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May 01, 2006
Wall: Tonight on Sundance Channel
Simone Bitton’s Wall (Mur) (2004, ***1/2) is one of too many exceptional documentaries that find expressive ways to confront the myriad contradictions of life in Israel and its occupied territories. Yoav Shamir’s 2003 Checkpoint, which plops the viewer down into the midst of an unexplained, inexplicable series of confrontations in Hebrew, Arabic and English at border checkpoints, may be the most haunting. Wall, however, has its own inspired strategy, a frontal visual style that has disappointed some reviewers but cleanly captures the 800,000 ton gorilla in the room, during the erection of the enormous, 400 mile wall that divides Israel from the West Bank. 
There’s no voiceover, and Bitton, who describes herself as an Arab Jew who has lived in all parts of Jerusalem, allows interviewees to present horror and sometimes, resigned humor. One of Bitton’s canniest moves is not to identify which side of the wall she’s reporting from; another is the opening, in which the vast, blank slabs are dropped into place, blotting the gorgeous land in distance from view. 96m.
Posted by Ray Pride at May 1, 2006 09:49 AM
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