Foxtrot

The theme 'war is absurd' has become a cliché that tests the creativity of many a filmmaker. How many ways can you represent the random chaos of shattered lives and senseless destruction? The emotional rollercoaster Foxtrot (2017) hits the high-watermark in originality for the way it deploys grief, social critique, and absurdism to show a different side of war.

The film's four acts defy the conventions of linear storytelling. In the opening seconds, a mother (Sara Adler) sees three soldiers at the door and before they can speak she collapses to the ground. With military precision, the doctor among them administers sedation and tells the father (Lior Askhkenazi) she will sleep for five hours; that's usual, they say. When a son has fallen in the line of duty they expect the father to cope. They leave; another comes to plan just another funeral; then alone, the father furiously paces like a caged beast, crushed by his own emotions. In five hours they return with totally different news.

That plotline alone could fill a movie, but it is merely the first step of an absurdist dance with chaos that goes forward, across, back, then returns to the beginning. In the second act we meet the very much alive son Jonathan (Yonaton Shiray) who is stationed on an isolated checkpoint where the only intruders are camels that have trained the guards to open the boom-gate to let them pass. Bored out of their minds, the four teenage warriors tell each other stories, punctuated by Jonathan's memorable foxtrot dance with his rifle as partner. The third and final acts complete this case study of random chaos; they include a scene one year later where the mother and father commiserate a tragedy and a dissolving marriage. The final seconds of the film match the opening in the way they erupt with the unexpected.

Undoubtedly, this film is anchored by the first 45 minutes in which Lior Askhkenazi gives a tour-de-force performance of going to hell and back. It is also a forensic satire that is beyond war clichés and that has infuriated the Israeli Military establishment. So much is being said in this film, with so few words spent. Small moments are jarring: like a father being told casually that his fallen son was promoted posthumously, as if he is worth more dead than alive, or the mechanically detailed way the military deals with death and bereavement. The camerawork and colour palette superbly set the mood of each act, and the asymmetry of the narrative reflects an alternative and absurdist universe in which war is normalised.

This is powerful cinema, the kind that can sweep you up with its characters, emotions, and story. Then, at the end of the film when the dance is done, you are left in disbelief at the banality of humanity. Watch for Foxtrotin Best Foreign Film award.

Greetings again from the darkness. The most dreaded knock on the door. Every parent or spouse of someone who has served their country during war time fully understands that indescribable feeling of opening the door and seeing uniformed soldiers waiting to deliver the worst possible news. That knock is how Israeli writer/director Samuel Maoz (LEBANON, 2009) chooses to open his film. Knowing her son Daniel is dead sends Daphna (Sarah Adler) into hysterics, and the experienced messengers know to administer something to help her relax and sleep. Her husband Michael (Lior Ashkenazi, FOOTNOTE) stands stunned, mostly unable to respond.

What follows is one of the most stunning first Act performances we've seen on the big screen. That is not hyperbole. Mr. Ashkenazi is remarkable over the first approximately 20 minutes as a parent in shock, experiencing devastating grief. The news is debilitating to his physical and mental being. Additionally, the filmmaking during this segment is quite something to behold. The close-ups add a heavy dose of humanity, while the terrific overhead camera angle presents Michael as trapped, while also adding to the disorientation that is so key. The one-hour alarm set to remind him to "drink some water" would be humorous if not for the fact that its structure prevents the man from totally breaking down.

The second Act takes us away from Daphna's and Michael's contemporary Tel Aviv apartment and plops us into a remote military outpost where 4 young soldiers are charged with guarding a road passage. Thanks to this boring assignment, the young men find ways of adding interest to their days: timing canned goods that roll down the ever-increasing slope of their sinking-in-the-muck domicile container, raising the bar for the periodic camel that lopes by, and giving the rare passers-by a bit of a hard time as their ID's are checked. 'Of course, this is war territory, so when something goes wrong, it goes terribly and horrifically wrong.

Our final Act takes us back to the original apartment as Michael, Daphna and their daughter are working to reconcile their feelings and somehow re-assemble the pieces of their shattered lives ... though the shifts from that heartbreaking first Act are what sets the script apart from so many movies. Cinematographer Giora Bejach continues the exemplary camera work during this curious segment that leaves us feeling somewhat uncertain at first.

This family is stuck in the war that never ends. Like so many in the area, they carry burdens, guilt and grief that, like the war, also never ends. That first Act is transcendent filmmaking and acting, and the three acts work together as a prime example of the melding of visual and emotional storytelling. Most of the film takes place in one of two locales, and it's the subtleties in each shot that tell us what we must know. And yes, the foxtrot dance does play a role, but like most of this film, it's best discovered on your own.

I am not sure why, but there's just something about this movie that brings warmth to my heart. I can't say that there's something inherently unique about its message, but the way that it communicated it really resonated with me. There is no evil in this film that causes pain to characters but rather just unfortunate events. And it's not someone's fault too. I think that this is a movie about the unnecessary suffering that we all have to live through. This message is often delivered with unnecessary pretentiousness and I was happy to feel none in this film.

There were a couple of lines that felt unnecessary, but it is because the whole movie is quite subtle and communicates a lot without words so these lines felt out of place.

The cinematography is also great, although it is not something I often draw attention to. Oh, and the acting is absolutely stellar, especially one of the father, I couldn't take my eyes off his performance.

I am upset that nobody I know saw this movie but I sure will recommend it to as many people as possible from now on so it gets credit it deserves.

This highly acclaimed drama from Israel is a thoughtful and deep reflection on how we perceive of the scars that grief and guilt can leave on us. The film follows a patriarch and his wife who are told at the beginning of the film by Israeli army officers that their son was killed in the line of duty. These two parents begin to embark on a seemingly hellish grieving process...for the first 30 minutes. I won't give away what happens next, but the film ends up taking a variety of unique twists and turns through three distinct parts similar to that of a triptych-style narrative. It's not quite what you think it is, that's for sure.

The acting in the film is consistently excellent, particularly the performance of the father. He manages to engage the audience in his seething feelings of sadness and an almost-primal sensation of rage, while still feeling uniquely down-to-earth and relatable. This is an almost impossible trick to pull off. Samuel Maoz clearly knows how to write thoughtful analysis of the society and people of Israel, with a clockwork level of precision--and props to him for that. The pacing in the film's three acts, however, could have been improved and can feel somewhat erratic in the movie's second half. Additionally, the finale of the movie is done in a somewhat peculiar manner that falls a bit short of what would most satisfy the viewer in terms of wrapping up the story. Still, I definitely recommend "Foxtrot" to those interested and thought this was quite a well-made film at the end of the day. 7.5/10

'Foxtrot' begins with a woman, Dafna (Sarah Adler), opening her front door, seeing who is on the doorstep and immediately fainting. Moments later her husband Michael (Lior Ashkenazi, possibly Israel's busiest actor) is told by three members of the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) that his and Dafna's son Jonathan has been killed on military service. The IDF take over everything, arranging the funeral, dispensing sedatives to Dafna and setting alarms on Michael's telephone to remind him to drink every hour. Then the scene shifts and we are at Jonathan's lonely desert outpost, where the soldiers - when not sleeping and eating in a slowly-sinking shipping container - man a grubby checkpoint used most regularly by an unaccompanied camel. A final scene change brings us back to Dafna and Michael on what would have been Jonathan's twentieth birthday.

I found the middle and final segments the most interesting: although not a lot happens at the checkpoint, the segment set there is an interesting study on how boys from comfortable middle-class backgrounds cope when handed guns and forced to live in squalor. The bereaved parents' conversation in the third segment, in which we see how their loss has affected their relationship, is terribly bittersweet. By contrast, the first segment has a curiously episodic feel to it that may be intended to convey how Michael stumbles through the hours immediately after learning of his son's death, but I found rather jarring. On the whole, though, this slow-moving film is well worth watching.