Bright Future
I went yesterday to see the new Israeli movie “Half Russian Story” (Sipur Hatzi Rusi, which for some odd reason I believe is distributed abroad under the title Love and Dance).
I really liked it, with one major remark: why do they call it only “half”, and not full, russian?
I am really fond of russain culture. I think that in literature, for example, nobody, not even the french masters, ever got close to the great russian novelists - their descriptions, their plots, their characters - profound masterpieces. I also like the totality and extreme seriousness which exists so deeply in the russian culture; not to mention the great pessimism, hope, and view of life as a series of struggles.
This film gave me, at a first impression, a similar feeling: the plot could easily come out of a russian novel though it is undoubtedly uniquely Israeli: it tells about a kid that grows up in a family where the mother is a new immigrant from Russia, and the father an Israeli born; they live in Ashdod, and the film brings up tensions of the immigrant society and their assimilation problems - from a world-class dancer that works at a grocery store to street-kids that form their gangs: difficult yet colorful life, at Israel’s back door. It depicts salonic dances as a motive that separates new immigrants from “native Israelies”, and it does it well.
The photographer there did an extremely good job. In general, I think that the huge jump that Israeli cinema did in the last decade or so has a lot to do with better photographers. Of course, there are better plots, also, but I have seen quite a few Israeli movies in the past few years which I liked. Most of them, by the way, were dramas (but maybe that’s just me, because I have also seen some nice comedies); but the biggest difference with movies from the seventies, I think, is the use of proper light.
By the way, if we move to a bit broader view, I think that the russian immigration (today every fifth Israeli was born in the former soviet union and arrived at Israel in the past 15 years or so) contributed so many good things to the Israeli society and culture, that only now we can begin to estimate its contribution; this film is just a little example - note the excellent russian players, for instance.
“Half Russian Story” is recommended, if you are ready for a serious russian drama with a happy ending (hey, that’s probably the “half”, in “half russian”); and it is just another link in a series of good Israeli movies that were produced here in the past few years - I think that Israeli cinema has a bright future.
