Photos C) 2007 July August Productions, courtesy Sony Pictures Classics. All Rights Reserved.

Arts &

ertainment

Ronit Elkabetz as Dina and Sasson Gabai as Tewfiq

The band arrives.

Director Eran Kolirin gives viewers scenes of communication between people taught,

for generations, to be wary of each other.

Tom Tugend

Jewish Telegraphic Agency

ewish-Arab relations, sometimes
in war, occasionally in love, are
frequent themes of Israeli mov-
ies, but rarely are they examined with
the subtle humor and sensitivity of The
Band's Visit. The film is scheduled to open
Friday, Feb. 29, at the Maple Art Theatre in
Bloomfield Township.
At the center of the leisurely action
is the Alexandria Ceremonial Police
Orchestra, eight Egyptian men in immac-
ulate light-blue uniforms, who have come
to Israel to perform at the opening of the .
Arab Cultural Center in Petach Tikvah.
Nobody meets the band at Ben-Gurion
Airport and, after futile attempts by the
Egyptians and Israelis to communicate in
broken English, the group is loaded on a
van to Bet Hatikvah, a forlorn settlement
in the Negev.
Arriving at the dusty little town, which
seems to have been lifted from an old John
Wayne western, Tewfiq (Sasson Gabai),
the leader of the band, asks Dina (Ronit
Elkabetz), the lusty proprietress of a cafe,

j

for directions to the Arab Cultural Center.
Dina sums up the glamour of her commu-
nity by answering that there is "no Arab
culture here, no Israeli culture, no culture
at all:'
The town folks offer to put up the visi-
tors in their homes overnight and, in halt-
ing conversations, Israelis and Egyptians
talk not about politics and wars but of
their everyday work and families.
Dina takes the widowed Tewfiq to a
local restaurant, where the odd couple
is eyed with considerable curiosity. The
Egyptian is at first reserved and suspi-
cious but warms up under his compan-
ion's genuine interest and sympathy, until
both join the jukebox in a rendition of
Gershwin's "Summertime'
Most of the other bi-national encoun-
ters are handled with light humor, often
tinged with a touch of sadness, but for one
hilarious episode.
The band's handsome young trumpet
player, who idolizes jazz icon Chet Baker,
encounters the resident Israeli nebbish
and accompanies him on the Israeli's
blind date at a roller-skating rink. When
the local boy proves too awkward to make

any advances to his date, the more experi-
enced Egyptian guides him along, word-
lessly, but with eloquent gestures.
Band's Visit is a very auspicious debut
for 34-year-old Eran Kolirin, directing
his first feature film. Unlike most young
Israeli directors, Kolirin did not go to
film school but apprenticed himself to his
father, a movie editor and director.
He thought he had hit the jackpot when
the Israel Film Academy picked Band's
Visit as the top domestic picture of the
year, which automatically qualified it as
the country's entry in the Oscar race for
Best Foreign Language Film.
But something strange happened on the
road to Hollywood's red carpet.
Under the rules of the American
Academy, more than half the dialogue in
a foreign film entry must be in the origi-
nating country's own language. However,
Band's Visit, whose Egyptian and Israeli
characters communicate mainly in broken
English, didn't meet the requirement and
was disqualified by the Oscar committee.
Even so, Sony Pictures, the film's dis-
tributor, entered it in the general Oscar
categories of best picture, director, screen-

play, actor and actress — none of which
came through for the film.
"Nobody in Israel thought about the
language problem:' said Kolirin, who spent
four years making the film.
When he heard about the adverse
American decision, "I was pissed off for
a few days, but I've gotten over it:' he said
during a visit to Los Angeles.
Since no Egyptian actors would accept
a role in an Israeli film, Kolirin cast Israeli
actors with roots in Morocco, Iraq or
other Arab-speaking countries. "However,
we had to teach them to speak with an
Egyptian accent:' he said.
Kolirin is a seventh-generation sabra on
his father's side and, like many Israelis, he
is struggling with his identity.
"The problem is that we are part of the
Middle East but live in an increasingly
Westernized country;' he observed. "I won-
der how much of me is Arab, not through
genes, but by living in this region:'

❑

The Band's Visit is scheduled to
open Friday, Feb. 29, at the Maple
Art Theatre in Bloomfield Township.
(248) 263-2111.

February 28 • 2008

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