Kissufim

Kissufim is a remarkable film. It captures the deep complexity of growing up in a conflict-ridden zone like Israel.

The kids in Kissufim have to maneuver the same traditional coming-of-age issues of any kids in the world: love, sex, career path, how they are perceived by others in the group. But these kids have to do it while inside a warzone - with weapons, enemies, and potential danger lurking around each corner.

What struck me is that kids already have enough to worry about when they are simply trying to avoid getting whacked in the butt by a senior ("Dazed and Confused"), but to layer on the backdrop gives this story a very real-life backbone.

Solid film.

In 2023, between this movie's shoot and its release, the October 7 massacre hit Kibbutz Kissufim. The movie, already rather elegiac (being set in 1977), automatically becomes all the more so.

The movie shows us that Kibbutz Kissufim houses not only its own members but also a contingent of overseas volunteers, some soldiers, and a Nahal group. Nahal is a program combining kibbutz work with military service, and the movie focuses on the young people in that program-- played, as often happens, by actors overage for their roles.

An audience can follow only so many characters, so the problem with movies set in an environment like this is that either interactions are reduced to an artificially small number of people or the audience may lose track of who's who. The Kissufim movie tends to unfold as if most of the kibbutz doesn't exist; and although the characters are assumed to be hard at work most of the day, the movie is almost entirely about their free time.

There are knowing glimpses of the political situation and of the confusing search for love and/or casual sex, but there is no strong narrative arc to carry the movie along and (with all due respect to some fine actors) the characters are not scripted in much detail. If I'd recommend the movie for any reason, it's the photography. It's almost as if at the moment when the movie's title appears on screen, the movie says "Let's talk about width." The camera is in love with the lateral dimension of the screen and takes many opportunities to emphasize it with intriguing repetitive elements or strongly horizontal backgrounds (such as the desert horizon itself). It's when our attention is turned to talking heads that the movie becomes less interesting.

A group of young Israeli army graduates volunteer to work on a kibbutz close to the gaza border.

Most of the movie is abut the complex relationships these young people have with each other, with very different memories they have of their army service, and with the reality of being very close to a troublesome border.

Some of the movie is in English because a group of non-Jewish volunteers from Europe come to also work on the kibbutz, they don't speak Hebrew and English is the common language.

There is the development of a love relationship, there is a very angry situation of a girl friend apparently being snatched away by another man, the girl is probably the least attractive of the young women in the group and by making herself freely available to the men she gains popularity.

She is a contrast to the central "heroine" of the movie, the prettiest of the women, who is also still a virgin to everyone's surprise.

The climax of the movie comes with the reality of where they are located, and in very typical Israeli movie style, the viewer is left rather empty, it is not a "hollywood" ending with everything tidied up neatly.

Though some of the women characters come through strongly - not enough is made of them - and the male leads have so much potential for development but are under-developed.

In order to completely understand this film, a viewer needs to understand Israel. For those who do not know Israel as a real place and Israelis as real people this film should be instructive.

It is a coming-of-age film about members of a Kibbutz (communal farm) in 1977. The characters are all young adults coming home from their military duty having experienced combat. Israelis are drafted after high school with few exceptions. It should not be forgotten that Israel has existed under threat of war for its entire history.

These young people are decompressing from their combat experience and just beginning to move on with their lives. Few Americans have experienced combat and fewer still are in communities where everyone has experienced it. This is not, in that sense, like the coming-of-age films we are familiar with in this country. The film also includes women characters who are finding their identities as women.

It should be noted that Kissufim is a real place. It is one of the communities massacred on October 7 last year.