AHED’S KNEE
Directed by Nadav Lapid
Narrative Feature | France/Israel/Germany | 2021 | 109 min | Hebrew with English subtitles
Philadelphia Premiere
Winner of the Jury Prize at the 2021 Cannes Film Festival and selected as a Special Presentation of the 2021 Toronto International Film Festival, Nadav Lapid’s latest film cements the celebrated filmmaker’s reputation as one of Israeli cinema’s most thought-provoking provocateurs.
Y, an acclaimed, controversial director, is casting his new project: a video piece called The Knee of Ahed Tamini (a response to a viral video of a Palestinian girl confronting IDF soldiers after the shooting of her cousin, and the subsequent tweet shared by an outraged far-right politician). He has also accepted an invitation to screen and discuss his previous film at a small library in the Arava desert. During the flight, Y asks the pilot permission to shoot the landscape from the cockpit window. His video messages to his cancer-ridden mother, his long-time creative collaborator, are made up of little moments like this from his trip. Upon landing in the Arava valley, a young woman, Yahalom, who set up the screening, greets Y and drives him to his hotel. In getting to know Yahalom, Y learns that she is both an avid fan of his film catalog and the prevailing Deputy Director of the Division of Public Libraries at the Ministry of Culture – the Israeli government agency in control of what art sees the light of day in the homeland. Required to sign a document designed to suppress any conversation during the event that could potentially paint the country in an unfavorable light, Y responds to Yahalom’s preemptive gesture, the only way he knows how: through the lens of his own experience.
Official Selection:
- Cannes Film Festival
- Karlovy Vary International Film Festival
- New York Film Festival
- Toronto International Film Festival
Awards:
- Jury Prize | Cannes Film Festival