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March 16, 2007
There are some nasty people
Jews fare better in neo-Nazi flick than in festival's kibbutz
opener.
CYNTHIA RAMSAY
Film festivals are supposed to offer something more than mainstream
movies. They are to provide at least a few challenging works and
the Vancouver International Jewish Film Festival (VIJFF) is no exception,
with this year's opening movie setting the stage.
Horrific kibbutz life
Perverted and mean. Judgmental and unforgiving. At best, innocent
and ineffectual. These are the types of people you'd have met on
a kibbutz in Israel in the 1970s, if Sweet Mud is any indication.
The film was Israel's entry for a foreign language Oscar and won
the jury prize at Sundance. It centres around Dvir, played with
great honesty and depth by Tomer Steinof. It's 1974 and Dvir is
almost 12 and about to enter his bar mitzvah year. When he graduates,
he'll take on the duties for which he and his peers have been training,
such as guard duty and taking care of the kibbutz's infants –
at the time, the film notes, members were "relieved from parental
duty to contribute more to the community" and kids were kept
in "children's houses."
In addition to these responsibilities, Dvir must take care of his
mentally unsound mother, who has been ill ever since his father
died some years earlier from an "accident." Dvir's older
brother, Eyal, refuses to help his mother for his own selfish (and
perhaps protective) reasons; besides, he must go away for his army
service. Dvir's grandparents – the parents of his father –
blame Miri, his mother, for their son's death and so, offer little
aid to her, although they do try and support Dvir and Eyal in their
own limited way.
At such a young age, Dvir has no mentors or even appropriate role
models - one adult has sex with his cows and purposefully and unremorsefully
kills Dvir's dog, after threatening to beat Dvir; a teacher tries
to be helpful, but she herself has no power within the community;
the head of what appears to be the kibbutz council is completely
fed up with Miri and treats the family horribly. Dvir is left to
fend for himself and does admirably, in large part because he has
a girlfriend who listens to him and helps him carry out a plan that
will eventually, perhaps, allow them both to escape.
While the land of Israel and the kibbutz is full of beauty and space,
the community itself is ugly and suffocating. The contrast is presented
well in Sweet Mud, but the overwhelming sense is oppressive,
rather than liberating. It is a heavy film that turns on its head
the ideals of kibbutz life – there are no benefits to communal
living presented here. It is a brave choice to start a Jewish film
festival.
Sweet Mud screens on Thursday, March 22, 7 p.m., at Fifth
Avenue Cinemas, and plays again on Sunday, April 1, 6:30 p.m., at
the Norman Rothstein Theatre at the Jewish Community Centre of Greater
Vancouver. It contains explicit sexual material.
Going toe to toe
Mike Downey is a neo-Nazi skinhead whose amorous foreplay in an
alley by a dumpster is interrupted by an East Indian burger joint
worker who, when dumping some dirty kitchen water out the restaurant's
back door, accidentally gets Downey's steel-toed combat boots wet.
Downey is sent into an uncontrollable rage, kicking the "Paki"
(in his words) to death. Arrested for what is considered a racially
motivated murder, Downey is to be defended by Danny Dunkelman, the
court-appointed, Jewish attorney assigned to his case.
Steel Toes is a Canadian entry in the film festival. If the
plot sounds familiar, it's because it is. Steel Toes is based
on David Gow's play Cherry Docs, which has been performed
in Vancouver on at least two occasions. It adapts well to the screen,
as Gow is a contributor. Also, Oscar nominee David Strathairn as
Danny and Andrew Walker as Mike have a good chemistry. When the
lawyer starts breaking through the skinhead's indoctrination by
"the movement," the intensity is palpable; the tears are
real.
Danny faces criticism from his Jewish friends and his wife for defending
Mike, but he carries on, inspired by his late father, who fervently
believed in tikkun olam and that the mighty should care for the
weak and the diseased, and not strike back when struck: "Somebody
has to stop the killing," says Danny's father in a flashback,
referring to the Israeli-Palestinian struggle and human conflict
in general, "and that's you and that's me. 'Thou shalt not
kill' is the basis of our entire civilization."
During the interaction with each other, a mutual respect develops
between client and lawyer. Mike becomes more certain in what he
must do to improve himself and his life, while Danny falls apart.
The student becomes the teacher, in a way, and Mike must help Danny
cope with his decisions, one result of which is that his wife leaves
him.
While Steel Toes is compelling, thought-provoking and entertaining,
there are weak moments, when dialogue sounds like just that –
a script being read. As well, the original music by Benoît
Groulx dilutes the film's impact; a slow klezmer-sounding theme
whenever Danny is in emotional crisis or observing his brethren,
Orthodox Jews, carrying about their business, seems clichéd
and smalltown for a movie dealing with such serious issues in current-day
Montreal.
Steel Toes plays Saturday, March 24, 2 p.m., and Sunday,
March 25, 9:30 p.m., at Fifth Avenue Cinemas.
The VIJFF runs from March 22 to April 1. For more information,
visit www.vijff.com.
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