FILM REVIEW: 24 DAYS By: Faiz No comments

Ruth (Zabou Breitman) in 24 Days.

Poor Jew

By Ed Rampell

Director Alexandre Arcady’s taut, suspenseful new film, 24 Days, is like the similarly monikered now-defunct Fox TV series, 24, in that it deals with torture within a set period of time.

However, 24 Days is based on a real life tragedy: The January 2006 abduction in Paris of French Jew Ilan Halimi (portrayed by Syrus Shahidi), a cell phone salesman of Morrocan ancestry. Arcady shares the screenwriting credits with Antoine Lacomblez and Emilie Freche, who co-wrote with Ruth Halimi (played by Zabou Breitman in the movie) a book called 24 Days, The Truth on Ilan Halimi’s Death.

Using a very realistic style, Arcady’s probing camera takes us inside the kidnapping, from Sub-Saharan Africa to France. In addition to being a policier, 24 Days is also an intense family drama. The Halimis seem like a very close knit family, although Ruth (Zabou Breitman) and Didier Halimi (Pascal Elbe) are actually divorced, which adds to the already considerable amount of tension. This leads towards the acting being occasionally overwrought in a few scenes: How many crying babies and screaming sisters, mother, etc., can a viewer stand?

The film is gripping with a political subtext and reminiscent of Costa-Gavras. 24 Days implies that the bungling police were extremely incompetent in carrying out their investigation and attempts to rescue Halimi. Most importantly, the movie explores the big question as to whether Ilan's kidnapping and abuse while being held prisoner was an act of anti-Semitism? The authorities try long and hard to deny this -- but others thought differently, including Ruth.

Arcady has a North-African background similar to Ilan's -- the director was born in Algeria and is also Jewish. He moved from Algiers to France when he was 15 and many of his movies have focused on Jewish issues and subjects, hence his interest in l’affaire Halimi. However, if 24 Days is indeed asserting that Ilan's hijacking was because of anti-Semitism, Arcady’s dramatization does not make a very convincing, strong case.

In terms of motive, there is only a very quick specific Islamicist reference and the inept kidnappers appear to be acting more on the basis of greed than on hatred per se for Jews. Yes, they targeted Ilan because he was Jewish, but not out of contempt for the Chosen People, but due to their foolish belief that all Jews are rich. So while Ilan's abductors did indeed act under the impression of a false stereotype of Jews, they did not seem to be motivated by a deep seated hatred per se of Jews, unlike inquisitors, Nazis, Islamicist extremists and other fanatics since Biblical days. The movie does not suggest that overzealous Zionist militaristic policies vis-à-vis the  Palestinians and the like provoked the body snatchers. They just wanted to make a fast, easy buck but stupidly chose a wrong target because they ignorantly believed an incorrect, idiotic caricature of Jews.

Of course, France has a history of persecution of the Jews, notably the notorious Dreyfus affair and the roundup of Jews and collaboration with the Nazis during the German occupation and the Holocaust.  As said, the Ilan events played out in 2006 and they indicate the ongoing precarious position of French Jews -- and, perhaps, of members of this long despised minority group everywhere. The resulting roundup of alleged abductors -- mostly or all non-white, in French ghettoes -- can also be seen in a different context in 2015.
 

 

 

THEATER REVIEW: NEW JERUSALEM By: Faiz No comments

Baruch Spinoza (Marco Naggar) and  Clara van den Enden (Kate Huffman) in New Jerusalem. Photo by Hope Burleigh.

A rationalist strategy

By Ed Rampell

The censorial impulse has always been with us, from the Spanish Inquisition to the Salem Witch Trials to Peter Zenger’s trial to the post-World War I Palmer Raids to the Scopes Monkey Trial to the Stalinist Moscow Show Trials to the House Un-American Activities/McCarthy Era purges, and so on. Throughout history the “heretic,” the “apostate,” the free thinker, the non-conformist, has often faced persecution by orthodox defenders of the established order who fear the status quo is being threatened by new, different ideas. David Ives’ New Jerusalem takes a searing look at an archetypal seer facing excommunication by no less than two powers that be.

Philosopher Baruch Spinoza (Marco Naggar) was born in 1632 in the Dutch Republic of Amsterdam, where his family had fled from Portugal, with its inquisition and forced conversions of Jews. What is now Holland has long enjoyed a reputation for the kind of tolerance which Spinoza preached, and Amsterdam, of course, is where Anne Frank’s family sought refuge from fascism’s gathering deluge 400 years later. While the Netherlands granted these Sephardic wandering Jews more liberty than the auto-de-fes of Portugal and Spain, Amsterdam’s Jewish population experienced what’s been called a sort of second class citizenship, not unlike what blacks encountered in the segregated South.

Spinoza sprang out of this social milieu, and by the time he was 23 evolved a “heretical” philosophy that challenged the precepts of the Old and New Testaments. In a nutshell, Spinoza argued in favor of logic and rational thought against superstition and was a major Enlightenment theorist. Not surprisingly, the dominant majority Christian culture seemed to feel jeopardized by Spinoza’s radical precepts. Spinoza posed a double-edged dilemma for Amsterdam’s Jewry (or at least its establishment) which felt not only ideologically endangered, but, as a minority, perceived its tenuous position in a foreign land was being imperiled by what the majority viewed as apostasy coming from the strangers in their midst. Dutch Jews, or at least their leaders, felt like they were between the proverbial rock and hard place.

This is the stuff that makes for heady drama: The clash of ideas plus a trial, which is inherently confrontational, generating the conflict tragedies thrive on. Some, however, may find the play to be talky, especially act one, with its exposition; act two moves at a brisker pace. Jerome Lawrence and Robert Edwin Lee’s similarly themed 1955 play about a teacher of evolution being put on trial, Inherit the Wind, was filmed four times, most memorably in 1960 by Stanley Kramer. But alas, poor 23-year-old Spinoza had no Spencer Tracy/Clarence Darrow type character defending him.

Perceived as a sort of witch doctor, Spinoza needs a spin doctor to defend him as he debates Amsterdam’s chief rabbi, Saul Levi Mortera (Richard Fancy), and Gaspar Rodrigues Ben Israel (Shelly Kurtz), a parnas (president or trustee) of the congregation of Talmud Torah.  Spinoza’s expulsion hearing of took place there, in Amsterdam’s foremost synagogue, in July 1656. Amsterdam regent Abraham van Valkenburgh (Tony Pasqualini) observes -- if not presides over -- the proceedings to determine whether or not Spinoza should be forever banished by the Jews with a kherem (somewhat similar to an Islamic fatwa).

Unlike the Scopes Monkey Trial, which was actually broadcast on live radio during the 1920s, little remains of the record of the actual inquiry (although the chilling verdict remains). Having no trial transcripts, the playwright conjures up dialogue and the action of various characters, who spy on and testify against Spinoza, including his Dutch friend, the painter Simon de Vries (Todd Cattell), his half-sister, Rebekah (Brenda Davidson) and a female friend who Spinoza seems sweet on but can’t properly woo because she’s Christian. Conflicted Clara van den Enden (Kate Huffman) valiantly tries to defend the thinker.

The ensemble acting is adroitly, tautly directed by Elina de Santos. The sparring between the philosopher and his interrogators, especially the rabbi, is electric. Sparks fly as an anguished Mortera faces off against his former pupil, while Kurtz’s parnas likewise delivers a bravura performance. The rabbi’s philosophical conclusions in the face of his ex-student’s reasoning is surprising -- and quite troubling: Spinoza must be expelled not because he lies, and is wrong, but because he tells the truth and is right. So the victims of expulsion go on to practice expulsion themselves.

Naggar’s prophet outcast alternately comes across as priggish, smug, self-absorbed, self-righteous, brilliant and brashly hubristic in that youthful, exuberant way. Naggar hails from Geneva, the Swiss city with a long human rights history that’s currently celebrating the birth there of another of the Age of Reason’s top philosophes, Jean-Jacques Rousseau. As the Jewish leaders, a bearded Fancy and Kurtz (a Yeshiva University grad!) are also standouts, delivering Ives’ zingers with gusto and angst, as their characters whine on about Spinoza’s temerity in thinking for himself.

Stephanie Kerley Schwartz’s set is spot on, creating a sense of being in a Jewish temple with Sephardic roots, where most if not all of the action takes place. However, Schwartz’s modern dress costuming presented a conundrum for this reviewer. On the one hand, this breaks the illusion of the fourth wall. Theatre, film, TV, etc., can take spectators to another time and place, long ago and far away, but when Mr. Pasqualini’s Valkenburgh appears in a snazzy three piece suit and tie, the aud’s “willing suspension of disbelief” (as poet Samuel Coleridge put it) is shattered.

On the other hand, this contemporary aspect could be an attempt to create a Bertolt Brecht-like “alienation effect,” intended to snap viewers out of the reverie that they are seeing real life unfold before their eyes, when in fact, they are merely watching a staged rendition of reality. Therefore, spectators should assess the play as a work of art using their logic (a true Spinozan perspective!), instead of via emotions caused by empathizing with characters, the plot’s plight points, etc.

Having said that, I feel that the modern dress costuming is a blunder, and note that according to photos in a N.Y. Times review, the cast wore period costumes in a 2008 off-Broadway production of Ives’ drama. Furthermore, the current version’s own graphic likewise depicts a figure in 17^th century garb. As for authenticity, only a few experts and sticklers for absolute accuracy would demand costly costuming completely faithful to that era’s fashions. In fact, mere black robes would have served as appropriate garb for some characters.

But this is a mere quibble, and the West Coast Jewish Theatre’s production is a thought provoking evocation of the thought police -- then and now. Last year WCJT also presented the anti-Nazi plays The God of Isaac and Arthur Miller’s Broken Glass. In addition to being an ethicist, Spinoza was a lens grinder, a symbolic calling for a man who set out to make humanity see the truth, and for one finally ground down before his time. To find out why Albert Einstein said he “believe[d] in the god of Spinoza,” don’t miss New Jerusalem -- a shining city on a theatrical hill.


New Jerusalem runs through April 1 at the Pico Playhouse, 10508 W. Pico Blvd., L.A., CA 90064. For more information: Call 323/821-2449;http://www.wcjt.org/. 

FILM REVIEW: BRIDE FLIGHT By: Faiz No comments

Frank (Waldemar Torenstra) and Esther (Anna Drjver) in Bride Flight.

Thresh beholdened

By Ed Rampell

Ben Sombogaart’s Bride Flight is a highly recommended adult movie. By this, I don’t mean that it’s porn – although it does have some eroticism and a glorious nude scene. Rather, I simply mean that this foreign film has mature subject matter and is for grownups who think. Bride Flight also has a fairly complex form that requires a sustained attention span, so it’s definitely not for mall rats intent on mindless action and escapism on multiplex screens. 

As its name implies, Bride Flight is indeed about wives-to-be who fly on the so-called “Last Great Air Race” from Europe to New Zealand back in 1953, when these globe straddling jaunts were very big adventures. The passengers aboard the KLM carrier that participated in and won this real life aerial contest included 40 Dutch immigrants, mostly women seeking to escape post-WWII Holland’s hardships by starting new lives at Christchurch, where their Dutch fiancés awaited them. A pretty offbeat premise, as far as plots are concerned.

The film focuses on three women and a man on this flight that, back in the 1950s, took days to make. Frank touches the lives of the trio, and although the émigrés’ existences become intertwined in their adapted country, they go on to lead very separate lives, yet remain intimately bound. In terms of Bride Flight’s complexity, it effortlessly shifts cinematically from past to present, so the romantic saga goes back and forth from the young to the aged immigrants. The technique requires viewers to focus on the unfolding saga, the way that Alain Resnais’ circa 1960 classics Last Year at Marienbad and Hiroshima, Mon Amour likewise bent time and continuity. 

Bride Flight therefore has two actors playing each major character -- 20-somethings for the new arrivals, seniors for the present day Dutch transplants. American audiences will be most familiar with the rugged Dutch action hero Rutger Hauer (1982’s Blade Runner, 2005’s Batman Begins, this year’s Hobo With a Shotgun) who portrays Frank. Waldemar Torenstra plays young Frank. Ada has married a religious zealot and is portrayed by nubile Karina Smulders, whose smoldering sex scene with Frank lights up the screen. Pleuni Touw depicts the older Ada.

As young Marjorie, Elise Schaap’s character makes the best marriage of the trio, although life tosses her a curveball, causing her to become obsessive and possessive. Petra Laseur plays petulant Marjorie as an older and perhaps wiser lady. Probably the most interesting character is Esther (Anna Drjver), a Jew who, unlike her family members, survived the Holocaust, although its lingering, PTSD-like effects continue, understandably, to haunt Esther. 

Esther retains a strong individualistic streak and along with the jealous Marjorie, shares a “deep dark secret.” Esther is a fashion designer. (Interestingly, Drjver is actually a runway model, so talk about tailor-made casting.) While movies and TV shows heavily favor certain professions -- crime fighters, doctors, journalists, attorneys and the like -- Frank’s career path is fairly unusual for motion picture protagonists, and another sign as to what an outstandingly unusual film Bride Flight is. 

Bride Flight's location shooting in New Zealand enhances the overall production, which is handsome to behold and drink in. Like most movies set and/or shot in the South Seas, the indigenous Islanders and their Islands serve mainly as backdrop for the really important doings of the Caucasoid stars. However, in Bride Flight it’s not even New Zealand’s dominant majority culture of white people or “Pakehas” of English origin who are featured; it’s a Dutch minority.

Nevertheless, this 130-minute, partially subtitled film is an excellent, well-crafted feature for auds who prefer their movies mature. Bride Flight is a realistic slice of life, albeit in an unusual milieu. Director Sombogaart’s Twin Sisters was nominated for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar in 2004, and gazing into my crystal ball, I predict the same for Bride Flight, which has also earned some richly deserved prizes on the film festival circuit. Bride Flight, like fine wines, shows that films taste better when aged.