Cannes: Day Ten continued

News of a clunky, uneven but nevertheless engaging film called 'Free Zone'.

May 20 2005

Natalie Portman returned to Cannes screens yesterday and this time for a very different film to 'Star Wars'.

The actress chose to follow George Lucas's three-film project with a largely Hebrew-language lead role in Israeli filmmaker Amos Gitai's 'Free Zone'.

Perhaps Portman was keen to cleanse her soul after succumbing to one of the greatest expressions of Mammon in film history.

The film opens promisingly with a long scene in which the camera lingers close-up on the face of Portman - here playing Rebecca, an American living in Jerusalem.

She sits in the back of the car and stares out of the window on the rainy city and, as a catchy Hebrew folk song works itself into a frenzy on the soundtrack, starts to cry.

Why, we don't know, until she begins to talk with her cab driver, Hanna (Hanna Laslo), revealing that she has split with her boyfriend.

She then accompanies Hanna on an eight-hour car journey to Jordan, where Hanna must meet Leila (Hiam Abbass), a Palestinian businesswoman who owes her money.

When the money is not immediately forthcoming, the three women travel together to meet Leila's colleague, the 'American'.

At first a light drama with some comedy, especially courtesy of acid-tongued Hanna, 'Free Zone' begins to unravel around the middle as Gitai's desire to reflect on the political history of Israel and Palestine begins to weigh too heavily on his story.

He gives his characters long, clumsy speeches and Portman begins to appear only as a catalyst for others to make lengthy declarations.

It's interesting that Gitai has decided to mirror troubles in the region by putting an Israeli, a Palestinian and an American in the close confines of a car; it's a neat device with potential for strong theatre.

But all that emerges is some less and less interesting conversation that veers between the warm, the antagonistic and the repetitive.

What's the message? That we can all get on if we try, but we must first overcome tension? It's hardly radical and Gitai's exposition ultimately creates a clunky, uneven film, even if it manages always to remain engaging.

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