Pourquoi Israël (1973)

Directed by

Claude Lanzmann

Genre

documentary film

Country

Israel, France, Italy

Runtime

3h 05m

Rating

7.6 of 10 from 5 voters

Elsewhere

IMDb

How it feels

The film surveys life in Israel twenty-five years after the founding of the state. Claude Lanzmann interviews a range of people including intellectuals, workers, and new immigrants to capture diverse perspectives.

contemplativeobservationalsoberintimatethoughtfulseriousfactualrestrained

What happens

Pourquoi Israël (Israel, Why) is a 1973 French documentary film by Claude Lanzmann in his directorial debut. Premiered just three days after the Yom Kippur War in Israel, it examines life in Israel 25 years after the birth of the state. Lanzmann spends time with, among others, German-Jewish émigrés, intellectuals, dock workers, police, prison inmates and the newly arrived, surveying life in the new homeland. The title is often incorrectly given as a question ("Why Israel?"); however, Lanzmann intended it as an answer or an explanation from a collection of viewpoints. International media attention arose following an incident in Hamburg, where leftist groups violently prevented a showing in October 2009, claiming the movie took a one-sided Zionist perspective. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

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