Saturday, October 29, 2005
Jack Baxter was (and still is) a documentary film maker. Jack wasn't (and still isn't) Jewish. But he, like so many around the world, had seen this place called Israel on the news and became intrigued. He just knew there was a film there waiting for him to discover.
So off he went to Israel, with a short budget and a simple idea.
It didn't work out. See, he had heard about this articulate fellow named Marwan Barghouti then on trial is Israel for terrorism. It was said that Barghouti was really a potential and even worthy future Palestinian leader. But shortly after his arrival, Baxter found that there was already an Israeli crew working on a Barghouti documentary, and they were well along. He also encountered the vigils and stories of the families of Barghouti's victims and with them discovered that Barghouti was not the man for him.
What to do?
Short on money, and ready to pack it in and head home to New York, he stopped in at a little Blues bar down by the Tel Aviv beach called Mike's Place.
He had found his muse.
A film about Mike's Place would be the perfect story to tell -- one not shown on the world's news cameras. Here was a little slice of Israel where the subjects known as "politics" and "religion" were kept out on the sidewalk, where Israeli Jews, Arabs and world travelers could mix and the only thing they had to have in common was a love of music, booze and a good time. This was going to be a perfect look at the Israel we never see, the majority Israel, stripped of its obsessions and looking as Israel looks to the Israelis -- normal.
And that's how it went for awhile, with Baxter carrying the camera, conducting interviews with the staff and generally living the life and capturing the moments and the personalities.
But then the story took an unexpected turn.
At the end of April, 2003, two British citizens of Pakistani descent traveled to Israel and the disputed territories. They made contact with members of the International Solidarity Movement and other left-wing activists, one of whom, an Italian journalist, likely facilitated their crossing the Gaza border by traveling with them into Israel. The two then traveled to the Tel Aviv beach with murderous intent. One's belt failed to detonate. The other succeeded, killing three people and injuring scores of others. (In fact, it should be noted that the toll would undoubtedly have been far worse if not for the bravery of security guard Avi Tabib who prevented the pair's entry and by some miracle wound up critically wounded by surviving.)
Filmmaker Jack Baxter was in Mike's Place filming at the time. Suddenly the story line had taken an unexpectedly serious turn.
Baxter himself was critically wounded, but while he recovered in the hospital from multiple grave injuries, including nerve damage, massive contusions and the effects of "organic shrapnel," his assistants (and also Mike's Place employees) filmed on. The visions of good times and booze are done for the moment, as we're now taken from horror of the bombing through the aftermath and the story of the survivors whose lives have changed forever.
Everything changed that night, and the film brings us along -- from the former footloose and fancy free bohemian life of a staff who can't wait to go to work every evening, to the reality of shattered romance, sleepless nights and the anguish and pain of self-doubt and guilt amongst people embarrassed by the fact that everything's changed for them. We're along as witnesses to their all-too-human weakness as they face the reality of their own frailty and the fact that they just don't want to go back to work again, even though they know they must.
And they do.
Blues by the Beach is not the constructed montage of stock footage and staged pieces that one would see in say, the average Michael Moore film. This is close-ups, interviews, candid shots in natural lighting. This is story, real and as it happened. The impact is pure human truth. We want to reach into the screen and do...something to comfort these people. But we can't, and in that way it's as effective a seat-squirmer as any thriller.
If I could make one change, I'd have included more of the bloody reality of the bombing aftermath, footage that the filmmakers have but chose not to include. Perhaps a wise choice. They focused instead on the human stories rather than going for the shock visuals.
Jack Baxter's wife and the film's co-producer was on hand for the screening this morning at the Kendall Square Cinema. The couple have spent everything making this movie because they feel its message is so important and powerful. Now the Baxters are desperately seeking distribution and funding for better production formats.
Blues By The Beach could do more to bring home what's at stake to the average person regarding the reality of suicide terror -- in Israel and everywhere -- than 1000 scholarly articles or 100 TV pundits. Here's to hoping they succeed.
There will be a second showing tomorrow, Sunday at 11:30am at the Kendall Square Cinema. If you're in the Boston area and have the chance, don't miss it.
One minor correction - the two British citizens responsible for the terror were not of Arab but of Pakistani descent.
I still do not understand why the Israelis would allow people of Pakistani descent into their coutnry no matter what passport they were holding. alrms should have gone off.
Thank you, I have made that correction.
Dexter Van Zile's Comments at Toronto Press Conference on Oct. 27
Solomon:
Can't get my work webmail to work. Posting this as a comment. Might be worth a posting.
Yesterday a homicide bomber blew himself up in a market in Hadera, a
village north of Tel Aviv killing 5, injuring 30, 7 critically. One
witness who lived approximately 300 feet from the blast said, "Body
parts reached all the way to my apartment building. The damage is
really great."
Israel deals with the threats of attacks like this every day. For
every successful attack against Israel, the Israeli defense forces
thwart 33 similar attempts. Nevertheless, this past summer, the
United Church of Christ and The Disciples of Christ, two churches in
the U.S. who take their cues from Sabeel, passed resolutions asking
Israel to take down the security barrier without asking the
Palestinians to stop the attacks that made its construction
necessary. These resolutions detail in ferocious specificity the
inconvenience suffered by Palestinians but make no reference
whatsoever to the loss of Israeli lives, or for that matter the loss
of Palestinian lives during the 4 year Intifada which began in 2000.
In these resolutions, the churches portray the barrier as if it were
built in a vacuum and not in response to hundreds of attacks like the
one that took place yesterday.
This is no accident.
This is the result of a persistent campaign on the part of Sabeel and
its supporters in the United States, Canada, Europe, and specifically
the United Kingdom, to encourage churches to blame Israel and only
Israel for the tragedy of the conflict and to ignore problems in
Palestinian society that threaten Jewish safety and undermine the
human rights of people living in the disputed territories. This
agenda is obvious in the resolutions passed by the Decouples of
Christ and the United Church of Christ which fail to acknowledge
Israel's attempts to negotiate with the Palestinians in the pursuit
of peace.
Say what you want about Ehud Barak's offer in 2000, but one fact is
indisputable, Yasser Arafat walked away from negotiations without
making a counter offer. These resolutions fail to acknowledge the
role Palestinian leaders have played in promoting violence against
Israelis. Muslim sheiks routinely call for the death of Jews on
Palestinian TV. But the resolutions say nothing about this
incitement, even as these same churches call for an end to hostile
rhetoric against gays and lesbians and resolutions approved at the
very same synods that passed the anti-barrier resolutions.
The resolutions fail to acknowledge Israeli efforts to reduce the
impact of a security barrier on the Palestinians. The Israeli peace
movement has protested the impact of the barrier on Palestinians and
in some instances has helped change its location. And moreover,
these resolutions fail to acknowledge the reduction in attacks the
fences had and the breathing space that this reduction has had for
the peace movement in Israel.
The resolutions fail to acknowledge the continued violence against
Israel during a putative cease fire. During the first 7 months of
2005, Palestinian terrorists killed 21 Israelis and injured another
238. Haaretz reported that during more than 6 of these month a
truce had been declared by the Palestinian authority and terra groups
in the disputed territories. But in July alone, there were 436
terrorist incidents, including 142 mortar shell attacks. The
security barrier is the result not the cause of attacks like these.
These resolutions ignore the existence of an infrastructure of terror
in areas under the jurisdiction of the Palestinian Authority.
Suicide bombers are isolated from their families by skilled handlers,
brainwashed and in some instances shamed into killing themselves and
Israelis. Sadly, the people who engage in this behaviour receive no
rebuke in the resolutions passed by the United Church of Christ or
the Disciples of Christ. These failures can only be explained by
ignorance or anti-Jewish hostility
Sabeel encourages both.
The speakers at Sabeel conferences portray Israeli defense policy as
if it were created in a vacuum, offering no description of the terror
Israel faces. And they present Israelis themselves as disobedient
Jews who fail to adhere to Judaism's higher values. And sadly there
are many in our churches who are willing to ratify Sabeel's narrative
by passing resolutions that condemn Israel's security barrier.
What is it about this security barrier that makes it worthy of
condemnation? What motivates this selective concern? What makes
this fence different from the one built between India and Pakistan on
disputed territory no less? And the one between Indonesia and
Malaysia? Or the one between Kurdistan and Uzbekistan, built in
response to terror attacks? Our churches have said nothing about
these barriers.
Churches in the U.S. have an obligation to tell the Palestinians that they have a choice between open borders and terror attacks. But
instead they have allowed their prophetic voices to be used as a
weapon of war against the Jews.
ISLAMIC JIHAD and FATAH Offshoot Hold Press Conference Celebrating Hadera Suicide Bombing
DailyScorecard Posts
Sources close to the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, the military wing of Abbas' Fatah movement.....
ISLAMIC JIHAD and FATAH Offshoot Hold Press Conference Celebrating Hadera Suicide Bombing
DailyScorecard Posts
Sources close to the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, the military wing of Abbas' Fatah movement.....
Arab League/Nations Rejected a Saddam Exile Plan Prior to the War
I hope Blues by the Beach gets a wide showing. More films like this are needed to show exactly how those homicide bombers destroy and affect lives. The news media seems determined not to show the human toll of the victims.
Would you kimdly infrom me how I can optain this documenty What is the cost of purchasing it. Or is there another way of viewing it?