Bend Film Festival - Saturday

 The first movie during my shift on Saturday was called “Four Souls of Coyote” and … I didn’t get to see it.  We were told that volunteers get to see the movies during their shift.  However, at our venue we were asked to have one volunteer stay in the lobby at all times.  I really wanted to see the second movie so I volunteered to stay in the lobby for the first.  

The second movie of my shift was called “America”.  It’s about a guy who has been in America for 10 years and returns to Israel where he grew up.  Yesterday, we saw “Dusty and Stones” , which was about 2 musicians who traveled from Aftrica to America.  Much of the story was about the reactions and experiences of going to America from their homeland.  So I thought it would be interesting to compare the reactions of a guy who returns to his homeland from America.

Another festival volunteer was interested to see if the movie would touch on some of the issues related to the current events occurring in Israel.  Both of us were disappointed.  The movie was more concerned with the main character’s past, why he left Israel in the first place and the relationships he had with the people he left behind in Israel.  The movie could have taken place anywhere.  And it had nothing to do with Palestinians or the Gaza strip or Hamas.  Unless I missed something, the movie had very little to do with America (the title of the film).

The movie was ok.  The main two characters were the guy traveling to Israel and his childhood friend.  I did not particularly like either of these characters.  In fact, the movie poster did not have a picture of either of the two main characters.  Instead it had a picture of the childhood friend’s fiancee.  The only festival award I could find was given to her as Best Actress.  And I actually liked her role better than the two main characters.  She did have a fairly large role, just not as big as the two main characters.  Kind of strange.

I realize that some great movies have main characters that are not very likable.  However I much prefer films where I genuinely like the main character.  Anyway I am glad I saw the movie and there were several memorable scenes that I will come back to and think about in the future.