Penny Woolcock's inventive film adaptation corrects some of the anti-Israel bias of Alice Goodman's libretto about the 1985 Achille Lauro highjacking. From the title onward -- the crippled American Jew didn't die, he was murdered -- I found the libretto biased against the Jews and whitewashing the terrorists. Woolcock makes enough attempts at balance that the Palestinian Film Festival rejected the film for being pro-Israel. Of course, it's not that simple.
Woolcock strips away the heroism of Goodman's terrorists. A pre-title sequence shows the beaten quartet arrested, defeated, woebegone, confronted by the widowed Mrs. Klinghoffer. In the epilogue the four "heroes" are again diminished. Leader Molqi has grown into a pampered big shot, chauffeured into the village in a Mercedes limo The idealistic Mamoud is a broken man, led away from a chance meeting with his damaged old girlfriend. His friend Omar has an arm in a sling, another emblem of reduction. This inflection may have disturbed Palestinian audiences because those terrorists — like their descendants — are national heroes.
The narrative opens with black and white footage of May 15, 1948, the day after Israel's creation as a state. Woolcock often intercuts the black and white (pseudo- documentary) past with the colour present, an emblem of the past as a persistent ghostly presence. In her choice of how to define that source of the conflict, Woolcock stays within Goodman's blinkers. She takes the Palestinian perspective — that the birth (and the continuing existence) of Israel was a disaster to the Arabs.
Woolcock begins with a specific incident where a young Israeli, a concentration camp survivor,whipped and tattoed, leads a raid which expels the Arab family from which Mamoud descends. That Israeli and his wife are among the hostages on the Achille Laura. Unlike the libretto Woolcock includes several obvious Jews among the hostages in addition to the Klinghoffers. As the other Jews are not per se singled out for abuse the implicit effect is to exempt the terrorists from anti-semitism, beyond Rambo's rhetoric. Klinghoffer becomes "the chosen" victim not because he exposes the terrorists' false-idealist bloodlust but because Rambo drew his passport at random from a passenger's bag. Finally, the presence on board of Mamoud's nemesis might be taken to justify the attack. In sum, the film like the libretto whitewashes the terrorists' anti-semitism. Hamas, of course, is constitutionally pledged to annihilate all the Jews, not just the Israelis.
Woolcock dramatizes the four terrorists' radicalizing. Mamoud, his beautiful girlfriend and three buddies witness Israeli soldiers knocking over a fruit stand and killing the merchant. A spray of pamphlets introduce them to the radical cause and the men lock hands over the Koran. A title — "Islamic fundamentalism flourishes in a climate of despair" — introduces Woolcock's most dramatic addition. Our four heroes are in the mob that stones his girlfriend for not wearing a hijab in public. When we later see her her face is still badly burned and bruised and she hides behind the cover.
If both Klinghoffers seemed burdened with bathos and the Jewish comic stereotype in the libretto, the performance elevates them both. Klinghoffer is made likable and brave. He poses comically for a passenger's camera. His diminishing, silly soliloquy ("I should have worn a hat") is made touching and emotional when he delivers it in close-up to assure his cuddling wife. As Rambo coldly watches the loving couple the murder seems to grow out of his envy. She watches two terrorists cruelly toy with her crippled husband below and sleeps through the sound of his shooting (which we see here, but only heard about in the libretto). After the murder, into the unawares Mrs Klinghoffer's face Rambo sings of having taken the Jew's filthy money. His callousness and her dignity correct the values in the libretto.
Mamoud is moved by Mrs Klinghoffer's first aria. Her finale segues through three settings. In the first her rage shrinks the captain. In the second two women passengers change her clothing to disembark. In the third she sings her memories of her husband to the passengers and reporters gathered on the pier. Her dignity, impassioned singing and emotional force gain majesty from the respectful faces of the listeners. The film makes her the clear hero and the dominant spirit, in contrast to her fatuous stereotyping in the libretto.
Woolcock strips away the heroism of Goodman's terrorists. A pre-title sequence shows the beaten quartet arrested, defeated, woebegone, confronted by the widowed Mrs. Klinghoffer. In the epilogue the four "heroes" are again diminished. Leader Molqi has grown into a pampered big shot, chauffeured into the village in a Mercedes limo The idealistic Mamoud is a broken man, led away from a chance meeting with his damaged old girlfriend. His friend Omar has an arm in a sling, another emblem of reduction. This inflection may have disturbed Palestinian audiences because those terrorists — like their descendants — are national heroes.
The narrative opens with black and white footage of May 15, 1948, the day after Israel's creation as a state. Woolcock often intercuts the black and white (pseudo- documentary) past with the colour present, an emblem of the past as a persistent ghostly presence. In her choice of how to define that source of the conflict, Woolcock stays within Goodman's blinkers. She takes the Palestinian perspective — that the birth (and the continuing existence) of Israel was a disaster to the Arabs.
Woolcock begins with a specific incident where a young Israeli, a concentration camp survivor,whipped and tattoed, leads a raid which expels the Arab family from which Mamoud descends. That Israeli and his wife are among the hostages on the Achille Laura. Unlike the libretto Woolcock includes several obvious Jews among the hostages in addition to the Klinghoffers. As the other Jews are not per se singled out for abuse the implicit effect is to exempt the terrorists from anti-semitism, beyond Rambo's rhetoric. Klinghoffer becomes "the chosen" victim not because he exposes the terrorists' false-idealist bloodlust but because Rambo drew his passport at random from a passenger's bag. Finally, the presence on board of Mamoud's nemesis might be taken to justify the attack. In sum, the film like the libretto whitewashes the terrorists' anti-semitism. Hamas, of course, is constitutionally pledged to annihilate all the Jews, not just the Israelis.
Woolcock dramatizes the four terrorists' radicalizing. Mamoud, his beautiful girlfriend and three buddies witness Israeli soldiers knocking over a fruit stand and killing the merchant. A spray of pamphlets introduce them to the radical cause and the men lock hands over the Koran. A title — "Islamic fundamentalism flourishes in a climate of despair" — introduces Woolcock's most dramatic addition. Our four heroes are in the mob that stones his girlfriend for not wearing a hijab in public. When we later see her her face is still badly burned and bruised and she hides behind the cover.
If both Klinghoffers seemed burdened with bathos and the Jewish comic stereotype in the libretto, the performance elevates them both. Klinghoffer is made likable and brave. He poses comically for a passenger's camera. His diminishing, silly soliloquy ("I should have worn a hat") is made touching and emotional when he delivers it in close-up to assure his cuddling wife. As Rambo coldly watches the loving couple the murder seems to grow out of his envy. She watches two terrorists cruelly toy with her crippled husband below and sleeps through the sound of his shooting (which we see here, but only heard about in the libretto). After the murder, into the unawares Mrs Klinghoffer's face Rambo sings of having taken the Jew's filthy money. His callousness and her dignity correct the values in the libretto.
Mamoud is moved by Mrs Klinghoffer's first aria. Her finale segues through three settings. In the first her rage shrinks the captain. In the second two women passengers change her clothing to disembark. In the third she sings her memories of her husband to the passengers and reporters gathered on the pier. Her dignity, impassioned singing and emotional force gain majesty from the respectful faces of the listeners. The film makes her the clear hero and the dominant spirit, in contrast to her fatuous stereotyping in the libretto.