MY LAND ZION
Yulie Cohen Gerstel, Israel, 2004
Thursday 2 December 2004 9pm-10pm; midnight-1am; Friday 3 December 3am-4am (Thursday night)
What woman chooses to give birth where kids get blown up riding on school buses? Israeli filmmaker Yulie Gerstel asks this, and other questions, in a personal assessment of her homeland. Interview: "The hostility I receive is very hard for me"
YULIE COHEN GERSTEL Director Interview
"The hostility I receive is very hard for me"
Yulie Gerstel made her debut on Storyville with My Terrorist, which has been shown several times, including on BBC Two. My Land Zion is the second film of a planned trilogy. It tackles the difficult question of what land means to the Israelis. Do they have any special claim to what is called Israel? If they do, what becomes of the Palestinian inhabitants?
Yulie Gerstel goes straight to the heart of Israeli identity in this passionately developed film. Unfailingly, she asks the right questions and the most embarrassing ones. What would we feel if our children were obliged to go by public transport to an Israeli school each morning? Would we insist that we defend it at any costs? How many Israelis actually care about the Arab minority in their midst - or those in the camps, many of whom have been displaced by successive waves of Israeli settlers?
You'll see many good Israeli films, but few will be as impressive in their moral integrity as this one.
