2015:
Taking part in the first festival on IMDb's Film Festival board (RIP), I found one of the most intriguing-sounding titles to be a movie that I was sadly unable to find anywhere to watch in the UK.
2017:
Keeping the film on the list of titles I wanted to track down,I was absolutely thrilled to stumble on the movie on Netflix UK,which led to me finally meeting Omar.
The plot:
Returning from the West Bank barrier after secretly meeting his girlfriend Nadia,Omar gets beaten up by Israeli soldiers. Telling his pals Tarek and Amjad about the beating,the guys decide to stage an attack at a checkpoint. During the attack,Amjad kills an Israeli solider. Despite not being the killer, Tarek gets stuck with being the one accused of the killing,as Omar gets arrested. Imprisoned, Omar is given a new barrier in life,of being a double agent.
View on the film:
Shot round the barrier of Israeli and Palestine,writer/director Hany Abu-Assad & cinematographer Ehab Assal give the title a stylish crispness which glitters in on location tracking shots keeping up with Omar's race to escape the divide he is trapped in. Imprisoning Omar (passionately played by an intense Adam Bakri) Abu-Assad closes in with tightly coiled close-ups that are released as Omar decides that he only has one action left to free himself of the betrayal from all sides.
Casting Nadia and Omar against a heart-felt Romeo and Juliet backdrop,the screenplay by Abu-Assad (who wrote it in 4 days!) wonderfully counters the slick camera moves via a gripping deconstruction of Omar's trust,which is visually bruised by the horrific beating Omar gets from the soldiers,and psychologically left a thousand pieces by the dominating doubts Nadia,Amjad and Tarek has that Omar is betraying them. While hitting the friendship between the trio with a great final twist, Abu-Assad fails to go in depth with the bond between each of them,with the situations largely lacking the emotional intensity that the situations desire,as Omar finds a barrier of betrayal.
Taking part in the first festival on IMDb's Film Festival board (RIP), I found one of the most intriguing-sounding titles to be a movie that I was sadly unable to find anywhere to watch in the UK.
2017:
Keeping the film on the list of titles I wanted to track down,I was absolutely thrilled to stumble on the movie on Netflix UK,which led to me finally meeting Omar.
The plot:
Returning from the West Bank barrier after secretly meeting his girlfriend Nadia,Omar gets beaten up by Israeli soldiers. Telling his pals Tarek and Amjad about the beating,the guys decide to stage an attack at a checkpoint. During the attack,Amjad kills an Israeli solider. Despite not being the killer, Tarek gets stuck with being the one accused of the killing,as Omar gets arrested. Imprisoned, Omar is given a new barrier in life,of being a double agent.
View on the film:
Shot round the barrier of Israeli and Palestine,writer/director Hany Abu-Assad & cinematographer Ehab Assal give the title a stylish crispness which glitters in on location tracking shots keeping up with Omar's race to escape the divide he is trapped in. Imprisoning Omar (passionately played by an intense Adam Bakri) Abu-Assad closes in with tightly coiled close-ups that are released as Omar decides that he only has one action left to free himself of the betrayal from all sides.
Casting Nadia and Omar against a heart-felt Romeo and Juliet backdrop,the screenplay by Abu-Assad (who wrote it in 4 days!) wonderfully counters the slick camera moves via a gripping deconstruction of Omar's trust,which is visually bruised by the horrific beating Omar gets from the soldiers,and psychologically left a thousand pieces by the dominating doubts Nadia,Amjad and Tarek has that Omar is betraying them. While hitting the friendship between the trio with a great final twist, Abu-Assad fails to go in depth with the bond between each of them,with the situations largely lacking the emotional intensity that the situations desire,as Omar finds a barrier of betrayal.