HONEYMOOD - BFI London Film Festival 2020 - Day 2

HONEYMOOD is an absolutely wonderful dramedy set in contemporary Israel.  On their wedding night, a young seemingly happy couple get locked out of their palatial honeymoon suite.  In searching for the room key the wife finds a note written to the husband from his ex as well as a ring.  This prompts the wife to drag him through the city to try to find the ex and return said ring.  What this uncovers is the fact that the relationship was clearly a rather quick one, on the rebound. That the husband's family actually really liked the ex, and much to his chagrin still have her photos plastered over their fridge door.  And that the wife, in a kind of semi-drunken state is really questioning what the frack she has done!  

I loved the whimsical detours through the night - the mockery of their mutual friend - a film student - with his never-ending film that they have to sit through - or the amusement of the armed guards outside the Prime Minister's house at seeing yet another runaway bride - or the fact that the poor groom can't escape his overbearing parents even when he pops into a local cafe for a bit of peace and quiet and a falafel. I also love how the idea that a groom can give a Mitzvah - a bit of good fortune to others - leads to such absurdist prevarications on the part of the bride.

There's so much to love here - a lightness of touch even when dealing with some pretty profound emotional issues. And it all hangs on a pair of great performances, not least from Avigail Harari as the bride. 

HONEYMOOD has a running time of 90 minutes. The film played Tribeca and London 2020 and was released in Israel earlier this year. 

London Film Fest Day 7 - EYES WIDE OPEN

EYES WIDE OPEN is Haim Tabakman's immensely impressive and brave debut feature about the difficulty of reconciling a private life within a community of strict orthodoxy. To be sure, Tabakman has explored this issue by depicting a homosexual love affair within an Orthodox community in Jerusalem, but the issues would apply equally to, say, young girls threatened with "honour" violence in the UK, or, say, gays in the Catholic church. This is a film about people who cannot simply cut the ties from the communities who reject them and flee to a more tolerant place, but want to live out both their private life and their faith. The inability to choose on or the other is the tragedy.

The movie succeeds because it is resolutely NOT sensationalist but actually rather quiet and introspective and intimate. Zohar Strauss plays a butcher who is playing a role in his father's butcher's shop and as a husband and father. He seems to be a genuinely kind man, and a man of faith. He falls for a handsome young man (Ran Danker) who has already been expelled from one religious community. Aaron is warned by the Rabbi and more menacingly by a self-appointed group of young men. There is a particularly beautiful shot where the two are arguing in front of the shop about whether the relationship is tenable. A van pulls away and in the reflection we see that this whole argument has taken place in front of the menacing youths. And at the same time, the story is widened out, to show a young girl acquiesce to an arranged marriage.

This really is a powerful, sensitive relationship drama that shows a situation that is more widely relevant that a reductive plot summary might suggest. It is not at all sensationalist or exploitative, but authentic, credible, well-acted and well-photographed. It deserves to be widely seen.

EYES WIDE OPEN / EYNAIM PEKUKHOT played Cannes and Toronto 2009 and opened in September in France and Israel. It opens in Belgium on December 2nd.