Jaffa

In many ways, Jaffa is a typical domestic drama that could take place anywhere in the world.  Reuven owns a garage in Jaffa; his son, Meir, and daughter, Mali, work for him there.  He also employs Hassan and Hassan's son Toufik.  Unbeknownst to anyone else in either family, Mali and Toufik are in love, making plans to elope.  Tragedy strikes when Toufik and Meir get in a fight and Meir is accidentally killed.

The twist here is the religious and cultural setting.  In the ethnic and religious mix that is Jaffa, Jews and Muslims get along well enough to work together, but prejudice and suspicion abound.  Reuven values Hassan and Toufik as employees, but Meir and Reuven's wife criticize and deride them as lesser people.  Mali and Toufik share a love that transcends their differences, but are still wary enough to keep their affair secret.

I know I, like every other human, harbor prejudices and preferences that can taint my relationships with others.  But I simply cannot wrap my mind around the animosity between Jews and Muslims as portrayed in Jaffa and many other films (not to mention the nightly news).  Sure they can get along in small ways--hiring them to work in your business, falling in love--but as a whole, they're blowing each other up.  What a sad way to live.  Good movie, though.

Bottom line, 3 stars.

Ajami

Fact: In the Middle East, Arabs and Christians are locked in a death feud, even though they're neighbors, often trade peacefully, go to school together, their children play together and marry.  But they keep killing.  I don't begin to understand it.  Same goes for different groups of Arabs.

Fact: poor young men in poor, hopeless neighborhoods worldwide turn to murder, drugs and other black market activities to try to get by.  I guess I naively thought that religious young men living in the Holy Land, a day's walk from some of the holiest sites of their faith, would somehow rise above.

Fact: revenge killings only lead to more revenge killings.

In Ajami, these two realities come together dramatically and tragically, as several interrelated stories illustrate the struggles in modern Tel Aviv.  It's fast-paced, with sequences deliberately out of order, and sometimes a little complex, one of those movies where they jump to the next scene and you (OK, I.  You are probably a more attentive movie watcher than I am.) have to stop and think, who are these guys and how do they relate to the other guys?  But even my little brain could grasp the stories as they snowball together.

Ajami is gritty, at times violent, and tastes genuine.  Well-made, well-acted, well worth a look.  This land of the Bible is calling out for redemption and reconciliation.  Let it be soon, Lord.

Bottom line, 3 1/2 stars.