SpuffyWeb Sadly Over-hyped

UnowPriceless hyped garbage

Matylda Swan It is a whirlwind of delight --- attractive actors, stunning couture, spectacular sets and outrageous parties.

Maleeha Vincent It's funny, it's tense, it features two great performances from two actors and the director expertly creates a web of odd tension where you actually don't know what is happening for the majority of the run time.

rakuda-1 It was a remarkable film. It wasn't what I expected from Portman. I felt for all the characters. Although certain moments were slow, and I didn't particularly like some of the unsteady camera work out the window of the car, I did like the way it moved at a pace slower than the average high speed modern film. It went at sort of a real life pace. I think Hiam Abbass was the most interesting character of the bunch. I actually wished the movie was longer. I did want to follow the lives of these characters. I liked also that it felt like these actors (with exception of Portman) weren't typical pretty Hollywood faces. I liked the credibility that that lent. Portman has a certain naturalness to her looks anyway so I could tolerate one pretty face. As an American what do I really know about Palestine besides what I see in the media? I liked the feeling of dignity that it lent to all people, and I feel for that, whether I can relate specific details to real or imagined knowledge.I think people who are used to the big production films would impatiently miss the rich and unspoken undercurrent and how it expressed what was not verbally said. It was a very humane film.

ott_dog This is more of a response to the latest post by "Mrnaturalsez". I guess we are expected to take your word on a movie instead of the Cannes Film Festival and the Toronto Film Festival, which incidentally gave this move high praise. The film was an interesting, raw look at Jerusalem and Jordan as one would see it as a traveller. Plot has nothing to do with appreciating this movie, so I think you missed the mark. The story was used as a reason to explore the middle eastern culture. It was also interesting seeing Natalie Portman speak in her native Hebrew language. The film drew upon Portman's real life, as she was born in Isreal and had a Jewish father and American mother. Some films are watched for action, others for art, but I guess one will believe what one wants. There's my 2 cents.

jinty-reid Found this movie confusing and felt it could have been done much better. Understood some of the focus in the movie, the bringing together of 3 women from 3 cultures living in countries involved in perilous times etc. Found the length of time that the viewer was subjected to crying at the beginning of the movie too long and belaboured the point that was easily grasped in the first few minutes. The superimposing of scenes became annoying and distracted from the quality of the movie, the flashbacks were poorly done and only added to the confusion. The ending left the viewer high and dry without giving any meaning at all to it. In all I did not enjoy this movie it seemed to be allowed to just ramble along and I am amazed it won awards.

dmarkuze This film is low budget and it definitely shows.It's bad and no words about its artistic merits will make it any better. I only heard one truth in the movie, when the Arab woman said that people should speak their enemy's language. There is no doubt that Arabic should be compulsory in Israeli school. (I was taught French instead). Furthermore, the Brazilian who is so praising this very bad move, Hanna Laslo's father (in the movie) hails from Berlin and therefore she is not a Russian_Israeli. Also, maybe I am mistaken , but I don't recall that Israeli tanks reached the Jordanian/Iraqi border during the 1967 war, so they could not have possibly destroyed the Oasis there. I consider myself left of centre when it comes to the Arab-Israeli conflict, but this movie certainly did not do anything for me in that regards.