named for the Spanish love song, the film is a story about gangsters in pursuit of a valuable stolen religious icon.  It is also a passionate love story, love that cannot withstand the pressures of the world of crime.  Utilizing elements of film noir, the film is a humorous takeoff on Tarantino's Pulp Fiction, as can be seen in the film's neatly complex and interwoven plot, the lovable criminals and hit men, and the clear visual and script references.
• Under Western Eyes  - winner of the Ecumenical Jury Prize for best feature film at the Berlin Film Festival (1997) and winner of the Wolgin Award for Best Israeli Feature Film at the Jerusalem Film Festival (1996).  The film is a combination road movie and detective story.  Using slow and measured pacing, it includes remarkable photography and beautiful desert scenery.  Gary is a young man, an architect, living in Berlin.  His father, who was imprisoned 20 years ago for spying for the Soviets against Israel, has escaped from the prison hospital.  Two detectives, obsessed with the case, send Gary a phony fax saying that his father has died, in order to coax him to come to Israel, and convince him to cooperate in finding the escaped convict. 

Ajami

It was a big disappointment last night that Ajami (directed by Scandar Copti and Yaron Shani) did not win the Oscar for Best Foreign Film. The film reflects the story of a neighborhood filled with tension and crime. Perhaps some background would be helpful, especially since the neighborhood of Ajami has been in the news in Israel quite a bit lately not only because of the film and its Oscar nomination.

My eldest daughter works in the field of planning and has been involved in issues having to do with Jaffa, specifically the crumbling neighborhood of Ajami. In a conversation this past weekend, she explained that planning decisions have been made over the years that have led to Ajami becoming one of Israel's worst slums. Take a Palestinian neighborhood, add Jewish immigrants into the mix, neglect the area and forget long-term planning.

Since this neighborhood is right on the coast, it was historically developed with a very important connection to the water. Over the years, however, a huge garbage dump and land fill was created on the Ajami beaches – a comment on how the neighborhood was viewed.

In recent years, as new immigrants moved out and some Palestinian families left, a process of gentrification began. Here in particular, it was a controversial process because gentrification was raising property values and today the locals can barely continue to afford to live here.

On top of all of this, Jaffa has been in the headlines also because of police brutality coincidentally against relatives of the now renowned Palestinian filmmaker. In addition, extremist Jewish religious groups are moving into the area in a publicly stated goal of transforming the mixed Arab-Jewish town into a solely Jewish town. This practice is a form of incitement which is supported by many in the establishment, as witnessed by a recent court ruling in favor of one of these groups buying and developing property for an Orthodox Jewish community on the edge of Ajami.

Ajami and Jaffa - Two new features about Jews and Arabs in Jaffa

Two new feature films premiered this week at the Jerusalem Film Festival which portray the intersection of life between Arabs and Jews in the working class neighborhood of Jaffa. The films are Ajami (directed by Scandar Copti and Yaron Shani) and Jaffa (directed by Keren Yedaya).

Ajami (2009), by Scandar Copti and Yaron Shani (who also jointly edited and wrote the script), is an excellent film about the meeting place between different worlds, between the Palestinians of Israel and the Palestinians of the West Bank, and within Israel – between Christians and Muslims, between Jews and Arabs, and between Bedouin and local Arabs.

According to the filmmakers, who spoke at the premiere event at the Jerusalem Film Festival, the film was 7 years in the making and was purposefully made with a non-professional cast. But you wouldn't know it. The film, which won Special Mention at Cannes, is a fast-paced, very hard-hitting film and seems professional in every sense of the word. The amazingly authentic story is about crime, drugs, and the violence and desperation of life in the Ajami neighborhood of Jaffa.

The story moves back and forth in time (a la Pulp Fiction). 13-year-old Nasri and his older brother Omar are thrust into the fears and realities of life after their uncle shoots a Bedouin from a large clan in the Negev, who had been demanding protection money. Malek, a 16-year-old Palestinian from the West Bank, is working illegally in Jaffa in order to raise money for his mother's medical treatment. Binj (Scandar Copti) is planning on moving into an apartment with his Jewish girlfriend. Dando, a Jewish policeman, is helping his family in the search for his younger brother, a soldier who has gone missing. The stories all intertwine as the tension builds and the motivations that influence these people become clear.

The film is available from Inosan Productions Ltd., office@inosan.co.il

Jaffa (by Keren Yedaya) is a film about forbidden love between Arab and Jew and about a dysfunctional family. At the premiere screening at the Jerusalem Film Festival, film director Keren Yedaya said: "I wanted to create a dialogue – a human, aesthetic, family dialogue."

The narrative unfolds in the family garage in Jaffa, where Mali (Dana Ivgi), the daughter of the garage owner, falls in love with Tawfik (Mahmud Shalaby) one of the skilled workers. The dysfunctional family is humorously characterized by Mali's mother (Ronit Elkabetz), who plays a sexy and bitter middle-aged mother.

The film is available from Transfax Film, at sales@transfax.co.il