Film: Live And Become
Release date: 19th April 2010
Certificate: 12
Running time: 143 mins
Director: Radu Mihaileanu
Starring: Mosche Abebe, Sirak M Sabahat, Yael Abecassis, Roschdy Zem
Genre: Drama
Studio: Bluebell
Format: DVD
Country: France/Israel
In 1984, during the Ethiopian famine, Israeli authorities and US state forces launched a clandestine operation to evacuate thousands of persecuted Ethiopian Jews from camps in the Sudan over the border to the safety of Israel. It was known as “Operation Moses”. In 2005’s Live And Become, Romanian-born director Radu Mihăileanu tells the story of a boy caught up in this mass exodus, and of his life in Israel. The film won a number of International awards, including the 2005 award for Best Film at the Copenhagen International Film Festival.
Live And Become begins in a refugee camp in the Sudan, where a Christian boy and his mother are stranded with little hope of survival. Seeing a fleeting hope for her son, the mother gives him away to pose as the child of another woman – an Ethiopian Jew – who is to be airlifted to the safety of Israel by the US as part of “Operation Moses”. The boy takes the place of the woman’s recently deceased son and is given the Jewish name Solomon, (or ‘Shlomo’ in the Yiddish familiar). As he leaves his own mother to board the safety of the plane under this new, false identity she tells him: “Go. Live. Become.”
In Israel, following the loss of his pretended mother and saviour, Shlomo is adopted by a kindly liberal French Jewish family, but still struggles to adapt to his new life. He is viciously stigmatised as the only black child in an unwelcoming and exclusionary culture of white faces, and struggles to maintain the false life of a Jew in Israel, forced daily to hide the shameful secret of his Christianity. We follow his life from boyhood through adolescence and watching him slowly grow into a young man.
Never far from Shlomo’s thoughts is the real mother he left behind in the refugee camp. He is reminded of her when he sites the full moon in the night sky which was shining as he first flew out of the camp and from her, and he never loses hope of one day returning to the Sudan to be reunited with her...
Live And Become succeeds as an intensely human story of a soul unfairly torn adrift from the people and places he knows, and it is on this level that the story shines. Rooted by captivating performances by Mosche Agazai, Mosche Abebe and Sirak M Sabahat as Shlomo, at different stages of his development, we are completely engaged throughout the ample running time of 2hrs 20mins by this lost little boy gradually finding his place in the world in the most testing conditions. Without his family, his roots or his religion, Shlomo is forced to resort to his own character to overcome his circumstances, and it is inspiring to see a wily wit and intelligence emerge from him, and gracefully better the ignorance and prejudices of those around him.
The supporting performances are without exception exciting and absorbing, particularly French actor Roschdy Zem and Israli actress Yael Abecassis as Shlomo’s liberal and opinionated adoptive parents. Yitzhak Edgar, too, as Le Qès Amara, Shlomo’s mentor, is a joy to watch, as he delivers a performance of profound gravity, and the film is elevated rather than diminished (as is too often the case) by some extremely competent child actors as Shlomo’s adoptive brother and sister.
Facts and exposition establishing political situations are delivered simply and effectively; you will need no prior knowledge of the Sudanese refugees nor the political or religious climate in Israel to enjoy this film. Similarly, Mihăileanu has managed to tell a deeply effective story of disenfranchised refugees and their situation in Israel – a hotly political issue – without ever becoming preachy or making us feel lectured to. Largely it’s because Live And Become is not a political film, but rather a human one. The themes being analysed are of identity, and religion, including the fascinating question of what it means to be a Jew. It’s a question Shlomo returns to again and again, and in a climate where religious identity becomes more and more important – in some cases a matter of life and death – it’s still one he never really finds an answer to.
Mihăileanu’s camerawork is superb; active and inventive, without ever becoming intrusive or irritating. Shots of the cities of Israel and Paris and the deserts of Africa are awe-inspiring, whereas the isolated world of the little boy lost away from home is captured in beautiful intimacy. The score is expansive and lush, marrying African and Middle-Eastern sounds, and roots us entirely in this extraordinary world; as strange and foreign to us as to the stranded Shlomo.
In Live And Beyond, Mihăileanu has crafted a wonderful piece of filmmaking, full of mesmerising performances, moments of real tension and tenderness, as well as eye-opening social commentary, and a thankful lack of sentimentality. The plot is occasionally too convenient for comfort, but this criticism shouldn’t detract from anyone’s enjoyment of this powerful and important film. A story about survival, identity, faith; about strength and weakness, compassion and ignorance. A truly epic work from a gifted filmmaker which deserves to be globally recognised. LOZ
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