Part love story, part thriller, part anti-hate polemic, "Time of Favor" is a complex, involving issue movie which remembers that in order to impart a message, you have to entertain.
Set largely within an Orthodox Jewish settlement on the West Bank, it's a claustrophobic, cautionary look at the dangers of fundamentalism - but while many film makers sneer at strongly held values or divine belief, Israeli writer-director Joseph Cedar (an ex-paratrooper who grew up in an Orthodox Jewish community) strives to understand each of his characters and give their views equal respect (if not equal weight).
It opens with three friends, Menachem (Avni), Pini (Alterman), and Itamar (Selektar), clambering through a catacomb before stopping to pray. The reason for this underground excursion? To be on the Jewish holy place Temple Mount, which also happens to be the location of the Dome of the Rock - a sacred site for Muslims. Jerusalem is a divided city, and this subterranean pilgrimage is a symptom of the hatred between the Palestinian and Jewish communities, but "Time of Favor" is most concerned with the tensions rife within the Israeli settlers.
Raised under the tutelage of the charismatic Rabbi Meltzer (Dayan), Menachem has become a respected, pragmatic soldier, keen to serve his friends but disturbed by the region's hatred. Pini, meanwhile, is an academically brilliant student who wants to bring his theological beliefs to bear in a practical - aka dangerous - way.
Complicating matters is Meltzer's daughter, Michal (Tinkerbell - no, really), who has been promised to Pini but fancies Menachem. It's a combustible situation. And a fascinating one. For while there are straightforward 'thrills' to be had here - the finale is Hitchcock tense - Cedar is always prompting his audience to think. You'll leave entertained, but also provoked.
In Hebrew with English subtitles.
Time of Favor (2002)
