Israeli Movies

Spoiler Alert! 

We watched an Israeli movie called, “Walk on Water”. In this movie the a man who is in the Mussad (the Israeli CIA that kills potential threats to the country/terrorists) gets a mission to find out what the family members of a man who was once a Nazi know. If he is still alive, his mission is to get rid of him. So this Mussad (המוסד) agent poses as a tour guide for a man from Germany coming to visit his sister who lives in Israel. They are said to be the grandchildren of a former member of the Nazi party. Their grandfather is said to be dead but the Mussad doesn’t believe it and wants to make sure. The movie is basically about his with this German man. In the end he ends up going to Germany to “visit” the man and goes to this man’s father’s birthday party. At the party the grandfather comes out and the Mussad agent knows that this man used to be a Nazi. He goes to finish his mission and kill the former Nazi but decides that he is done killing people and doesn’t. Instead the grandson kills his grandfather.

The whole movie was very good. I had never really understood what the Mussad did/does and I feel like I now have a better understanding of it. I obviously don’t really get it but I know as much about it as I do the American FBI and CIA. It really just shows how much of a Jewish state Israel really is. When the government is tracking down these bad people they are going after Nazis. I feel like in America no one cares if there are still Nazi war criminals alive. But here that is something that effected our people, the people of Israel, and so Israel makes it a priority. I just found that very interesting.

Another movie we watch is called, “Sholmi’s Stars”. It is about a boy with a not so ideal family life. He is very special, he is smart and talented beyond all belief and an amazing cook. When he cooks he puts star cookies on his cakes and such. Hence the name. It is basically about the struggle he is in with his family. His parents are fighting, they aren’t together because his father cheated. His brother is, for lack of a better word, an asshole. His sister has children and is constantly fighting with her husband. And Shlomi is stuck in the middle of all this and taking care of his senile grandfather. He is a teenager and struggling with the girlfriend aspect of his life. He is fascinated with this one girl who may or may not be/have been sleeping with Shlomi’s brother and his brother’s best friend. It was a pretty confusing movie. But very cute. In the end Shlomi’s family sort of mends themselves and Shlomi and the girl he loves move to Haifa together and he goes to a school there that is more fitted for his brilliance. To me this movie just really showed that even in a completely different country they still have the same issues. When I would talk to my American friends about Israel they would all say, “Why are you going out there? Isn’t it a war zone? What if you get bombed?” and I would try to explain to them that while there is more things of that sort out here, that is not what people are thinking about. People out here have some of the same concerns we do back home in the states. It also just goes to show that everyone has a crazy family, or some sort of crazy in their family... not just me. I really enjoyed it.