Arts & Entertainment
THE ONE, THE ONLY, THE ORIGINAL.
Palestine, 1947
The Little Traitor recalls
Zionist-British conflict.
Tom Tugend
Jewish Journal of Greater L.A.
T
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April 29 2010
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he Little Traitor, open-
ing Friday, April 30, at the
Landmark Maple Art Theatre
in Bloomfield Township, harkens back
to 1947, when "Palestinians" referred
to the future State of Israel's Jewish
inhabitants and the hated enemies
were British soldiers wearing red
berets. The film, based on the semi-
autobiographical novel Panther in the
Basement by Israeli author Amos Oz,
combines the coming-of-age story of a
young patriot with historical insights
on the struggle for a Jewish state.
Proffy (short for "professor") is
an 11-year Jerusalem boy who hates
the British soldiers who occupy his
land, impose strict curfews and con-
duct midnight house raids. With two
like-minded playmates, he forms the
"underground cell" FOD ("Freedom
or Death"), which sprays "British Go
Home" graffiti on walls and tries to
disable a British convoy by scattering
nails on the road.
On most evenings, Proffy sneaks up
to the rooftop to scan the roads for the
British enemy through binoculars. Not
infrequently, his attention strays to a
lovely young woman in a neighboring
apartment in various stages of undress.
One evening, Proffy, played with
remarkable authenticity by Ido Port,
is caught after curfew hours by British
Sgt. Dunlop, played by a sympathetic,
if slightly corpulent, Alfred Molina.
An unlikely but warm friendship
develops between Proffy and the
Bible-reading soldier during mutual
language lessons, in which Dunlop
explains the meaning of "snooker"
and Proffy introduces his friend to the
subtleties of "meshuggah."
After a short time, Proffy's fellow
young freedom fighters discover the rela-
tionship and denounce him as a traitor.
Proffy is hauled before a Jewish Agency
"court" and sternly examined by an
interrogator played by Theodore Bikel.
In one of its most emotional scenes,
the film re-creates the almost unbear-
able tension of the November 1947
vote by the United Nations, which will
determine the partition of Palestine
between Arabs and Jews. Families
huddle around the radio, keeping score
Ido Port and Alfred Molina in The
Little Traitor
of each country's vote, and then burst
into the street in wild jubilation after
the final count.
Lynn Roth, who directed The Little
Traitor and wrote the screenplay, is a
veteran Hollywood writer and pro-
ducer who has won numerous awards,
especially as showrunner (executive
producer) of the long-running 1980s
television series The Paper Chase.
She also has been a longtime
teacher in the master class for Israeli
filmmakers in the Los Angeles/Tel Aviv
Partnership Program and said that she
had dreamt for decades about making
a film in Israel.
After extensive preparations, she
began filming The Little Traitor in the
old Musrara quarter of Jerusalem in the
summer of 2006, and three days into
the project the Lebanon War broke out.
"It struck me as ironic that I was
making a film about fighting in
Palestine in 1947, and now, almost
60 years later, the bullets were flying
again," she said.
Despite such distractions, including
the army call-up of some of her crew
members, Roth "miraculously" com-
pleted shooting the film in 28 days.
A New York native, Roth said she is
bound to Israel by many ties, not least
the graves of all four grandparents in
the Jewish state. ❑
The Little Traitor is scheduled
to open Friday, April 30, at the
Landmark Maple Art Theatre in
Bloomfield Township.
(248) 263-2111.