Nimrod Eldar is credited as this movie's writer, director, sound designer, and editor. All four of them are very talented, but I wouldn't say they work perfectly together.
Eldar's script is a tense, naturalistic, well-acted family drama focused on a widower and his daughter. The father is a zoo veterinarian, and the first line of the movie is spoken by the unmistakable Yigal Horowitz, a real veterinarian who is famous for treating wild animals in a program in Israeli educational TV. His presence seems like a wink at the audience and generates an expectation of light-heartedness that the script certainly doesn't fulfill. Similarly, the man-mountain Eran Naim, playing a policeman, is sort of a distracting cross-over from the films of Yaron Shani, where he's repeatedly played essentially the same role.
The patient at the zoo is a beautiful leopard. Eldar the director also makes a point of presenting a beautiiful amusement-park ride and some beautiful shots of the Dead Sea area. There are even some facial close-ups that are notable for their artistry. But instead of reinforcing the drama or providing welcome relief from the tension, these visuals call attention to themselves at the expense of audience involvement. The same might be said for some of the long pauses that Eldar the editor has inserted, while Eldar the sound designer has wisely eschewed background music almost entirely but occasionally overdone the sound effects.
I certainly recommend the movie, but overall, it could be that Eldar the director didn't sufficiently trust Eldar the screenwriter and tried to load more ornamentation onto the script than it would bear. It certainly is a bleak story, most of the time, but a director's got to play the hand he's been dealt, even if the game is solitaire.
