Avis des utilisateurs

If a movie polarizers the audience so much as to receive such conflicting opinion, from garbage to masterpiece and winning a prestigious prize - just go see for yourself. A lot of the bad reviews here are just an expression of hurt patriotic feelings which I respect but I don't support in this setting . Art is supposed to be a point of view. But Israel is a very propagandist environment where the army is sacred and there is no other point of view accepted. there is no climate for self reflection. This movie is about being disillusioned angry and sad with what your country has become . It asks a lot of uncomfortable questions about the future of this country. It not a masterpiece but not garbage, it's thought provoking and worth considering .

Yoav (Tom Mercier) is a young Israeli man who has recently arrived in Paris with the intention of becoming a French citizen and renouncing his Israeli identity. Upon his arrival, he befriends a young couple: Emile (Quentin Dolmaire) and Caroline (Louise Chevillotte).

"Synonyms" has an enjoyable, cosmopolitan vibe. There are also some interesting scenes in which Yoav is participating in language classes that immerse new French citizens. Unfortunately, there are too many limitations in the film that diminish the viewing.

It is clear that Yoav has mental health issues but there isn't enough background given about him to help sympathize with his plight. There is also little to no information on why he hates Israel so much and wants to abandon his family. A scene between Yoav and a family member was touching but too brief.

Overall, too much in the film does not make sense. - dbamateurcritic

Film undoubtedly directed by pretentious high school students, during an internship.

Cons: 1. Yoav runs away from Israel because Israel is, I literally quote, "méchant, obscène, hideux, ... " and he arrives in Paris to work within the embassy of (guess what!) Israel. Incredible! It's moronic... 2. Yoav does not speak. Yoav yells or shouts. Constantly. Unnecessarily. Sometimes, to change, Yoav screams. It's boring... 3. Yoav impregnates himself, idly and condescendingly, from the customs and traditions of the Parisian natives to fill the void of his own life. It's depressing... 4. Yoav plays music with a machine gun, on a French song interpreted by the american band Pink Martini. It's almost funny. But no, actually. 5. Yoav is sometimes filmed with a basic camera held by a person obviously suffering from epilepsy: right, left, up, down, ... quickly and randomly. I was almost seasick. 6. ... 7. ... and so on, and so on ... 8. ...

Pros: Paris, the city. However, I live there and I may see this city everyday; then, I do not need to waste my time during two (long!) hours in a movie theater, for this kind of movie. So, finally, no positive point. Definitely!

As a synthesis, in one word: no!

Not sure what the point of the movie was. Is it displeasure w/some aspect of Israeli military service? Disgust w/Israeli political positions? Finding one's identity? An unrealistic infatuation w/French idealism to be found by becoming French? A searching for friendship or relationship? Or something else since I'm not the brightest acorn on the tree & obtuseness (although good for artsy awards) is beyond me. Anyway, lots of time just walking & talking & reading a French language dictionary. Shows the power of words, culture & language.

... leaves you under no illusion of the differing liberties that exist between two nations and their cultures in the mind of a young man fleeing Israel for France. Irregular and inconsistent, at times a tough nut to crack, although when is life anything other than that? If you need a linear melody and clarity of enunciation then this film is not for you - but who want's to waste their time being spoon fed the kind of valueless stuff the masses grow fat on. A bit of imagination and diversity is so much more wholesome.

I saw 'Synonyms' yesterday (Oct 5, 2019) at the Mill Valley Film Festival and while watching it and for short time afterward, I had no clue about what I'd seen. In short, What was the plot? I walked to my car, began the drive home, and ... POW ... a plot-wise theory came to mind.

On its face the story is one of a gay Israeli youth, come to Paris, to reinvent himself, to begin a new life. And with the help of a French couple he meets in Paris, and despite the desires of his Israeli father to return, he seems to do just that.

But that synopsis hardly takes up the film's two hours. What does encompass the rest of the time are some pretty harrowing, vaguely interesting incidents that take place, some in Paris and others in Israel. None of these incidents are more than snippets. There are no true beginnings or endings. They are there. A seemingly insane Israeli fight-picker on the Paris Metro. An Israeli Security Chief with an unorthodox interviewing style. A rainy day at Paris' Israeli Embassy. Machine gun firing in tune to piped in music. And on. And on.

And it was as I was driving home that I realized these incidents were nothing but stories our hero was imparting to the young French Couple who'd taken him in. Now I imagine that others in the audience may have understood this. But not me. It's not as though these 'stories' are book-ended by a fade-in or out, by special music or unique photo effects. In fact our hero looks and sounds precisely as he does in 'real-life' throughout these related stories. So, again, I was in the dark. But a bigger issue is this. Suppose I did understand the story-within-story construct. Would that have made the film any better. Maybe. By one star.

One more thing. The hero's penis. It's on screen a lot. Some might say more than necessary. I mean I can imagine the film with absolutely no frontal-nudity whatsoever and I would have been just as satisfied or dissatisfied. Actors today are given to saying, I'll be nude if it advances the story. Well it's tough to know how this penis does.

According to award-winning Israeli director Nadav Lapid ("The Kindergarten Teacher"), "art has the right to be chaotic and wild, to go to extreme and dangerous places." If you are looking for chaotic and wild, you need look no further than his Synonyms (Milim Nirdafot), a mystifying and often maddening film that will either leave you awestruck or looking for the nearest exit. Winner of the Golden Bear and the FIPRESCI prize at the 2019 Berlin Film Festival and Lapid's first film shot outside of Israel, Synonyms is loosely based on the director's personal experience of having left Israel for Paris after completing his mandatory military service. As he explains enigmatically, "I left Israel not because of any specific event, but due to its very existence as the embodiment and shaper of 'Israeliness,' at the collective Israeli soul, the DNA of being Israeli."

Co-written by Lapid's father Haim Lapid, the film introduces first-time actor Tom Mercier as Yoav, an Israeli ex-patriot who wants to shed his identity as a macho Israeli soldier and become immersed in French culture, one that he sees as celebrating the arts. In bondage to his heritage, Yoav carries with him the burdens of being an Israeli with its history and present day political conflicts. Paradoxically, the film does not mention the fact of the resurgence of antisemitism in France and the departure of many Jews to Israel. Ultimately, however, Yoav is no more enamored with Paris than he is with Tel Aviv, and the interchangeable synonyms he constantly repeats reflect the similarity of his experience in both cultures.

As captured by the hand-held camera of cinematographer Shai Goldman ("Doubtful"), the film opens with the view of a young man's feet walking briskly through the streets of Paris. As he enters an old building near the River Seine and opens the door to his room, there is nothing inside but empty space - no furniture of any kind. Leaving his back pack in the middle of the floor, he does what any normal person would do in a cold and empty house. He strips naked, takes a bath and begins to masturbate until he is disturbed by sounds coming from the next room. Jumping out of the bath naked, he discovers that he has been robbed of all his possessions and frenetically runs through the building knocking on doors for help but to no avail, a suggestion perhaps that Paris will not be as welcoming as he thought.

With nothing left to do to protect himself from the cold, he gets back into the tub in a state of hypothermia and awaits redemption or death whichever comes first. Yoav is jostled back to life the next morning, however, by two young neighbors, Emile (Quentin Dolmaire, "My Golden Days"), the son of a wealthy entrepreneur and a would-be writer and his partner Caroline (Louise Chevillotte, "Lover for a Day"), an accomplished oboist, poster children for the French bourgeoisie. Though Yoav is a total stranger, Emile gives him the clothes and financial support he needs to keep going.

Refusing even to speak Hebrew, Yoav is repelled by Israel calling it "evil, despicable, disgusting, odorous," among other choice adjectives he learned from his pocket-sized French dictionary. He does not even smile when Emile tells him that, "No country can be all of those things at once." Possibly suffering from PTSD, Yoav is disillusioned about what he believes to be his country's obsession with security and takes his anger out on his own body, freezing it, starving it, and prostituting it.

According to Lapid, Yoav is "banging his head against a wall called Israel. But it's also because he is banging his head against himself." His diet consists of the same dish every day, a plate of spaghetti with crushed tomatoes, the cheapest meal possible. He advertises for work as a model, but has to endure abuse at the hands of the "artist," the only one who answers his ad. He is fired from his job as a security agent for the Israeli consulate when he takes pity on a lineup of immigrant applicants who are waiting in the pouring rain. Shouting that there is "no border," Yoav allows them to enter the embassy without being processed.

Along the way, Yoav meets some fellow Israelis, but they only serve to reinforce his preconceptions. One is tasked by the embassy to create incidents in order to confront gangs of neo-Nazis, while another aggressively hums the music to the "Hatikvah" in the face of Metro travelers interested only in getting home after a day's work. Though Emile is apparently sexually attracted to Yoav, he does not act on his impulses but, instead, helps him in his desire to become a French citizen by arranging a marriage to Caroline.

In the citizenship class, Yoav has to sing "La Marseillaise" as well as the Israeli national anthem in his own language, but he goes through the motions of reciting the words without feeling or commitment. Synonyms is a polarizing film which basically mirrors Lapid's view of the Israeli army as a reflection of the nation's damaged soul. While it lacks a coherent narrative and will test your endurance, Synonyms is a unique experience which raises important questions about the nature of our identity, our ability to come to terms with who we are, and our willingness to celebrate it.

This was by far the worst movie (out of 17) that I watched at the Berlinale this year. What a shock during the prize ceremony! After 90 of its 125 minutes, I still didn't know what story it wanted to tell - only from the plot outline in the catalogue. It is an incoherent mess, pretentious, containing a few interesting scenes that lead nowhere ... In the press screening, there was a constant line of people leaving the theater.

The disproportionate quantity of 1s over 10s received by this title shows that it has achieved its purpose, which is -in my view- to expose ideologies as they are in its strongest sense. Those reviewers who have felt their world questioned have reacted as expected. I do not think that this should be taken personally by anyone, it exposes ethnocentrism an nationalism alike (present in any of us, and more in some societies). The scene of the character trying to provoke and elicit negative sentiments by wearing a kippah or telling clients in a night club "I come from Israel and I am a Jewish", only to elicit a 'so what' response, is something very frequent. I have seen this attitude very often in nationalists of different kind, who think that the rest of the world is thinking 'non stop' about them. There is a coloured beggar in my neighbourhood; I never gave him any money, so that he calls me racist every time he sees me... Regarding nudities, I can just talk about the Italian painter of the Renaissance Danielle da Volterra. He was charged by the Vatican to paint underpants in all figures appearing nude in the pictures and frescoes of Michel Angelo. He was nicknamed 'il braghetone'. Having lived in different countries, maybe I am more sensitive of some issues handled in this picture. You enter (nude) a new world only to be considered a 'lesser person' because you are not 'the same as the others'.

The lightness of the telling is beautiful. So many small cinematic touches including him practicing his french as he walks the streets. The guilt and fear felt by the people in the train. And anger felt by his friend Yaron. And what finally happens to him. The way stories are sold, without letting it feel like a sale and then given back, with generosity drying up without it feeling like it was ever a trade. That trenchcoat in the color of dijon mustard.

Lovely.

There is no need to make a movie if you have nothing to say. Because if you do, you trap a number of unfortunate people to a theatre which you transform into a torture chamber. You bombard them with incomprehensible pictures, very badly cinematographed, making no sense whatsoever. If you think that the spectators can solve a non-existing puzzle, you are mistaken. I suggest that you can try to do something else, be a photographer or a painter, but not a film maker.

I'm all about alternative, european crap. Hell that is why I watch almost everything I can get to at festivals. This has to be one of the worst movies I've watched in my life. Storyline, structure, flow, script everything is atrocious.

I am from Canada and I was out, for some years, with a newly arrived Arab immigrant. It was striking that for her first four years in the country, she was comparing the nice things she saw in her adopted country with what was missing in her native country. Then for some years, she complained about what was wrong or missing in her adopted country with what was present in her native country. Afterwards, she ceased paying attention and stopped complaining!

In this film, the protagonist, Yoav, is escaping from his native Israel, for reason of some oppression exerted on him, although we have to wonder if it were real or imaginary. Wanting to obliterate his former existence and create a new one in France, he adopts the clothes, the language, the national anthem, a French woman and the nationality as if they were sufficient to cross over. Will they be? Or isn't the issue more in the person himself, in his sense of his own identity, than in the difficulties of integrating a new country, particularly one as opened and welcoming as republican France?

The film does a competent job at exploring that problematic, although not in a Hollywood simplistic and obvious way; the viewer has to fill little gaps left intentionally for his imagination. The cast is excellent and Tom Mercier, playing Yoav, is a skilled and courageous actor. A good film!

Don't listen to all the bad reviews here from people probably pissed they had to look at a naked man. This is a brilliant, original film about the nature of identity - how much is indelible and how much is fluid? - with a blistering lead performance from Tom Mercier, who has the look and charisma of a young Tom Hardy. This is the first of Lapid's films I've seen but will look forward to seeing more.

Well filmed and with good moments (particularly harsh and precise criticism on both Israel and France), but it is too confusing, weird, with inconsistent relationships between characters.

If I had not been attending film festivals for 20 years, I might not think so harshly of this film. But all I could think is "been there, done that, and it was much better". Awful script - the main character would not know basic French vocabulary (like taureau) and then use common French expressions that you would not see on Advance language students. French characters were one-dimensional, and shared the same zombie-like acting of the main actor. Israeli characters were cartoon versions of Mossad-style psychos. This was the film equivalent of bad conceptual art.

I wanted to leave at the 30 minute mark but did not want to disturb a whole row of senior citizens out of their seats. Avoid it if you can.

First things first, especially because this kind of almost happens at the very beginning. If you are a prude, you may have issues with the nudity in the movie. Also it is male nudity, whatever that means to you or doesn't mean to you.

But the nudity (purity?) should not be a distraction from what the movie is trying to tell you. It is about someone who tries to escape - life as he knew it. The oppression he felt. Freeing himself, literally and metaphorically speaking.

It is up to you to decide if you think the movie achieves telling that story in a sense that is satisfactory - no pun intended. Drama and life happen - it is what you make of it, what you can make of it. Pacing wise this will not be everyones cup of tea either.

This movie starts out well enough with a young Israeli man arriving in Paris where he almost immediately gets into trouble. But from then on the movie becomes incredibly frustrating because not much else happens for two hours. You're just left with snippets of stories from the past and the present that eventually lead absolutely nowhere. I had heard this movie was a bit polarizing, but this is not the kind of movie I had in mind when I heard those words. When you think polarizing it's either a very hard to understand movie, or an extremely violent one, something that produces a visceral reaction. This is just a dull and empty "polarizing" movie. It's well shot and competently acted, but that's not enough.

"Synonyms" is a film that a lot viewers probably won't completely get. I didn't, since I'm not that knowledgeable about Israeli culture, and only learned more about it after seeing this movie and doing some research. But even if one can't necessarily understand the specifics, I think viewers who are willing to give this movie a chance will be able to understand the feelings behind it.

Tom Mercier gives a phenomenal and completely naked performance (figuratively and literally) as a young Israeli man trying to start a new life in France. He's caught between the macho, rigid belief systems of the country he's leaving behind and the lack of belief systems of his adopted country. You're free to be anything and do anything in France, but not really. Like anywhere, you're free if you have the money to be, and if you don't belong to a class of people who are discriminated against for one reason or another, and if, and if, and if. Mercier's character wants to get away from the Israeli commando culture that doesn't want to let him go, but by the end of the movie he's almost embracing it because at least it's a belief in something, whereas the privileged, bored, bourgeois France that he's exposed to is like a banal black hole.

There are countless moments in this film that are bizarre and perplexing, none less so than the one when he's hired by a videographer to strip naked, lay on his back with a finger up his anus, and shout out what I guess are supposed to be provocative phrases but instead come pouring out of him like a howl of rage and frustration. The scene is long and awkward and uncomfortable and so completely lays bare (pun quite intended) the vulnerability Mercier's character feels in a country that doesn't care about him, or rather only cares about what it can get out of him.

This one stuck with me for quite a while.

Grade: A

"Plumb on the very first night, he passes out in the cold and empty apartment, after his belongings are stolen when he is taking a shower, rescued by the neighbors Émile (Dolmaire), a well-off young man inspiring to be a man of letters, and his oboe-playing girlfriend Caroline (Chevillotte), the trio strikes up an amicable if blunt bond, Yoav receives monetary aid from Émile, in return, he imparts him his own life story in Israel as inspirations for the latter's literature creation, and his belated carnal knowledge with Caroline is simply icing on the cake which improbably leads to a marriage proposal and an obscure fallout."

read the full review on my blog: cinema omnivore, thanks

This film makes zero sense. This guy came from Israel, speaks only high French, talks dirty about Israel in an illogical way, all the French are amazing, he lives without money, does nothing, has no thoughts and no feelings. Still he works at the embassy of his country he hates but does nothing. All the other security people are faceless horrible people who only try to hit people. So pretentious, so useless and has no point whatsoever, except for putting Israel's image bad (with lies!!) - shockingly bad, boring. Just save your time & money and don't see this horrible film.