“Love, Israeli Style” is not nearly as lighthearted as the title would have you believe.
The four short films in the program to be screened at the seventh annual Contra Costa International Jewish Film Festival run the gamut from love gone awry to love denied, parental love, sisterly love and a few varieties in between. Only one, “Snail,” a hip, funny, love-is-where-you-find-it romp through the world of video dating, is relatively free of angst. But all are interesting in their way.
“Love, Israeli Style” will be shown Wednesday, Feb. 27 at Berkeley Hillel and Tuesday, March 5 at the Contra Costa Jewish Community Center in Walnut Creek.
All the movies were made by filmmakers at the Hadassah College of Technology’s department of cinema and television production in Jerusalem.
The first and longest of the films, “Tamari’s Wedding Gown,” directed by Hana Zucker-Seltzer, tells a tale of sibling rivalry. Dafna is planning her wedding to Ofer. Her married sister, Tamari, shows up from the States, her own wedding gown in her baggage. Dafna hates the dress and, gradually, comes to feel the same way about her sister, whom she suspects of seducing her fiancé.
Meanwhile, Tamari has troubles of her own. Her husband has rejected her and kept their little daughter from her, despite frequent, pleading phone calls from Israel.
Despite the grainy, almost amateurish, quality of the cinematography, the tale of non-communication, jealousy and mistrust transcends the execution.
Lightening the mood, “Snail,” directed by Idit Fond, is next. Gili, a talk-show host (“Tranquility on the Road”), is dumped by her lover and feeling anything but tranquil. Her neighbor, Ruti, another single woman but one with an irrepressible zest for life, gets her involved in a number of man-meeting schemes, from video dating to praying at the graves of holy men. (The former results in a parade of weirdos and losers; the latter is supposed to get God to deliver a boyfriend within 40 days.)
“Snail” is a truly delightful little film, with cartoons that represent Gili’s romantic fantasies cleverly interspersed throughout. Well-made and entertaining, it may be the best of the bunch.
“yes/no/black/white,” by Hava Shir, is a touching 17-minute vignette about the gulf between a preteen girl and her religious father. It shows love of another kind, between parent and child.
Shanny Tiles’ “Questions” probably is the best-made film in the bunch. It deals with the struggle of a young religious man between his upbringing and his attraction to a secular girl. In the end, he must make a choice. It is peculiarly Israeli in its feel, with beautifully photographed views of the landscape as well as the religious community in Jerusalem, where the would-be lovers work in a bookstore. It also delineates two disparate ways of Jewish existence. An interesting movie with an Israeli, if not a Hollywood, ending.
The festival is presented by the CCJCC and the Israel Center of the Jewish Federation of the Greater East Bay, with major funding from the Jewish Community Foundation of the federation and the Consulate General of Israel, as well as individuals and corporations. It is co-sponsored by area synagogues and Jewish organizations.