When Israeli war correspondent, Shlomi Eldar got banned from entering Gaza after Hamas came into power, he needed a new beat to cover. Taking to the Hospitals, Eldar found not just a new beat, but a new opportunity to open communications between the Israelis and the Palestinians in a conflict that appears to have no end in sight.
After learning of a recently born Palestinian boy suffering from a rare immune deficiency disorder, which if left untreated will result in death, Eldar uses contacts from his affiliated news organization to go public in hopes that someone will donate money for the necessary bone marrow operation.
What follows is a powerful story that unfortunately felt more like a special extended commercial-free episode of 60 Minutes than any cinematic documentary. At every turn, the earnestness of this family’s desperate situation to save their boy’s life was overshadowed by noticeably trite musical cues and unnecessary first-person voice overs. These aspects of the film seemed to exist only to falsely elicit emotion from me in an otherwise already powerful story where the subject matter speaks for itself.
This film’s strength, however, was when the focus turned to the Palestinian mother who at one point candidly reveals that she would not be opposed to having her son, who is being treated by Israeli doctors, grow up to become a suicide bomber. Differences in religious belief and whether one believes life is precious or not are just two of the important conversation starters in opening dialogue and beginning to reach for peace.
In showing all the spectrums of ideology of everyone involved in the young boy’s life, I can see why this film won the Israeli Academy Award for best documentary. I guess their Academy values substance over style, whereas I prefer rich in context documentaries that are able tug at my heartstrings without generic emo-keyboard chords overlapping the drama.
Showtimes for Precious Life:
Monday, Jul 25 – 3:00pm (Castro Theatre)
Saturday, Aug 6 – 12:20pm (Roda Theatre – Berkeley)
Sunday, Aug 7 – 12:10pm (Oshman Family JCC – Palo Alto)
