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Hadar Bashan Wins The First Prize in the Documentary Division of the International Women's Film Festival in Rehovot
Nighttime. We sat and talked on the tiny lawn in front of my caravilla. Hadar Bashan was flushed with the victory of first prize in the documentary division of the International Women's Film Festival in Rehovot. Her film, 'In the Freiman's Kitchen', depicting the anguish of an elderly religious couple during the last weeks of the expulsion from Gush Katif, had just won the coveted award.
"There were endless films of exploitation bringing not honor to women but rather debasing them," she sadly explained. "My film brought the festival to another level. A higher spiritual level."
Hadar, dressed in ankle-length skirt, her hair carefully covered by a colorful scarf, is an anomaly in the filmmaking industry in Israel. Born and raised in Kibbutz Nezer Sereni near Rehovot, she grew up in the ideology and secularism of the Mapai Kibbutz movement. Nezer Sereni was established by survivors of Buchenwald. "My friends were the children of Holocaust survivors."
An eleventh grade course in traditional Judaism opened her heart and mind to what would become her quest to become a religious Jew. "I was fascinated by our religion and delved deeper. Slowly I began to keep mitzvoth. I didn't talk to my friends about the changes in my life, but the people in my kibbutz saw that I was sincere and began to help me with kashrut." Slowly, very slowly, she swam against the current. "Rabbi Haim Druckman and his family 'adopted' me."
"Who will marry you?" her mother asked. "You are a girl from a non-religious background."
"Today a 'baal teshuva' is more readily accepted, but not when I was making the changes."
Introduced to Gideon Bashan, a young student at Jerusalem's Merkaz Harav Yeshiva, they established their home in Gush Katif. Gideon is the principal of the Tzvia Girls High School in Ashkelon.
"We had seven children and I felt the importance of the religious woman's role as a homemaker. But with the children at school I looked for another outlet. I always loved movies but as a religious woman studying in the secular environment of Sapir College in Sderot, was going against the current. I was 45, the other students were in their 20's. But together we learned filmmaking."
Her first student film showed a 'settler' creating pottery. Her second told a love story between a young religious couple. "The couple never touched yet their intensity jumps from the screen. The secular students were taken aback by the modesty and passion of young love in the religious world."
"I took only two courses every semester and slowly, always slowly, I learned the craft." Her documentary film 'Where to,' a strange choice for a religious woman, went on to become an enormous success in the world of international film festivals.
"We were brought to a Bedouin village as an exercise in learning to shoot film in an unfamiliar environment. There I found a Bedouin tribe with congenital deafness. They spoke to each other using sign language. I saw their movements as dance and I knew it would move on film. The heroine is a simple deaf Bedouin girl who wishes to work outside the village. Her dream is to become wife number one to a husband who would respect her. There is no voice-over, only the quiet and the beat of a drum simulating the heartbeat one hears at absolute silence," Hadar explains.
This unusual film brought acclaim not only to Hadar but to Sapir College in the beleaguered Negev town of Sderot. The film appeared at the Kol Noa Darom Film Festival, Tel Aviv DocAviv, and was accepted in a film festival in Switzerland. "The staff at Sapir College knew I was always looking for truth and were wonderful to me. I had their top-grade equipment at my disposal at all times."
Today, Hadar Bashan sees her film, 'In the Freiman's Kitchen', as a showcase for the settler movement as it tells the story of Gush Katif in its most intimate terms. We see the love and strength of two exceptional people who must with disbelief part from their home and community.
"The film is dedicated to the memory of Yaakov Freiman, who died of a broken heart. He was uprooted from his beloved Gush Katif and slowly perished. I am glad he remains alive in my film." The last scene of the Freiman's placing a cake in the oven for a Victory Party when the decree would be reversed stands out as a great moment in filmmaking. The readings from the poetry of Zelda add to the poignancy of the film. "I want the political Left to understand the consequences of 'disengagement' with its cruel effect on ordinary people."
"My family needed me during these difficult times for we, too, were to be evicted from our homes, but the filming continued."
'In the Freiman's Kitchen' appeared in the Jerusalem Cinematheque Film Festival and will be the focus of a conference on Social Problems in Israel in November. Hadar has been interviewed on Israel tv. She hopes to see the film in international film festivals and television. The movie is in Hebrew with English subtitles.
Source: Rachel Saperstein. Hadar Bashan, Gush Katif filmmaker. IsraelInsider (19 September 2007) [FullText]
"There were endless films of exploitation bringing not honor to women but rather debasing them," she sadly explained. "My film brought the festival to another level. A higher spiritual level."
Hadar, dressed in ankle-length skirt, her hair carefully covered by a colorful scarf, is an anomaly in the filmmaking industry in Israel. Born and raised in Kibbutz Nezer Sereni near Rehovot, she grew up in the ideology and secularism of the Mapai Kibbutz movement. Nezer Sereni was established by survivors of Buchenwald. "My friends were the children of Holocaust survivors."
An eleventh grade course in traditional Judaism opened her heart and mind to what would become her quest to become a religious Jew. "I was fascinated by our religion and delved deeper. Slowly I began to keep mitzvoth. I didn't talk to my friends about the changes in my life, but the people in my kibbutz saw that I was sincere and began to help me with kashrut." Slowly, very slowly, she swam against the current. "Rabbi Haim Druckman and his family 'adopted' me."
"Who will marry you?" her mother asked. "You are a girl from a non-religious background."
"Today a 'baal teshuva' is more readily accepted, but not when I was making the changes."
Introduced to Gideon Bashan, a young student at Jerusalem's Merkaz Harav Yeshiva, they established their home in Gush Katif. Gideon is the principal of the Tzvia Girls High School in Ashkelon.
"We had seven children and I felt the importance of the religious woman's role as a homemaker. But with the children at school I looked for another outlet. I always loved movies but as a religious woman studying in the secular environment of Sapir College in Sderot, was going against the current. I was 45, the other students were in their 20's. But together we learned filmmaking."
Her first student film showed a 'settler' creating pottery. Her second told a love story between a young religious couple. "The couple never touched yet their intensity jumps from the screen. The secular students were taken aback by the modesty and passion of young love in the religious world."
"I took only two courses every semester and slowly, always slowly, I learned the craft." Her documentary film 'Where to,' a strange choice for a religious woman, went on to become an enormous success in the world of international film festivals.
"We were brought to a Bedouin village as an exercise in learning to shoot film in an unfamiliar environment. There I found a Bedouin tribe with congenital deafness. They spoke to each other using sign language. I saw their movements as dance and I knew it would move on film. The heroine is a simple deaf Bedouin girl who wishes to work outside the village. Her dream is to become wife number one to a husband who would respect her. There is no voice-over, only the quiet and the beat of a drum simulating the heartbeat one hears at absolute silence," Hadar explains.
This unusual film brought acclaim not only to Hadar but to Sapir College in the beleaguered Negev town of Sderot. The film appeared at the Kol Noa Darom Film Festival, Tel Aviv DocAviv, and was accepted in a film festival in Switzerland. "The staff at Sapir College knew I was always looking for truth and were wonderful to me. I had their top-grade equipment at my disposal at all times."
Today, Hadar Bashan sees her film, 'In the Freiman's Kitchen', as a showcase for the settler movement as it tells the story of Gush Katif in its most intimate terms. We see the love and strength of two exceptional people who must with disbelief part from their home and community.
"The film is dedicated to the memory of Yaakov Freiman, who died of a broken heart. He was uprooted from his beloved Gush Katif and slowly perished. I am glad he remains alive in my film." The last scene of the Freiman's placing a cake in the oven for a Victory Party when the decree would be reversed stands out as a great moment in filmmaking. The readings from the poetry of Zelda add to the poignancy of the film. "I want the political Left to understand the consequences of 'disengagement' with its cruel effect on ordinary people."
"My family needed me during these difficult times for we, too, were to be evicted from our homes, but the filming continued."
'In the Freiman's Kitchen' appeared in the Jerusalem Cinematheque Film Festival and will be the focus of a conference on Social Problems in Israel in November. Hadar has been interviewed on Israel tv. She hopes to see the film in international film festivals and television. The movie is in Hebrew with English subtitles.
Source: Rachel Saperstein. Hadar Bashan, Gush Katif filmmaker. IsraelInsider (19 September 2007) [FullText]
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