The Band's Visit
|
List Price: Our Price: $5.31 You Save: $25.68 (83%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $1.19 (click here) Category: DVD See more DVD releases |
|---|
Buy this DVD movie at online store in your country
Canada
Canada
Movie Reviews of The Band's Visit
Movie Review: I liked it...
Summary: 4 Stars
I really enjoyed this movie. My family hated it. I thought it was quirky and fun and a pleasure to go along for the ride. The different personalities of the band members and the small townspeople were universally recognizable. Very human. I really liked it. Not for everyone.Movie Review: touching if overly slight tale of international brotherhood
Summary: 3 Stars
***1/2
In Eran Kolirin`s stripped-down and understated human comedy "The Band's Visit," a small orchestra made up of eight uniformed Egyptian policemen travels to Israel as part of a cultural-exchange program. Thanks to a scheduling snafu, the band members find themselves stranded in a tiny village in the Negev Desert where they are looked after by a kind and attractive restaurateur (the luminous Ronit Elkabetz) and one of her friends who agree to put the men up for the night. The musicians include a crusty old conductor, played by the marvelously deadpan Sasson Gabai, and a handsome young womanizer and trumpet player (Saleh Bakri) who don't exactly see eye-to-eye on much concerning either music or life.
Like many such films from abroad, "The Band's Visit" eschews obvious narrative flourishes in favor of a more slice-of-life approach to storytelling - indeed, almost to a fault in the case of this particular film. Yet, while there are times when the movie's "smallness" is of so determined and deliberate a nature that it begins to border on the self-conscious, "The Band's Visit" finds its truths in the minutiae of everyday life, in the heartfelt exchanges between characters (particularly between Gabai and Elkabetz), and in the way it acknowledges the commonality of the human condition. The people in the film may come from different - even antagonistic - cultures, but they are quick to discover that there is far more that unites them than divides them in the grander scheme of things.
Coming in at a brief 86-minute running time, "The Band's Visit" is a mere vignette in what is obviously a larger tale of Egypt/Israel relations, one that makes its case for cooperation among all the world's peoples without undue fuss or fanfare.
Movie Review: The Bland Visit
Summary: 3 Stars
This is a moderately engaging tale of an Egyptian police band who become stranded in a backwater Israeli town after taking a bus to the wrong place to do a concert for the opening of an Arabic Cultural Center. Since this one-horse town has no hotel, the proprietress of a local diner and some other folks put up the band members for one night until they can catch a bus to the correct destination. That night challenges them all.
To say that the movie is understated is an understatement in itself. Ronit Elkabetz is excellent as the smoldering Dina. But the film moves at a glacial pace that may tax the patience and attention span of many viewers.
Arab and Jew are supposed to be enemies, bit the film is effective in showing that one a person to person level, affinities can overcome these prejudices.
Movie Review: inadequate subtitles
Summary: 3 Stars
Seller was quick and efficient.
The film was the problem. One can still understand the story, but the subtitles don't add much to understanding. They stop mid idea and leave it to the viewer to fill in the blanks. Luckily, the language moves more toward English as the film progresses. A sweet story.
Movie Review: Low key dramedy needs more character development
Summary: 2 Stars
*** This review may contain spoilers ***
This low key "dramedy" from Israel is about a police band from Alexandria, Egypt scheduled to play at an Arab Cultural Center in a particular Israeli town. They end up in the wrong town and spend the night as guests of a single Israeli woman and a young married Israeli man. Although the band consists of eight men, the screenwriter fleshes out only three of them.
The main character is the band's leader, Tawfiq who mainly interacts with the film's protagonist, Dina, the single Israeli woman who tries to make the best of life in what she considers a boring town. There's also Khaled, the youngest member of the band who goes into town with a young Israeli guy and ends up coaching him on how to be more successful with woman. And finally there's Simon, who ends up playing his unfinished "concerto" for Itzik, the young Israeli married man trapped in an unhappy marriage. The movie tries to stress the common humanity of both the Israelis and the Egyptians as they awkwardly interact with one another. The only two characters who rise above sentimental stereotypes are Tawfiq and Dina. Tawfiq is first introduced as being a bit of an authoritarian, especially how he won't allow Simon to conduct the band and orders Khaled around as if he's a child. But later, Dina brings out Tawfiq's softer side when he confesses that his son committed suicide and his wife died of a broken heart; revealing that it was his own heavy handed methods of child-rearing that led to the son's suicide. One wonders what causes Tawfiq to be so impressed with Dina. She confesses while they have coffee in a diner that she's having an affair with a married man. Later at the end of the film, Tawfiq gets up in the middle of the night and overhears Dina and Khaled having sex. Nonetheless, he thanks Dina for her hospitality when the group leaves the next morning.
Dina is impressive as a world weary single still looking for love but again I question how she was able to open up shy Tawfiq in the space of one night. Khaled isn't all that believable as both "love counselor" and rebellious band member. Beyond the little comic moment when he shows Papi how to be successful with women at the skating rink, a few moments of tension with Tawfiq and the fleeting glance of him having sex with Dina, we don't find out much more about him. Even worse is Simon and Itzik who bond over Simon's unfinished musical composition. Itzik has a few comic lines about the difficulties of his marriage and Simon has nothing more to do than his play his clarinet. The other band members are mainly content to remain silent and let the three principals do the talking.
Much of the conflict between the characters in this film is too "soft". It allows the filmmaker to suggest that Arabs and Israelis can overcome their differences since they are so alike. But people are more complex and the screenwriter fails to give his characters enough nuances and enough conflict for this drama to work on a deeper level.
Nonetheless, the film keeps one's interest to the end and there are enough revelations (albeit underdeveloped) that make this film worthwhile seeing.