Celia Gurevitch Jewish Community Library

This week we will show Free Zone, the 2005 film by acclaimed director Amos Gitai (Kedma, Eden, Kadosh, Kippur … and many other films.) The film follows the complicated and slowly developing friendship of three women, coming from different backgrounds. Rebecca is a Jewish American, who is in Israel only for a short period of time. She is played by Natalie Portman, who is an Israeli citizen and was indeed in Israel only for a year to study at the university. Her taxi-driver is Hanna who has some business to do in the Free Zone, a place surrounded by Syria, Iraq and South Arabia. They eventually meet with a Palestinian woman and the three of them go through some adventures. The movie is built up around their interactions and reactions to events around them. When I first watched it I had no access to subtitles. It was fascinating and challenging trying to follow the cavalcade of languages and the quick changes between them: English, Hebrew, Arabic and even Spanish. This time we will have subtitles, so if you are fluent in all of these languages you will have a better chance to understand it.

The running time of the movie is 90 minutes. It is unrated, but those countries where it got rated it was OK-ed for ages 12 and up. I recommend the movie to those who are sensitive to and interested in the various facets of the struggle in the Middle East represented by three women. I also recommend the movie to you if you are not yet sensitized, because this movie might help you to understand the sides better through a deeply personal story, superb acting, and exciting story line.

The trailer below starts with the award winning ceremony of Hanna Laszlo, who won the Best Actress category at the Cannes Film Festival for her performance.