Far from Perfect, Far from Terrible

Excellent adaptation.

Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.

There are not many films that will make me ponder about my mortality. Sitting in the old- school cinema of The Projector last night, I think only Departures (2008) made me do that. About what exactly? About whether my life journey up to that point has yielded dividends in terms of significant milestones and character building; about whether I have laid the path ahead of me; about whether I have enriched my own life so that I can enrich others who crossed my path; about my legacy. Departures changed my life. Since then no other films have come along to make me contemplate the deeper aspects of my mortality. That is until last night. The Farewell Party (2014) opened the Israeli Film Festival here and what a film it was. I found myself laughing so hard at the antics and ideas, but I think I got ahead of myself here. The story is about a group of old friends living in a retirement home for old folks. Life is hard when they see their friends slowly dying from debilitating diseases. So a tinkerer tinkers out a self-euthanising machine to put the choice of life or death in the hands of terminally ill patients. Soon the rumours of the machine spread and more people ask for their help. The group of friends are now faced with a life and death dilemma. I think this gem of a film is what it means to laugh in the face of death. From the get go scene of a woman getting a phone call from God, me and my friends and a near full-house audience were laughing till our sides hurt. This is not rude humour of the Hollywood kind but sensitive and compassionate. By tackling the difficult theme of euthanasia through comedy, it provides a way into a labyrinthine can of worms. It feels real and genuine, not made up to gain sympathies. The tone is deftly maintained from the first scene to the last with nary a misstep. Nothing is overcooked; everything timed perfectly. It is warm and comforting; like snuggling underneath a warm blanket with your significant other in cold weather. There is joy coupled with deep sadness. Get ready to laugh through streaming tears. The writing is marvellous and effortless in a sense that the two writer-directors must have written this from a deep place of hurts but yet it doesn't want to wring your emotions dry. It rises above the common denominator and glides from scene to scene like an angel on wings. It is thorough but never exhausting. It dares to ask hard questions but never forces its ideas down your throat. Get ready to debate after the movie because you will want to. The acting by the ensemble cast is amazing. Watch out for a scene in which they wear nothing just to cheer a friend up. The exquisite balancing act is sheer masterclass. Not many directors would be able this pull it off and I think you really need to be an amazing human being to be able to do this, and we got two here. Tal Granit and Sharon Maymon were there last night with an illuminating post-film discussion. Their talk was candid, heartfelt and they shared from a deep place. I had a chance to talk to them later about a scene in which the actors did a song number that felt like the only misstep for me and you know what... their explanation convinced me it wasn't. Love the film; love them.

The Israeli movie Mita Tova was shown in the U.S. with the title The Farewell Party (2014). It was co-written and co-directed by Tal Granit and Sharon Maymon. It's described as a drama/comedy, but it's not very funny.I like the concept of the movie--a group of older people in a retirement home are brought together to help members of their group who are suffering. Can they technically manage euthanasia? What are the ethical and moral implications? What are the legal implications?The most difficult situation does not involve physical pain. Levana, played by Levana Finkelstein, is a beautiful, intelligent woman who is showing signs of dementia. She's astute enough, in her lucid moments, to understand what's happening to her. What is the wisest answer to her terrible problem?The directors made a brilliant casting decision when they chose Ms. Finkelstein as the actor to play Levana. We tend to think of patients with dementia as being very old, with disheveled hair and clothing. Finkelstein does not conform to this stereotype. She is youthful, attractive, and stylish. We realize that this woman had a reasonable expectation of many more years of happiness. Sadly, that expectation will not be fulfilled. It's tragic.I found the comic portion of the movie to be problematic. Certainly, you can have comic interludes in a tragedy. However, I don't believe directors Granit and Maymon succeeded in making the comedy work. To me, this was a drama, and I think viewers should approach it as a drama. If you enjoy the comic aspects of the movie, all the better.We saw this film at Rochester's Little Theatre, as part of the fabulous Rochester International Film Festival. It will work very well on a small screen.

The Farewell Party was probably the funniest film at this year's Palm Springs film festival. It had to be. It's about euthanasia. By making it equal parts farewell and party the comedy made the sombre reality bearable.In an Israeli retirement home a modest inventor Yeheskel devises a machine to add a mortal combination to a hopeless patient's IV. The delicate operation is done by a heavy combination of gears and chains that looks like it would raise a drawbridge. That's a comic paradox akin to "mercy killing." He makes it for his old friend Max, who begs for release. The only doctor who will help is a vet, another resident.Yeheskel and his accomplices do not take their enterprise lightly. At every step it's a battle of conscience, to determine whether they're taking a life or saving it. It's a fight between the law and justice. When the home's administrator scolds them for an indecorous generosity, her piercing, personalized insults make their justice superior to her law. They're also supported by an incidental news report, which features the daily traffic mortality count — an unsolved problem larger than mercy killing — and the story of an 80-year-old man who with no other alternative killed his suffering wife then himself.Yeheskel's wife Levana is at first the most strenuously opposed to the death machine. But as she slips into humiliating dementia she comes to crave it herself. At the first sign of that Yeheskel destroys his machine. He won't use it on her. Or rather, for her. Then he remembers serving his beloved's needs should trump his own, so he rebuilds it to let her die in comfort and dignity.The framing story of one Zelda provides the religious context. In the first scene she gets ostensible phone calls from God, advising her to continue her treatments because there's not yet a vacancy in heaven. At the end she lets on that she knew it was Yeheskel all along. When she gets his treatment it's interrupted twice by power failures. She takes that as a sign from God and resolves to live on. Thus we contrive a higher power to direct us, i.e., to let us do what we want.Even these modest saints remain human, too. The vet's lover — who literally comes out of the closet — is venal enough secretly to collect a fee for the service. He's banished from the group and the affair.When Yeheskel gives his Levana the last "duckie kiss," it's what he gives his granddaughter. The characters' playfulness expresses their essential childishness, a vestigial joy and innocence. As Levana tells the administrator, "Their bodies are old but they're still children inside." To their credit. Retired from work and responsibility they're free to be young again however they can. That's the last joy in life. So, too, the old veterinarian is still trying to find a way to tell his mother he's gay.The fall setting outside reminds us that death is just a part of the natural cycle. That continuity also impels the musical interlude where the dead join the living to sing about Neverland.This marvellous film is required viewing for governments considering regulations to allow for assisted suicides. They all should be. .

This movie has brought be to tears - which is extremely unusual for me.Going through a similar process with my late father, I can say that the movie is very accurate.Such an amazing mixture of laughter and tears. So real, and so different from the run-of-the- mill, dime-a-dozen, Hollywood films. The kind of movie that provides you with real food for thought and a long lasting impression. I was greatly impressed by the very high quality of acting, direction, editing and cinematography, which is rare in the Israeli films landscape. I would most definitely rate is the best movie I've seen the past year.