Living a lie
10/10
Author: jotix100 from New York
1 January 2008

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

A film of epic proportions, "Va, vis et deviens", shows an excellent director, Radu Mihaileunu at his best. Mr. Miahueunu, who co-wrote the screen play with Alain Michel Blanc, gives us a slice of life in this life affirming film that will please audiences because the way these two men decided to present their story that centers around a tragedy perpetrated in Africa.

A young Ethiopian child sees enough devastation around him. When he is separated from his own mother, a kind Jewish black woman, advises him to assume a new identity, that of an Ethiopian Jew, so he will qualify to be taken to Israel, part of a plan to help settle these unfortunate people in the land of milk and honey. The young man, who has witnessed enough tragedy during his short years, goes along and is taken to a place where he has no one, or even belong.

Schlomo, as he is called, is lucky enough to be adopted by a kind Israeli family with two young children of their own.Being black in an almost all white society has its disadvantages as the young man learns early on. The love of his adoptive parents should have been sufficient, but he is a child that knows he doesn't belong among these nice people that have opened their home, and accept him.

Schlomo, who we see through different aspects of his life, as a boy, then a teen ager, and a grown man, meets an older Jewish black man, another fellow Ethiopian, who helps him overcome his fears and ask him to come clean, not only to Sarah, the woman who loves him, but to everybody. The big secret he has been carrying all his life, is a burden keeps him enslaved all his life, revealing it, will free him of the tremendous guilt in his heart.

There are excellent all around performances in the film. Yael Abecassis and Roschdy Zem, who play the adoptive parents make a tremendous contribution to the film. The young Schlomo is acted by three different actors, all of them good. They contribute to make this, one of the most credible movies in a while.

The hauntingly beautiful music of Arman Amar, and the cinematography of Semy Chevin, make the film even better to watch. The director, Radu Mihaileunu shows great sensitivity with the material and turns a great picture that will be hard to forget.

Yaël Abecassis

*

*

'Deny thy mother, and refuse thy name...'
7/10
Author: janos451 from San Francisco
3 May 2007

The closing night of last year's San Francisco Jewish Film Festival turned out to be more than just the screening of a movie. There was drama in the Castro Theater, many in a mostly Jewish audience sobbing audibly in response to the story of an Ethopian child escaping to Israel by pretending to be Jewish. In June 2007, "Live and Become" is being released commercially in the U.S.

Forty-seven-year-old Radu Mihaileanu - Romanian-born, raised in Israel, now a French filmmaker, director of the much-honored "Train of Life" - created a complex, honest, deeply affecting work in "Live and Become" ("Va, vis et deviens"). In the post-Holocaust world of many Jews trying to pass for gentile, Mihaileanu's true and truthful story shows the opposite: a mother's denial of a child as her own, forcing him to adopt a new identity and religion in order to survive - as a Jew, in Israel, escaping the deadly Ethopian famine and war.

Yet another meaningful reference is Imre Gyöngyössy's 1983 "The Revolt of Job" ("Jób lázadása"), about a Hungarian Jewish peasant couple adopting a Christian child, raising him as a Christian, and refuse to recognize him as their own when they are being taken away, again to assure the child's survival. (The child lived, and grew up to be the writer and director of the film about his own story.) Mihaileanu's film is based on true events. In 1985, the Mossad supervised an amazing drive, "Operation Moses," the airlift of thousands of Falasha, Ethiopian Jews, believed to be descendants of Menilek I, the son of the Queen of Sheba (Makeda) and King Solomon.

Thousands died on the march to Sudan where the Israeli airlift operated, but even more escaped, arrived in Israel, were accepted by the country - if not without religious and political controversy. History and politics are just the background to "Live and Become," the title stemming from the heartbreaking command of the boy's mother: go, don't tell anyone who you really are, become a Jew, do not come back.

Three actors play Schlomo (the name given to the boy at the Ellis-Island-like refugee center) at various times of his life.The film's greatest impact is from the child Schlomo(Moshe Agazai)who must learn new customs, a new religion, Hebrew, Yiddish, and French (of his adoptive parents) at the same, forgetting his Amharic. His initial transition from the refugee camp to modern Israel is astonishing, at one unforgettable moment, while taking his first shower, he is trying to stop the water from going down the drain, panicking at the sinful waste.

Mihaileanu is a skilled, powerful moviemaker: he is sticking to the central message, staying with his characters, keeps telling what is the truth for them, but the direction, acting, cinematography are glossy-professional. What makes the film extraordinary - what creates all the crying in the audience - is its honest and effective portrayal of the young refugee's isolation and loneliness, made worse by his belief that his escape is at the cost of his mother's life, in exchange for a lie he feels he must live, even as he becomes an authentic member of Israeli society.

The cast is uniformly outstanding, but Schlomo's adoptive parents are especially memorable. Moroccan-Israeli actress Yael Abecassis' warmth and strength, Moroccan-French actor Roschdy Zem's rough integrity create a true and enviable family environment - but there is nothing easy or false about the young refugee's difficult journey and internal tribulations.

Récompenses

Grand Prix du meilleur scénariste, 2003
Prix du jury œcuménique, Prix du public et Prix européen au Festival de Berlin en 2005.
César du meilleur scénario original en 2006
(le film était également nommé dans les catégories du meilleur film, du meilleur réalisateur et de la meilleure musique)
Cygne d'Or du meilleur film au festival de Copenhague en 2005.
Grand prix et prix du public 2005 du Festival du film d'aventures de Valenciennes.
Prix du film le plus populaire du Vancouver International Film Festival en 2005.
Prix Humanum 2005 de l'UPCB / UBFP - Union de la presse cinématographique belge

Les Citronniers (en arabe, Shajarat Limoun ; en hébreu,Etz Limon ; en anglais, Lemon Tree...et en Quebeccois ?), est un film franco-germano-israélien réalisé par Eran Riklis, sorti le 23 avril 2008.

Résumé

En Cisjordanie, Salma Zidane, veuve palestinienne vit seule dans sa petite propriété, limitrophe de la frontière israélo-palestinienne, constituée d'une bâtisse de pierre et d'un verger de citronniers. Le ministre israélien de la Défense emménageant sur la parcelle adjacente, les services de sécurité décident de déraciner les arbres fruitiers, perçus comme autant de possibles caches pour d'éventuels terroristes.

Mme Zidane entame une procédure devant la justice militaire puis devant la Cour suprême d'Israël ainsi qu'une délicate relation avec son avocat, Ziad Daoud, dont la femme et la petite fille sont demeurées en Russie, pays de ses études.L'argument reprend le contentieux ayant opposé un plaignant palestinien et Shaoul Mofaz, ministre de la défense israélien (2002 - 2006) qui, dans un contexte similaire à celui exposé dans le film,avait obtenu l'arrachage de citronniers jouxtant son terrain.

Cast
Hiam Abbass : Salma Zidane
Ali Suliman : Ziad Daoud
Tarik Kopty : Abu Hussam
Rona Lipaz Michael : la femme du ministre de la Défense
Loai Nofi : Nasser Zidane, le fils émigré aux États-Unis
Makram Khoury : Abu Kamal, notable palestinien
Lana Zreik : Laila, la fille de Salma
Jamil Khoury : Mussa, le gendre de Salma