Dan's Papers - October 26, 2007 - Political Documentaries At The Hamptons Int'l Film Festival

We've all heard the saying, "Truth is stranger than fiction." How about a better adage: "Truth is more moving than fiction." Such is the case with Hilla Medalia's To Die in Jerusalem, a potent movie about the Palestinian/Israeli conflict. A scripted film with professional actors couldn't have been more dramatic, nor could fictional dialogue been more authentic than the confrontation between two mothers coping with their daughters' deaths.

Simply put, while To Die in Jerusalem has no plot, it still has a story based on the suicide bombing of a supermarket where a young Palestinian bomber and an Israeli teenager are killed. The irony is their suggested similarities: both are the same age, have similar features and personality traits, and come from middle class, seemingly educated, backgrounds. If this bond has come to signify the film's "theme," it also captured the world's imagination when a picture of the two girls appeared on Newsweek's cover, the photograph's symmetrical composition and close-up conveying the powerful connection.

Yet this theme has other, more salient implication. If these young women, and by extension their grieving mothers, have an alliance, why can't Palestine and Israel put aside their conflict by recognizing the plausible bonds between their children?

As we watch the film, we know this won't come to pass, yet we naively hope that the mothers may reach an understanding. We wait patiently for their meeting, despite false starts and anticlimaxes over a four-year period as the women begin to show compassion and a lessening of political resolve (particularly seen in the Palestinian mother's argument that Israel stole her land).

As we wait, we get to know these people; they become like "characters" in a Hollywood movie. We sympathize with their plight, we identify with them, we find ourselves not taking sides. The music is moving, the cinematography is perfect, the editing is effective. In many ways, To Die in Jerusalem has the earmarks of a Hollywood film with its production values, structured story and compelling protagonists.

Let's change that saying quoted in the beginning. Rather than "Truth is more moving than fiction, how about "Truth and fiction can merge and become one."

Photographs from Past Hamptons Int'l Film Festivals

In questioning the notion of "truth," there should be no disagreement that Vox Magazine's photography exhibition featuring celebrities from previous Hamptons Film Festivals is authentic. While we know that the shots could have been stylized or manipulated, this is not the case with Pat Field's effective images. What's special about the pictures is how they evoke an individual's "real," not "reel," personality. Consider Martin Scorsese's serious gaze or Marcia Gay Harden's cheery demeanor. Or Barbara Kopple's preoccupation. Truthful in every way.