''Free Zone'' is a 2005 film directed by

Amos Gitai Amos Gitai ( he, עמוס גיתאי; born 11 October 1950) is an Israeli filmmaker, who was trained as an architect. Gitai's work was presented in several major retrospectives in Pompidou Center in Paris, the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) and ...

. Shot in

Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...

and

Jordan Jordan ( ar, الأردن; tr. ' ), officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan,; tr. ' is a country in Western Asia. It is situated at the crossroads of Asia, Africa, and Europe, within the Levant region, on the East Bank of the Jordan Rive ...

, the Israeli-

Belgian Belgian may refer to: * Something of, or related to, Belgium * Belgians, people from Belgium or of Belgian descent * Languages of Belgium, languages spoken in Belgium, such as Dutch, French, and German *Ancient Belgian language, an extinct languag ...

- French-

Spanish Spanish might refer to: * Items from or related to Spain: **Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain **Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many Latin American countries **Spanish cuisine Other places * Spanish, Ontario, Can ...

production stars Israeli Jewish actress

Hanna Laslo Hana Laszlo ( he, חנה לסלאו; born 14 June 1953) is an Israeli actress, television presenter and comedian. In 2005, she won a Cannes Film Festival Award for Best Actress for her performance in the film '' Free Zone''. She has also receive ...

Palestinian Palestinians ( ar, الفلسطينيون, ; he, פָלַסְטִינִים, ) or Palestinian people ( ar, الشعب الفلسطيني, label=none, ), also referred to as Palestinian Arabs ( ar, الفلسطينيين العرب, label=non ...

actress

Hiam Abbass Hiam Abbass ( ar, هيام عباس, he, היאם עבאס; born 30 November 1960), also Hiyam Abbas, is a Palestinian actress and film director. Personal life Hiam Abbass was born in Nazareth, Israel, to a Muslim Arab family. She was raised ...

, and

Israeli-American , native_name_lang = , image = , caption = , population = 110,000–150,000 , popplace = New York metropolitan area, Los Angeles metropolitan area, Miami metropolitan area, and other large metropolitan ar ...

actress

Natalie Portman Natalie Portman (born Natalie Hershlag, he, נטע-לי הרשלג, ) is an Israeli-born American actress. She has had a prolific film career since her teenage years and has starred in various blockbusters and independent films, receiving mu ...

. It is the second film of Gitai's "Border" or "Frontier" trilogy. The film made its debut at the

2005 Cannes Film Festival The 58th Cannes Film Festival started on 11 May and ran until 22 May 2005. Twenty movies from 13 countries were selected to compete. The awards were announced on 21 May. The Palme d'Or went to the Belgian film '' L'Enfant'' by Dardenne brothers. ...

on May 19, 2005. It was released in Israel on June 9, 2005, and then appeared at numerous other film festivals throughout the rest of the year, having a limited release on December 16, 2005 in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

Plot

Rebecca (

) is a young American woman who has lived in

Jerusalem Jerusalem (; he, יְרוּשָׁלַיִם ; ar, القُدس ) (combining the Biblical and common usage Arabic names); grc, Ἱερουσαλήμ/Ἰεροσόλυμα, Hierousalḗm/Hierosóluma; hy, Երուսաղեմ, Erusałēm. i ...

for several months. She has just ended her marriage with a Jewish man, Breitberg, after he tells her of having raped a Palestinian woman while he was a soldier. Rebecca herself has a Jewish father but a gentile mother and so, despite her Jewish upbringing, is not considered a Jew according to religious tradition. Crying openly, Rebecca enters a tourist cab, driven by a Jewish Israeli woman, Hanna (

), who is the daughter of

Holocaust The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; ...

survivors. Hanna's destination, to which Rebecca agrees to accompany her, is the free-trade zone or "Free Zone" near

's borders with Syria,

Iraq Iraq,; ku, عێراق, translit=Êraq officially the Republic of Iraq, '; ku, کۆماری عێراق, translit=Komarî Êraq is a country in Western Asia. It is bordered by Turkey to the north, Iran to the east, the Persian Gulf and K ...

, and

Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabia, officially the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), is a country in Western Asia. It covers the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula, and has a land area of about , making it the fifth-largest country in Asia, the second-largest in the A ...

to collect money owed to her husband, who has recently been wounded in a rocket attack. Upon reaching the Free Zone, they meet up with Laila (

), a

woman who serves as the contact for Hanna's husband's black market partnership with a man known as "the American." The three women set off on a tense journey to retrieve Hanna's money and to find the American's son, Walid, who may have absconded with the money. The film is bookended by a rendition of the traditional

Passover Passover, also called Pesach (; ), is a major Jewish holiday that celebrates the Biblical story of the Israelites escape from slavery in Egypt, which occurs on the 15th day of the Hebrew month of Nisan, the first month of Aviv, or spring. ...

song " Had Gadya", performed by

Chava Alberstein Chava Alberstein ( he, חוה אלברשטיין, born 8 December 1946 in Poland) is an Israeli musician, lyricist, composer, and musical arranger. Biography Born Ewa Alberstein in Szczecin, Poland, her name was Hebraized to Chava when she ...

. The song "Ain Ani" by Shotei Hanevua also plays in the taxi at the end of the film.

Cast

as Rebecca. Partly Israeli, partly American, she left

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

to live in

but has no family of her own there. *

as Hanna. After being expelled from Sinai, she established with her husband in the

Negev The Negev or Negeb (; he, הַנֶּגֶב, hanNegév; ar, ٱلنَّقَب, an-Naqab) is a desert and semidesert region of southern Israel. The region's largest city and administrative capital is Beersheba (pop. ), in the north. At its sout ...

. *

as Leila. A Palestinian

Arab The Arabs (singular: Arab; singular ar, عَرَبِيٌّ, DIN 31635: , , plural ar, عَرَب, DIN 31635: , Arabic pronunciation: ), also known as the Arab people, are an ethnic group mainly inhabiting the Arab world in Western Asia, ...

, rejected by her own son for her modern mores. *

Carmen Maura María del Carmen García Maura (born 15 September 1945) is a Spanish actress. In a career that has spanned six decades, she has starred in films such as ''Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown'', ''¡Ay Carmela!'', '' Common Wealth'', and ...

as Mrs. Breitberg. The mother of Julio. In the final cut, she only appears in a superimposed flashback. *

Makram Khoury Makram Jamil Khoury (Arabic:, مكرم يعقوب خوري}, he, מכרם חורי) is an Arab-Israeli actor, born 30 May 1945 in Jerusalem. He was the youngest artist and the first Arab to win the Israel Prize, the highest civic honor in Isra ...

as Samir, the American. A Palestinian orphan who was a refugee in

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2020, it is the second-largest U.S. state by ...

. Now living as a car trader in a Free Zone oasis. *

Aki Avni Yitzhak "Aki" Avni ( he, אקי אבני; born ), is an Israeli actor, entertainer and television host. He appeared in the movie '' Free Zone'' with Natalie Portman. He also played the character Mohsen in the second season of the television series ...

as Julio. Rebecca's former fiancé of

-Jewish origin. They separated after he told her that he had raped a Palestinian refugee during a military operation. * as military officer in the border with Jordan .

Reception

''Free Zone'' received negative reviews from critics. Review aggregator

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...

reports that 26% of critics have given the film a positive review based on 46 reviews, with an average score of 5/10. The website's consensus reads, "The symbolism in this cinematic metaphor on conflicts in the Middle East becomes so overbearing that it's hard to care about the characters or their plight."

Awards

In the

won the Best Actress award, and the film was nominated for the

Palme d'Or The Palme d'Or (; en, Golden Palm) is the highest prize awarded at the Cannes Film Festival. It was introduced in 1955 by the festival's organizing committee. Previously, from 1939 to 1954, the festival's highest prize was the Grand Prix du Fe ...

. The president of the jury said afterward he considered honoring all three ''Free Zone'' actresses with an award for best ensemble acting.

Controversy

During filming at

Western Wall The Western Wall ( he, הַכּוֹתֶל הַמַּעֲרָבִי, HaKotel HaMa'aravi, the western wall, often shortened to the Kotel or Kosel), known in the West as the Wailing Wall, and in Islam as the Buraq Wall (Arabic: حَائِط � ...

on February 23, 2005, the Israeli police asked actors and film crew to leave after protests from Orthodox Jews who were praying there while the crew filmed a kissing scene between Natalie Portman and Israeli actor

. The scene was not included in the final cut of the film.

References

External links

''Free Zone'' – Amos Gitai
official site (interview with director) *
Compilation of reviews
on ''Free Zone'' site
''Free Zone'' images
on NataliePortman.com fansite * Stephen Holden (April 7, 2006).

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

. {{Amos Gitai 2005 films Israeli drama road movies 2000s drama road movies 2000s English-language films English-language Israeli films English-language Belgian films English-language French films English-language Spanish films 2000s Hebrew-language films Films directed by Amos Gitai Films set in Israel Films shot in Israel 2005 drama films 2005 multilingual films Israeli multilingual films