World Film Report Israeli: Doc Filled Month with A Film Unfinished and Doc Aviv

At this year’s Hot Docs, perhaps the most important festival in the world documentary circuit was where Yael Hersonski’s “A Film Unfinished” claimed the Best International Feature award. The film revolves around a Nazi propaganda film that was recently discovered. Back in the ghetto, the Nazis staged a fake documentary with the participation of the Jewish residents of the ghetto, trying to deceive the world, showing them all is well. Looking at the film today, Hersonski uncovers the lies the Nazis told through cinema. Unfortunately, the Sundance winner of the Editing award has yet to be screened in Israel.

Two non-Israeli documentaries dealing with Israeli issues stepped into the light this month. The Heart of Jenin tells the story of the family of a Palestinian boy who was shot and killed in the Palestinian city of Jenin. Despite their tragedy, they decide to donate their son’s organs to needed people of Palestinian and Israeli. The film (trailer) won the Best documentary award at the German film academy ceremony.

After the Cup: Sons of Sakhnin United tells of the soccer team of the village of Sakhnin, in the north of Israel. Sakhnin is essentially an Arab village, but in the soccer team, Jews and Arabs play side by side. When the soccer team won the Israeli cup, and went on to represent the country in Europe, tensions rose high. The film opened just last week in the U.S.

Dover Kosashvili’s new film is about to be unraveled (see last month report for details), but before shooting his new Israeli film, he was hired by an international production company to direct “Duel“, an adaptation of Anton Chekov’s book. That project was forgotten. Until a few weeks ago, when it suddenly emerged, at the Film Forum in New-York. I admit I was quite skeptical about this movie, but Manohla Dargis (read review) and J. Hoberman (review) think highly of this film — it seems that It’s going to be Kosashvili’s year.

Two months ago I mentioned that the Israeli film industry was in hibernation mode. Well, it seems to be waking up. The main event last month on the Israeli film scene was Doc Aviv – the annual international documentary film festival in Tel Aviv. Thirteen years ago Ilana Tzur initiated a festival dedicated to documentaries from all corners of the planet. Throughout the years the funding decreased, but the festival just kept getting bigger. In the first few years you could try to catch some unknown documentaries, hoping to fish some films that for some reason were left unnoticed by the international film scene, yet they surely deserved recognition. This year’s edition of the festival presented all the five finalists of this year’s Oscars. Galia Bador, a co-manager, was brought in by Tzur for last year’s edition, and next year she will head the festival by herself, as Tzur announced she was retiring when this year’s festival ends. Although still low on funding, Doc Aviv seems to be a success, and the variety of films is impressive. But the most interesting thing for me was always the Israeli documentaries, as this festival was always the platform for premiering the latest of whatever was made. In the next few lines I will try to summarize my impressions of the films I saw at the festival.

Mama – Bettina Faintein
A story of three sisters, ages 20-something to 30-something, who are worried about their mother after not hearing from her for quite a while. The mother seems to be this unique character, trying to catch up with her youth. In her fifties she travels with a backpack in the outback of China and Mongolia. She gets lost there, and her daughters arrange a search expedition. The movie is an unintelligent account of what could have been a moving story. The movie could do without the majority of the voice-over (it’s silly to hear her say “We’re walking in the snow” as you see them…walking in the snow), but the most puzzling editing decision was starting the movie twice. The girls go to China and start investigating, and after about 15 minutes, the movie cuts to “Tel Aviv, 6 months later”, and the end of the story is revealed. Then, the girls go on a second trip, to try and understand how that ending came about. Also, there’s not enough footage of the mother for me to get a sense of the unique character she (probably) was. A total miss-out. Such a shame.

I’m not a Phillippina – Anat Tal
A moving tale of a small blind girl, who is adopted by a woman from the Philippines, whose work visa expired, and is living in constant fear of deportation. All the little girl has is her adoptive mother, and if she is taken away, her future is bleak. The girl was born in Israel, and feels Israeli (“I’m not a Phillippina” – she says), and all she and her mother want is to stay in Israel. What could have been a raging Michael Moore kind of documentary is actually a subtle, gentle and moving film. Maybe too gentle, for it doesn’t press for tears, but even so, the girl is irresistible, and the film is a small gem.

The Electric Mind – Nadav Harel
An interesting attempt at “clearing the name” of electrical shock treatments, and washing away the stigmas associated with them. Those treatments, it seems, are quite an effective way of dealing with all sorts of psychological malfunctions, and they are not to be used on the difficult cases only. Relying on a lot of research, and interviewing many doctors and experts, this film is quite interesting. However, the film also tries to demonstrate the treatment through the stories of four or five patients, but since this is a scientific film, the human aspect is left behind, and ultimately, that left me with a sense of uneasiness.

Israel LTD – Mor Loushy
I don’t know how much of you, readers, actually know about everyday life in Israel. Some of you may think that it’s all about wars and camels (It’s only one side of the things). But “Israel LTD” is an horrifying account of the “Israeli experience”, a program designed to bring to Israel a group of 15-17 year old Jewish Americans, for a month of touring the country (mainly the borders), and feeding them with war stories about the Israeli heroes and the bad Arabs. There’s even light military training involved. The movie mostly stays out of the characters’ ways, for the Israel that is sold to these impressionable youngsters is so one-sided and different from what I know. And I’m an Israeli too. The movie premiered at this year’s Doc Aviv, and will now begin its’ international film festival tour. Go and see it if you can, and try to keep in mind that the picture you see is not the whole picture, though some might want you to think just that.

Schund – Yael Leibovitz Zand

Not a documentary, but a mocumentary. A fictitious tale of a Yiddish theater actor who wanted to avoid the “schund”, the low form of entertainment, and try to create meaningful plays, and even political plays. In Yiddish. And when that didn’t work out, he stole some money, and disappeared. Many real Yiddish actors are interviewed in this piece, and mostly it’s a cute and lovely movie. However, when the hoax is revealed in the end, it’s like someone is laughing at you, pulling your pants down and saying: “got you”. There are enough real life interesting characters (alive and dead) in the Yiddish theater business to make films about, and in the process telling of the world of this special genre. Making a mocumentary about it seems redundant.

Teacher Irena – Itamar Chen
I was quite lucky. The last film I saw in the festival is also the best. “Teacher Irena” tells of…teacher Irena, an extremely charismatic woman, who has only one thing in her life – an enormous amount of love for the children. A single parent, all she ever does, inside the school, and outside of school hours, is take care of the kids, coming from different backgrounds, and different social status. A moving film about an extraordinary woman.