eight out of ten
I resisted watching this movie because I knew it would be powerful and emotional and much too relevant to today's current middle east issue between Lebanon/Palestine/Israel. Well I believe that for this very reason it is so important to watch it. You may not agree with the viewpoint of the movie but its still an important film to watch to understand the perspective of both parties involved. Some say that the film is terribly biased. I believe the movie is perhaps biased in support of a state of Israel but as far as Israel's steps to react to the violence and their own acts of violence I feel the movie is extremely even handed and touches upon a lot of moral gray areas. Many criticize the film for not being completley accurate. For example, the death squad killers of Israel are shown to have a conscious when its argued by most experts that they were not particularly troubled by the murders they committed, instead they felt pride because they were doing what they did for their country. Okay, even if this is true, the effect of this guilty conscious helps create a starting point to debate and discuss the issues in the middle east. Most Americans are sadly unaware of the problems and have one sided views of the issue. This movie seeks to show both sides of the debate and wants to start a dialogue on what we think. For that purpose, this movie is extremely effective.
There is a particularly poignant scene in the film where Aver (the Israeli death squad guy) and Ali ( A Palestinian liberation army leader) have a candid conversation unaware of the other's religious convictions or views. Whats interesting is both discuss their home. Both discuss that they are willing do die defending their home. Both are talking about the same peice of land.
Powerful quotes in the movie stated about an event long ago but eerily speak about issues today:
Every civilization finds it necessary to negotiate compromises of its own values.
Forget peace for now. We have to show them we're strong <-- and this one is the most powerful of them all because I actually heard this same phrase from the movie depicting decades ago, used by an Israeli spokesperson to a news correspondent Monday morning. *sigh* There is no peace at the end of this.
