Free Zone

This is one of those really bad films. Actually there isn't too much to say. Boring script, shallow stereotypical characters and long unending scenes. "ART FILM" at its worst. Some of the camera shots were nicely made though, I have to agree. And Channa Laszlo does a good work as leading actress.

OK, now let's forget about that. Another boring film from Gitai. Nothing new. What interests me as a film-goer from Israel is the question: How come Gitai is the most successful Israeli film maker in international audiences.

There are other much more talented Israeli directors such as Avi Nesher, Dover Koshashvili, Gil Dar or Keren Yadaaia. So why Gitai? Well it is a known fact that the French and European audiences love him because of his left wing ideas. He flatters the European views on Israel and he sells himself in Europe as an Israeli dissident and exile unacknowledged or even censored by Israeli establishment for his so called radical views.

As an Israeli left winger, let me tell you. Nobody cares enough about Gitai to even bother to censor him. The truth of the matter is that if you know the Israeli reality only a bit, it becomes immediately apparent how phony and untruthful his films are. His view of Israel, the way you see it in "Free Zone" is like that of the tourist he is, coming to Israel from Paris to make a new film and watching the whole of Israeli reality condescendingly from his know-all glasses.

This is the reason why all his films fail in Israel both critically as well as in the box office. Not because of his "radical" political views. Israeli audiences can cope with criticism, but not with Gitai's packs of cliché's. It is a shame audiences in the world who don't know the situation in Israel well enough, get their impression from such phony works.

4/10

My 7 vote was for the filming, direction, and plot. For the informative value of the film, I would give it a 9. It was a bravely balanced portrayal and helped personalize my understanding of the how the structure of the conflict militates against the urge to empathize when face-to-face. It is heartrending watching antipathy being replaced with empathy and mutual assistance even while the regional conflicts continually compel opposing sides toward distrust and attack. Seeing the way the many groups are living in constant fear of lethal attacks has become the norm is heartbreaking. Each side continuing to live with a hollow hope for resolution and peace is awesome and somewhat offsets the massive human tragedy. While typical of human social psychology, it is still sad to see that even clashes within affiliates can lead to incendiary outbursts. The final scene is a terrific metaphor for the complex, dire configuration of the plight of the individual people, the American, Israeli, Palestinian, and all others in the region. Portman is to be commended for her taking the role of Rebecca in a movie that was sure to receive little acclaim.

I had seen a couple of Amos Gitai's movies and enjoyed his work specially Kadosh which was well done and based on my previous impression of him, when I came across Free Zone, I bought the DVD. However, Free Zone is a disappointing movie. No real story line, weak connection between plots, awful sound quality, long meaningless shots, primitive acting (specially by Hana Laszlo when she is milking the cows and hears the explosion and other scenes) and so many other flaws. Opening scene did not make sense and too long, closing scene was primitive as well. It seemed like maybe Gitai wanted to relay a message in this movie showing life and misery of living in that part of the world. But he failed in his effort. Special feature on the back of DVD indicates optional English subtitle. Except a few scenes that characters spoke Hebrew or Arabic, there is no subtitle. I normally watch my movies to the end for if I may miss something but was tempted to turn this off a few times. I would not recommend wasting money or time on this movie.

It would be easy to misunderstand or even miss the whole point of this movie. But if you can get past the endless opening scene of a sobbing Natalie Portman, by the end Gitai has explored three characters (with great acting performances), three women from different cultures, and three countries. I don't want to give away the end, but Gitai has managed to make a point about Israelis, Palestinians and, after some thought about his set-up of the character, especially Americans. This makes some of the slower, strained parts of the movie better, even makes them seem to fit together nicely. My grade might be a tad high, but it's rare when any movie maker pulls off character, acting, politics, and characters that well represent their different societies. For that, this movie gets a lot of credit.

I enjoyed this movie, and Im not just saying that because Im Jewish. But things that really really ticked me off was his editing technique, especially the overlapping just made me nauseous. I need to watch this movie again because I didn't understand a lot of the things. I didn't like the ending, it kind of just put me off. Overall it was a fine movie. But can someone please explain why she ran away in the last scene, like out of no where too. The credits were messed too, with the 2 women yelling at each other, it was just pointless. If this movie had better explanation of what in the world is going on, I would had enjoyed it more. I have to compliment the acting though, it was well done. Also, some of the scenes were just way to extended. This movie is worth watching. Great morality and has deep meaning, but it still could have been done a lot better, especially when your showing tragedy in the middle east.