The Band's Visit - great movie, 3 rivers film fest. The Alexandria Police Orchestra Band arrives in Israel, only to get lost. They end up in at a jewish settlement somewhere in the Negev desert - they ask three people at a convenience store, "Where is the Islamic Cultural Center?" and the residents laugh -"Cuture? Here? There is no cultural anything here. Dead." The audience laughed - many jewish people in audience, and I think, probably spent time on a settlement in the desert in their youth, one of those summer kibbutz programs. Anyway, this Egyptian band members are stuck in this nowhere israeli settlement, and the townspeople take them in, with hilarious result;. So the film has the usual cultural conflicts and humor, but it becomes far more serious. These settlers have few new people to talk to, and the band members give them a chance to share their feelings with outsiders. We learn of the extreme loneliness that the settlement residents experience, and the loneliness of the band members. We observe the human condition, whether jew or arab, israeli or Eygptian: people are trapped in loneliness, they despair, and in that way we share a common humanity. An absolutely beautiful film. Was not considered for best foreign film by Academy Awards,because the film has too much English spoken!!! There are several languages spoken in the film, but the characters share only one, broken english, so its not considered a foreign language film. So no Acacdemy award consideration. Too bad!!!
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