ISRAELI DOCUMENTARY SCENE EXPERIENCES THE LUST FOR ARCHIVE MATERIALS

Anyway the tendency is demonstrated by the programs of two festivals – Docaviv, that took place in May, and Jerusalem IFF, taking place this week. A range of films from the both ones are based upon the material from the past, that are important in terms not only the plot but aesthetically.

The story of Mundek Lukawiecki, who fought the Nazis with the Polish partisans, is in the center of THE PARTISAN WITH THE LEICA CAMERA by Ruth Walk. But the real center of the film is the photos taken by Mundek in the forests, in the occupied settlements, and during brave & desperate guerilla actions, giving us a rare glimpse into the reality that before has been just imagined in the fiction movies.

Yigal Mosinzon, the writer, is not only an integral part of Israeli culture, but also “a bad boy of Israeli literature”, and a cultural icon who remains mysterious. The MOSINZON by Avi Weissblei reveals the writer’s unconventional personal story through his work, colorful episodes of his life full of relationships, marriages, and more than one unbelievable romance, including with Marilyn Monroe. But what is the most interesting and valuable about the film is a live presence of the outstanding personality given by the archive TV interviews and footage.

Much more personal, even intimate story is told by Shauly Melamed in his MINI DV, because old home videos came into play here. Yes, home videos shot during his childhood send the director on a downward spiral, inspiring a search for other LGBTQ adults who documented themselves during puberty. Shauly finds many such individuals who, in their youth, exposed their non-conforming identities without understanding the secrets the camera beheld. Through watching the childhood footage by the four LGBTQ adults the spectator can feel how vulnerable the world of LGBTQ youth is.

1341 FRAMES OF LOVE AND WAR by Ran Tal unravels the enormous price that comes along with documenting atrocities and wars. The acclaimed photo-journalist Micha Bar-Am allowed the director to enter his vast archive of negatives and stay there for a year and a half. The result is a knocking down movie composed entirely of images that Bar-Am took over more than fifty years.

In the 1950s, a young British couple go on their honeymoon. They arrive at “the end of the world,” a small desert town, and decide to stay. In faraway Eilat, Israel’s southernmost city, they begin their new lives, while maintaining their British core. And for the decades Dr. Morris filmed his family – the births and deaths, joys and tragedies, dramas and quiet days spent in the sun – all unfolding in the heat of the Israeli desert. Years after his death, the forgotten film materials were found and landed in the hands of directors Itamar Alcalay and Meital Zvieli. Who made THE CAMERA OF DOCTOR MORRIS, a spectacular work about an extraordinary family, who are just as ordinary as anyone else.

But not only the visible testimonies can become the groundwork of the documentary. THE DEVIL’S CONFESSION: THE LOST EICHMANN TAPES by Yariv Mozer is a confirmation. A few weeks before the opening of the Eichmann trial, transcripts of recorded conversations that Adolf Eichmann had with a Dutch Nazi journalist, Willem Sassen. The conversations were held a few years before Eichmann was brought to Israel by the Mossad. During the trial, Eichmann tried to convince that he was only a bureaucrat who carried out orders... In the movie, for the first time, we will confront Eichmann with himself in full color, revealing the hidden factors and motives that succeeded in hiding these recordings... That are found now – in order we could listen to the confessions of one of the Final Solution architects.

1341 FRAMES OF LOVE AND WAR by Ran Tal