Amos Oz: The Nature of Dreams
Cinema Nova. 29/04/10
Status: Starting to get boring…
So here’s the joyful thing about the way I watch movies: I just go. Maybe I have a spare couple of hours between a thing I’m doing and another thing I’ll be doing later, so I just buy a ticket to whatever’s next that I haven’t seen. Sometimes it’s horrible and sometimes it not. Sometimes it’s X-men Origins: Wolverine and sometimes it’s Amos Oz.
For those of you (like me) not up with the Israeli literature scene, Oz is a best-selling author and political activist. He’s as at home discussing books with Salman Rushdie and Nadine Gordimer as he is discussing UN speeches and international politics with his prime minister (or his predecessors).
The documentary itself assumed a whack of knowledge about Zionism, the Israli-Palestinian conflict and about Oz himself - some of which was fair, some not so much. But the focus is always squarely on Oz who was charming, eloquent and funny enough to keep me engaged even when his subject matter went over my head.
The best thing about this documentary was that I had no expectations at all. I bought a ticket because of the screening time and (having no idea who Oz was) the title was giving nothing away. If I'm still being surprised by films at the end of this year-long adventure, I will be very happy indeed.
