Zion and his Brother
Eran Merav's stunning first feature offers a fresh and razor-sharp perspective on the loving and sometimes fraught relationship between brothers.
Set in a working-class suburb of Haifa, this gritty drama (which premiered to much acclaim this year at Sundance) sports a stellar cast including Ronit Elkabetz as the boys' mother, who has hitched her hopes for a better life on an auto shop owner.
Fourteen-year-old Zion and his older brother Meir are thick as thieves, but when rough play leads to a tragic accident in which an Ethiopian boy is killed, the brothers are challenged by thorny questions of loyalty and morality.
The pressure of keeping a secret, coupled with Meir's clashes with their mother's boyfriend, stretch the bonds of fraternal allegiance almost to the breaking point, where Zion must decide if he is ready to take responsibility for his own life.
This remarkably assured debut, grounded in rich details about daily life in this neighbourhood, offers us glimpses of a substratum of Israeli society rarely seen on screen.
