Ha'aretz hamuvtakhat

(Some plot spoilers) I saw Amos Gitaï's film 'Promised Land' at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 14, 2004 at its 2nd North American screening. The film had just world premiered at the Venice Film Festival on September 7, 2004 where it won the Emblem of Peace Award.

Director Gitaï was at the screening and made some brief introductory remarks during which he said that the film was dedicated to his mother who had passed away during the course of the filming and who had been a lifelong advocate for women's issues. He also said that his main goal with this film was to portray an anti-'Pretty Woman' point of view and to show that prostitution was in no way a life of glamour, champagne and limousines and that prostitution images of that nature, whether portrayed in film media or elsewhere, were even used by criminal elements to lure young women into sexual slavery. Due to time limitations there was no Q and A session after the film.

Certainly with that introduction and the knowledge that this theme and script had attracted international talent as diverse as Hanna Schygulla (The Marriage of Maria Braun, Lili Marleen, Werckmeister Harmonies), Anne Parillaud (La Femme Nikita, Sex is Comedy) and Rosamund Pike (Die Another Day, The Libertine) to appear in the film, I had very huge expectations. Unfortunately, the film could not fulfill them.

(Spoilers start) The story concerns a group of young Eastern European women who are smuggled across deserts and borders at the beginning of the film and then auctioned off in the middle of the night at an outdoor slave market, although they still stay together throughout the course of the rest of the film. They are finally able to determine that they are in Israel and the title of the film is meant to be taken ironically in their case. They were presumably seeking to escape poverty in their home countries but their fate now is likely to be even more cruel. There is no back story provided except for one character's later flashback about seeing a choir sing in a countryside church back in Estonia and her saying in voice-over that 'Estonia seemed so far away'. It was often difficult to tell the women apart due to the dark lighting of the film (The film was so dark that when the cinema's projector went on the blink about 10 minutes in and started showing only intermittent flashing images, the audience sat and continued to watch for a good half minute or so, thinking it was part of the regular film, until finally a few brave souls started to clap in annoyance. After a short repair, the screening continued.) No character or name introduction was made for most of the women which didn't help the situation. They are just objects to be brutalized and assaulted by the various smugglers and guards during the journey. They end up transported to a restaurant/night club that doubles as a brothel and there they are stripped off and hosed down and then superficially dressed and made-up to attract customers. Hanna Schygulla appears in a cameo as the head madam in charge of this process and Anne Parillaud is a junior madam/gang leader. Again, no background is given about them either (although Schygulla calms one of the young women by making it sound like she herself went through the same tortuous journey at one time). At this point a British woman (played by Rosamund Pike) rather mysteriously appears in the midst of the club and there is some suspense as you wonder whether she is there to help the women as some sort of undercover police agent or whether she is a captive herself. The women are held at night on board a ship in the harbor and it is there where the use of a 'deus ex machina' plot device leads to the resolution. (Spoilers end)

Admittedly, the dehumanizing anonymous treatment that the women receive was probably part of the point in order to convey the cold-hearted brutal nature of the background to prostitution, but it didn't provide the audience with a specific character to identify with for most of the running time and when one of the East European women did finally emerge as the lead in this respect, it seemed like an afterthought and rather too late in the plot.

Overall, this has the feeling of an incomplete effort about a serious subject that really deserved more work and it leaves the impression that the budget and thus the shooting schedule did not allow for more to be done. For comparison, see Lukas Moodysson's 'Lilja 4-ever', which gets a similar story across with much more impact, primarily by focusing on a single young woman.

Disappointing, an important story is not told clearly enough. 5/10

Promised Land is one part of the so-called Borders Trilogy that Amos Gitai has crafted, the other two being Free Zone and Disengagement. In this film, he tackles the issue of women trafficking across borders between Egypt and Israel, in which there seems to be no problems, obstacles or conflict between the peoples of both sides engaged in this illegal trade, which still persists, with various filmmakers around the world taking on the issue head on in their respective geographies, in films such as Lilya 4-ever and Your Name is Justine.

This film can be broken down, I believe, into three parts, and on the whole it's like Gitai taking the audience on a journey to witness first hand the ordeal that the female victims are put through. The shaky cam technique helped in putting oneself there in the first person perspective, though it could be somewhat unsettling, as if the perspective and point of view seem to come from being one of the perpetrators of the trade, being able to partake in, yet only standing by like an eyewitness, but unable to reach out and help the girls.

It's not a documentary, but the effect made it look like one, with conversations up close, and plenty of tight shots choosing to disorientate the viewer, just like how the victims are suffering, as they are moved constantly from place to place in hurried fashions, under the blanket of night, trekking across deserts to their final destination, which at the end of the film, you wonder just exactly where you have ended up in. One scene that'll definitely stir some upsetting emotions, is how the women get herded up and inspected like cattle, having their assets exposed and prodded, chided, stripped of their dignity and clothes, while listening to an auction going around them for the best price from the highest bidder. Before that the girls do look as if they're clueless about their impending ordeal, until it's too late.

The second act dealt with an underground club of sorts, which brings the entire film to the one hour mark. Here the girls are prepared, again in quite undignified terms of being hosed down with water to clean themselves, akin to being a prisoner (well actually yes), and the first step toward their sexual slavery, including making up to beautify themselves for their clientèle later. As mentioned, again the audience is put in the spot, standing by to watch but unable to do anything about it. Perhaps yet again we're thrust into the spotlight, because I think the message is clear that should there be no demand, the supply would naturally dry up. I suppose this approach here is like getting people to swear off meat, to varying degrees of success, by having the person witness how meat is being slaughtered and prepared.

Now the third act I believe was pure Gitai genius, though it may irk many to think, that's it? I had very much enjoyed the ending of Free Zone, and this could rival that as being equally powerful. Without giving anything away here, I felt that on one hand the plight of the women were raised, and there doesn't seem to be anything in sight that could rescue them. Then comes that major event that brings us up and about, presenting an opportunity to be grasped and exploited. It isn't impossible of course, given the environment Israel finds itself in from time to time. On the other hand, the Deus Ex Machina approach here may not go down well in being something like a cop out of a finale. But if you dwell on it deeper, it's the honest truth that there's simply no quick and easy solution to have it solved, especially not on film, hence the approach that unless some form of miracle happens, we're not going to see the problem disappear anytime soon.

Promised Land is one long process from beginning to end that hopes to elicit some response from the audience in either raising their awareness of the problem outside of their comfort zones, or for those who are fueling the demand side of things, to perhaps stop and think if they're contributors to a totally inhuman and undignified process. Oh, and fans of Rosamund Pike who might be drawn to the film because of her presence, you're likely to be disappointed as she only as a very limited supporting role in the film.

There should be many movies about this topic so that the powers that be actually start to do something about trafficking. But films like this are not the solution.

The film is clearly shot on a budget, mostly on handheld cameras and without much, if anything, of a script or indeed, a plot.

Many scenes are extended to ridiculous length for no good reason except to pad out the run time.

The direction is awful, as is the screenplay, acting, editing and cinematography. It would be possible to re edit this film from its 88 minutes to about a half hour and still get the same level of drama.

I thought with Rosamund Pike and Anne Perrillaud that it might be worth a watch. I was wrong.

This film is a major disappointment by Amos Gitai.One should even call it a blot on his career.Promised land is neither a feature film nor a documentary nor anything which can lie in between.It features two popular stars Anne Parillaud and Hanna Schygulla but even their presence is not helpful enough to sustain viewers' interest.The film is about the plight of some Russian girls which are sold in Israel but its presentation is really bad. It does not make any sense as in order to heighten the importance of the topic Amos Gitai has decided to shoot the most part of the film in darkness. However darkness cannot hide the film's defects.The film maker has surely not done his homework well due to which viewers are forced to watch a crude succession of abominably cruel scenes in which women are traded like cattle.Most of the actors too suffer in this film as their roles have not been defined properly.Recommendation:better watch this film and be bitter about it rather than being sullen without having seen it.

This was an incredibly important subject...treated in an amateurish, arrogant way. The director expected the audience to understand what was going on...this was impossible: there was no plot, no script to "speak" of, no plot points, no character development, no story development. It was filmed in a shaky documentary style (which is valid if you have something to say). I was always taught that any narrative, be it a movie, book, play, even a piece of music, has to have a beginning, a middle and an end - this dreadful excuse for a movie had a beginning...and then it waffled for the next hour or so until the woman we sort of guessed was the heroine, ran off into the night. Let's be specific: The opening sequence wasn't that bad - very evocative scenes in the dessert, camels, Bedouin, a group of Eastern European women, a campfire, lots of Russian and Arabic chit chat - OK, "expectations build": Next scene (after the first obligatory rape scene): auction of the Eastern European women as prostitutes: very noisy, not sure who the English-speaking (French-accented) person was - a buyer or a seller: couldn't make that out. A van drives by with two people in the back (man/woman) staring out at the auction...who are they, why are they there? Nobody knows. Next scene: in a nightclub (after the "hosing down" of the prostitutes - a highly contrived scene, calculated to make us think of Holocaust victims in the showers - come on Amos, what are you really trying to say? The woman from the van (we eventually learn her name is Rose - Rosamund Pike) which was driving around the auction and her boyfriend (is he her boyfriend?) arrive at the nightclub, one of the prostitutes asks her for help. Rose is totally confused: "What, how, why - I can't help you...why me?" she says indicating that she doesn't even understand the cry for help. Next scene, Rose and her boyfriend (?) are in the passenger compartment of a van with ALL THE PROSTITUTES IN THE BACK! Hello...! What's going on here? She couldn't (or wouldn't) help the prostitute escape, why is she in the van with them? Contrived gratuitous sex scene with Rose and her boyfriend (?). Next scene, the van arrives in a grimy industrial area, unloads the prostitutes at what is apparently a brothel ("The Promised Land" of the title) - and lo and behold, Rose the mystery woman gets out with them and enters the brothel: where's her boyfriend? Dunno... Why is she there with them? Dunno...She and the "heroine" - the prostitute who begged her for help in the nightclub - sit huddled together listening to the driving rain (it wasn't raining when they entered the brothel), talking as if they were old friends. Flashback, to Estonia, the prostitute is a virginal choir girl, singing about the "Peace of Jerusalem" (in English mind you), pure driven snow outside (another "message") and suddenly Rose appears: OK now I'm totally lost. Then the audience is jerked back to the present with a terrorist attack on the brothel - why? There's nobody around, the only people there (apparently) are whores and their johns...upstairs - why a terrorist attack here? Everybody runs outside, the prostitute who asked for help and Rose escape in the confusion and run off into the night. Close. ..and this won a prize at the Venice Film Festival!!!!??? It wouldn't win a passing grade in a student film contest. It's clearly a case of the Emperor's New Clothes: this has to be the most self-indulgent so-called movie ever to grace the screen: even "Plan 9 from Outer Space" had some quirky charm... Sorry Amos - not even an "E" for effort.