"Bethlehem" (2014)

Bethlehem is about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but it treats its subject in an unexpected manner. The conflict here has been stripped of the religious and political factors that have made it so complicated and inextricable. What remains is the personal, human core driving the struggle between Palestinian resistance fighters and Israeli police. 

Yuval Adler’s direction and Adler and Ali Wakad’s script tell the film with a level of docu-realism that makes the story harrowing and bleak at times. But Bethlehem isn’t entirely consumed by its sense of indignation and close observance of detail; indeed, the film is largely a taut, deftly plotted thriller that culminates in a devastating, intense final sequence. 

Sanfur (Shadi Mar’i) is a young man whose older brother Ibrahim (Hisham Suliman) is the leader of a Palestinian resistance movement known as Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades. Sanfur has become an undercover asset for the Israeli officer Razi (Tsahi Halevi). Sanfur has father figures in his life, including his own constantly disappointed real father, but he’s been neglected and overlooked and that’s easily drawn him into the influence of Razi. But Razi also holds real affection and concern for the boy and worries about his well-being and future even as events mount to tear apart their tender relationship. 

Bethlehem doesn’t lack for exciting action, but it’s often at its best when providing a glimpse into a world largely unfamiliar and rarely seen for many of us here in the states. Adler has a high level of empathy for his characters especially his two central figures, and one of the film’s strongest feats involves showing how little any political views factors into day-to-day decisions on both sides. The personal as political, as it were, is what stands out. These political actors are so far removed from what initiated the violence playing itself out that their motivations often feel more grounded in traditional gangster and cop, cat-and-mouse fighting than the complicated realities of the disputed territory. 

At times, it feels incredible that a film like Bethlehem was ever made. The film was shot on location in Israel and Palestine in the disputed territories of interest. The film feels startling true and honest about the real world tragedies it is informed by and fictionalizing, and this only serves to makes its own narrative all the more poignant and tragic. I keep thinking of the title; the film opens on a city sign denoting we’re in Bethlehem. It’s being shot at and is riddled with bullet holes. It’s hard to imagine this as the same land, of rebirth and salvation, mentioned in the Bible. Yet it is. 

Grade: A-