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The state of Israel often makes front page news, and not in a good way. But as many Glbt people are finding out, there's another side to life in the Holy Land.

Over the past two decades, the Israeli Parliament quietly passed a number of pieces of federal pro-gay legislation. The gay ban on serving in Israel's military is long gone. Employment and housing discrimination protections were also implemented, gay couples can now inherit from one another, and be named as beneficiaries on each other's insurance policies.

The biggest surprise came not long ago, when Israel began recognizing the legal marriages of its gay citizens. Gay Israelis can now marry in South Africa, Spain, or anywhere else where gay marriage is legal, and return home as a fully married couple, with all the rights and responsibilities that marriage entails.

Additionally the tropical, beachfront city of Tel Aviv has emerged as...

The Miami Gay & Lesbian Film Festival kicks off tomorrow with a screening of Ella Lemhagen’s Swedish comedy Patrik, Age 1.5, in which a gay couple discover that their newly adopted "baby" is actually a 15-year-old anti-gay juvenile delinquent. Among the other films scheduled at the festival, which runs until May 3, are: Yair Hochner’s quirky romantic comedy Antarctica (above, top photo), in which several gay men and a couple of lesbians try to sort out their entangled romantic lives in bustling Tel Aviv — all that while awaiting for aliens to land in the city. Valdis Óskarsdóttir’s Icelandic comedy Country Wedding (above, lower photo), about several individuals with various personal secrets who gather for an out-of-town wedding. Jacqui Morris‘ British romantic comedy Mr. Right, which follows three London gay couples and their emotional ups and downs. Martin Weisz’s Grimm Love (neither romantic nor a comedy), based on the real...

There's a lot going on in the gay sex romp "Antarctica," and that's not good.

The setting is Tel Aviv, where librarian Omer is depressed because he is about to turn 30 and has yet to meet Mr. Right. He has a series of one-night stands with guys, but nothing meaningful comes of them.

His sister, meanwhile, calls off her marriage (to a man) to pursue a lesbian relationship with her boss at a trendy coffeehouse.

"Antarctica" director-writer Yair Hochner would have been wise to confine himself to these two story lines,...

by Michael Koresky (November 14, 2008) [An indieWIRE review from Reverse Shot.]

One can't accuse director Yair Hochner of not giving his target audiences what we want: in the opening fifteen minutes of the Israeli filmmaker's ensemble dramedy of hook-ups and hang-ups among a small group of gay men in Tel Aviv, he fills the screen with all manner of groping titillation. As one eye-catcher (Ofer Regirer) plows through a succession of one-night-stands, Hochner dissects the screen into boxes, temporally overlapping one another, allowing for a flurry of casual indulgence; there's no music to accompany this man's seemingly endless dalliances, just heavy breathing and the occasional clipped conversation.

by indieWIRE (November 12, 2008) Director Yair Hochner's "Antarctica" is set in Tel Aviv and centers on an interconnected group of friends and their various relationships. At the crux is the adorably bookish Omer, about to turn 30, who still hasn't found himself, and his free-spirited best friend Miki, who both end up inadvertently dating the same handsome journalist, Ronen. Frozen in place, they and their assorted family members and lovers all seek the same thing--a guiding light to show them that love is still out there. Regent Releasing opens "Antarctica" in Los Angeles Friday, November 14 with other cities to follow.