Ahava Colombianit

Three men here:

The first represents the unconscious mind, he is searching for "true love", sleepwalking and bumping around with the society's definition and conventions of the term.

The second represents the subconscious mind, the first one to get married, the man of "action", who has an awareness of something being off but can't put his finger to it... until he discovers marijuana.

The third represents the conscious mind, the main lead of the story, who is hooked with his perfect match from the start. Yet there is a problem. Being a conceptual guy, he is shackled to a bad concept that he can't seem to get rid off because you can't "think" your way out of a problem. Finally, in the end, he has an experience that helps him to unlearn the bad concept and forces him into an action of freedom.

I believe that for the foreign viewer the new and refreshing thing about this Israeli movie is how non-serious it is. There are no war-and-peace dramas, and no religious or spiritual pretensions in this movie. Yet, the Israeli viewer should not be surprised at all. There is life on-going in Israel despite the permanent state of tension, people love, quarrel and laugh, as in most places in the world. Moreover, the film claims descending from a least two genres quite popular in the Israeli cinema - the traditional 'burekas' character-oriented comedies in the 70s and 80s and the more recent yuppie-inspired films and TV series. Yet, 'Columbian Love' (translation of the title) tries and to a certain extent succeeds to overcome the limits and clichés of the Israeli models.

It does so however, without being too original, but borrowing from another genre popular oversees, the romantic comedy like 'Four Weddings and a Funeral'. The tone of the story telling, the light comic and especially romantic approach remind the feel-good UK and US films and succeed in many occasions to bring smiles and ... make us feel good. Yet,the stereotype character building is not completed avoided, especially in the role played by Shmil Ben Ari. The rest of the team does quite a good job. The only other actor that looks different is Miri Avital, it's not that she acts bad or lacks sex-appeal, but she behaves differently on the screen. Miri spent too many years in the US, and as a result her acting looks ... non-Israeli.

'Columbian Love' does not break any records of excellency but is still a pleasant production, no need to avoid it.

When, early on in the film,the Rabbi performs a wedding ceremony, completely stoned from smoking pot (which he misled to believe was a hand rolled cigarette) it's pretty clear that this movie is not a harsh portrait of the harsh Israeli reality but an extremely light comedy, in Hebrew.

The wedding I mentioned is a major milestone in the lives of three life-long friends: Omer (Nir Levy), an ex-army officer who has doubts about his wedding, Uri (Assi Cohen in a pretty Lukewarm performance), that re-evaluates his three and a half year relationship with Taly after she dumps him due to a Bachelor party stripper "malfunction" (just like Janet Jackson had a "wardrobe malfunction" at the Superball halftime) and Zydan (Itay Barne'a) who declares early on that "a wedding is voluntarily getting into a life imprisonment just to have sex with the guard".

Zydan starts to doubt his own theories about love that has no limits or official bonds when he reconnects with a childhood girlfriend, and now a "working girl", noga (Osnat Hakim)

Zydan, consumed by emotions that don't coincide with his philosophy, wishes to rekindle the unbridled love with a Colombian girl he knew (hence the title- Colombian love) and is about to find out that heavenly theories and reality seldom co-exist.

In the meantime, Uri (the bachelor party "malfunction" protagonist) is torn between his true love and his father who's lust for pride and "awe" (no matter how artificial) drives Uri's relationship to a brink of disaster. These fragile relationship suffer another rattle when Uri's sister, Oranit, an ex-secular who found god, makes Tali her nemesis after the latter accidentally topples her card-tower made exclusively of holy kabala related figures.

This movie, as one can clearly tell, is a light comedy that combines the Israeli-style clash of cultures and generations along with the universal "love conquers all" we all saw a movie about at one point or another.

The film is aided with a great script that only towards the end, lowers the bar for Kitsch phrases and sometimes vague statements by Zydan (the storyteller). The acting is mostly good and although the turn of events is a little too dramatic to be identified with (and commented on), the movie never loses its pacing and spirit and remains what it was destined to be, a light film dish designed to make its viewers laugh instead of being baffled or Devastated or both.

Of course, as a summer-time romantic comedy, this movie leaves very little added value once its over so greatness cannot be a matching adjective for it but it still is a hilarious film and provides 90 minutes of good, old fashioned fun. A much maligned and the most underrated movie Ganre of all.

8 out of 10 in my FilmOmeter.

This movie is very funny, has a healthy sense of humor, the kind I haven't seen in an Israeli movie. The plot is fluent and it keeps you watching (which I can't say about many Israeli films). I was happy to see that the movie had a happy ending unlike most films of the genre that end in tragedy. Overall, good actors, many of them are new to me (so I was pleasantly surprised), some already famous like Asi Cohen, which is very good here. The film has very funny situations regarding several aspects of Israeli life. Don't look for hidden meanings or a political agenda, it's just a fun movie (and a good one) that might be cult movie material. Enjoy (10/10).