Movie Review: The Band's Visit (Bikur Ha-Tizmoret- 2007)

The Band's visit is a delightful movie from Israel made by Eran Kolirin. The premise of the movie is very simple, a band from Egypt is invited by the Arab Cultural Center of a town in Israel to play for their inauguration. Unfortunately something goes amiss in communication and no one comes to receive them to the airport leaving them to deal with transportation on their own. They manage to reach the town they think they need to be in, but obviously they make a mistake and land up in an incorrect similar sounding town. The movie is mainly about that and the day they spend at that town. This is a very slow moving movie where nothing much happens but yet is a very heart warming movie about people. The conductor of the Alexandria Police Orchestra is Lieutenant-Colonel Tawfiq Zacharaya (Sasson Gabai) while the proprietor of the town restaurant is Dina (played by the ever so exemplary Ronit Elkabetz, who is also there in 'Late Marriage').There are a motley of other band members and people in the town who also add to the movie. The plot might not be much but the expressions of the people and the portrayal of the scenarios is worth it to watch this movie. The dialogues are in a mixture of Arabic, English and Hebrew and it is definitely a shame that this was not accepted as the official entry for the Oscars last year.