Israel cinema-Bring on the Popcorn!
A nation's movies are possibly the best gauge of its culture and evolution. In Israel, cinema has been used for escapist entertainment, social commentary, political proselytism, anti-religious polemics, and much more.
Hardly a year goes by any more without an Israeli movie honored at the Oscars, Cannes, and many other festivals. It all started with Sallah Shabati and Azulay the Policeman, Ephraim Kishon's comedies from 1964 and 1971 and Israel's first two Oscar nominees. Other Israeli films nominated for Oscars over the years include Moshe Mizrahi's 1973 coming of age drama The House on Chelouche Street and Menahem Golan's 1977 historical action-adventure Operation Thunderbolt (Mivtza Yonatan) based on Israel's real-life rescue of Jewish hostages from Arab and German terrorists in Entebbe, Uganda.
More recently, Beaufort was nominated in 2008. Called by some "Israel's first great war movie," it tells the story of a group of soldiers trying to complete a pointless mission. In 1982, Israel captured the 12th century Beaufort Castle military outpost from the PLO in Southern Lebanon. Eighteen years later, as Israel was preparing to evacuate the area, the dangerous mission to continue guarding the outpost became meaningless. This movie, chronicling the last days of Beaufort, shows the absurdity of daily life during wartime like few movies from any country ever have.
In an unprecedented feat, the next two years also saw Oscar nominations for Israel. In 2009, it was Waltz with Bashir, an animated docudrama about the Lebanon War, and in 2010 it was the Jewish-Arab co-production Ajami about crime and poverty in modern day Jaffa.
One of the most special, unique, and beloved movies to come out of Israel in the last few years is Ushpizin. Possibly the first feature film written and created by Orthodox Jews, it was a smash hit both in Israel and among audiences worldwide. (You can view the trailer here.) Life-affirming and heartwarming, with unforgettable performances by Shuli Rand (who also wrote the screenplay) and Michal Bat-Sheva Rand (Shuli's real-life wife in her first on-screen role), it is a movie never to be forgotten by anyone who has seen it.
If you're interested in getting a deeper look at Israeli cinema, you could hardly do better than Judaica Webstore. With over 150 movies, representing every decade of Israel's existence, the selection is probably better than you will find anywhere else. You will also find dozens of documentaries on Jewish and Israeli history, as well as numerous children's films and music DVD's. But it's the prices that will keep you coming back again and again.
Bring on the popcorn!
