VIFF ‘07: Cinema of our Time: Beaufort

This so-called anti-war film helped me understand the difference between a peace film and an anti-war film and why any work one does needs to be carefully labeled. Using the word war is appropriate here because it is almost all about fighting, death, aggression and killing. It is bleak and not the world I want in my mind at all.

The remarkable thing this film achieves is that fear is shown and even embraced by the soldiers depicted. More than one man cries on camera. And this is the “invincible” Israeli army.

The soldiers themselves, through their humour, let us know how incredibly stupid the work they are doing is (we are guarding the mountain so it doesn’t run away).

But the gift, for me, was the parenting insight this film gave. When an explosives expert is ordered to go against his own best judgment and gets blown up, his father is interviewed on t.v. and takes all the blame for his death. His reason is simple: he failed to instill the sense in his son that his son was the most precious thing on the planet. I know of no other mission as a parent more important than this.

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