The Band's Visit
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Movie Reviews of The Band's Visit
Movie Review: Uplifting Tale of Humanity
Summary: 5 Stars
This is a beautiful film leaving the viewer uplifted, and with a renewed sense of hope. An Egyptian Police Ceremonial Band, played mostly by Palestinian actors, ends up in the wrong town on their way to an Arab cultural center opening. As they emerge from the bus, they are in a remote Israeli town, with no bus out until the next morning, no hotel in town, presumably no other Arabs in town, and essentially no money.
The band is led by a very stiff "General" who is now forced to depend upon the kindness of strangers in looking after his charges, until the next bus out of town the next day.
Although it could have been a mindless comedy, the film takes a very serious approach to character development and depicting the interaction of the two cultures, resulting in many intensely humorous moments.
All the main characters are touched by the meeting of these two cultures and groups of peoples, and changed by it in positive ways.
The movie's humanity and love characterize it, and give us all hope for greater interaction between Arabs and Israelis along a similar vein, allowing such a recipe to emerge again, and again.
Bravo!
Movie Review: Reflection on humanity
Summary: 5 Stars
One of the best foreign films I have seen recently is "The Band's Visit". Story about the City of Alexandria (Egypt) Police Department music band that plays traditional Arabic music. When this group of musicians is invited to come to Israel in the local Arabic Cultural Center to perform, they find themselves on a wrong bus and in the wrong village. Stranded in the city with limited resources and no translators, the band is left to their own devices for food, and overnight sleep. This is where the hearwarming part of the movie starts. Locals unaccustomed to any visitors, open their hearts and homes to these strangers. Simple show of kindness such as giving them food and a bed to sleep opens up everyone involved in the deeper reflection about their own lives, their purpose, about the art and about meaning of family and community. One cannot help but laugh about universal domestic bickering; understanding about strain unemployment brings to a young family; heartbreak about loneliness and despair; universal need for love and understanding. You will be rewarded by a beautiful traditional arabic musical piece at the end that will be a crown jewel of this wonderful little film.Movie Review: What you feel will be more than what you see
Summary: 5 Stars
Good writing, it has been argued, demands a keen sense of what to leave out. This remarkable film excels in its choice of what to omit.
Never before in viewing a film have I so strongly felt the presence of matters off-screen. This film, I believe, is nothing less than a profound fable about the whole of relations between the Arab and Israeli worlds. Remarkably what triumphs here is the humanity of each culture. Each is heroic; each is humane.
Sadly, there is never peacefulness, just tension never resolved; sadly, there is never triumph, just accomodation. There is an aching sadness throughout the film--there has been loss; there still is loss, there will always be loss. Throughout the film--especially in the silent moments (where I swear you hear the voices of Jewish and Muslim dead) and especially in the memorable shots of empty landscapes and ruminative shots of main characters--which never seem to fully fill the camera frame (where I swear you see the ghosts of Arab and Israeli dead)--there is the weight of a ruinous past, a troubled present, an unresolved future.
May G-d bless; Inshallah
Movie Review: This Film is a Gem!
Summary: 5 Stars
I loved this movie. It is a true gem.
The story is about an Egyptian Police Band that is supposed to do a performance at the opening of a new Egyptian Cultural Center in Israel. One of the band's members asks for directions to the city and mispronounces the Hebrew word for the town. Thus, the misadventures start.
The band ends up in a small town in the middle of nowhere. It is certainly not a place of any culture says the woman who runs the restaurant where their bus lets them off.
This comedic and poignant film unfolds duing a period of little more than 24 hours, until the band can catch the next bus to the right place. We see lust, love, pain, grief and hope. We laugh a lot. I guffawed a few times. We are witness to how people learn to accept one another and go past their prior negative feelings.
I recommend this movie without reservation. It is wonderful.
Movie Review: "The Band's Visit" is The Best Movie I Own
Summary: 5 Stars
No point in repeating all said in the Amazon editorial review, so how can I get you to buy this film and share it with all your friends, family, neighbors, strangers, and government? Well, the script is a masterpiece: not only for what is said, but what is unsaid. The acting is magnificent: you see and feel the joy, sorrow, anxiety, loneliness, melancholy, satisfaction, mistrust, respect. The cinematography is extraordinary: a thread of beautiful still photographs, seamlessly stitched to form a beautiful tapestry. While we may be culturally diverse, have different religious beliefs, or none at all, speak different languages, harbor ancient distrusts, we are in fact human, and must exercise the right to act humanely. No film I know says this quite so clearly, or beautifully. The winner of 35 international film awards, The Band's Visit is The Best Movie I own.