The Boston Jewish Film Festival ends with "Dusk"
On Saturday, another terrific Boston Jewish Film Festival ends
with a bang. Or maybe with a "Crash." The BJFF's final show, its "surprise screening," is Israeli
director Alon Zingman's debut feature "Dusk," which shares the multi-story, interconnected structure of Paul Haggis's 2004
Oscar winner, and like that film even has an auto accident as a central
event. But unlike "Crash," this film's narrative links seem less like
coincidences cooked up by a scriptwriter and more like the head-scratching
synchronicities that happen in real life. (Or in the films of Krzysztof
Kieslowski, whose masterpiece the "Three Colors Trilogy"
comes out on November 15 in new Criterion DVD and blu-ray boxed set editions.)
The characters include a young Argentine woman and her
nine-year-old son dealing with the absence of his father; a woman who suddenly
discovers that she has been adopted and tracks down her biological mother; and
a doctor estranged from his father, a police officer. But maybe the most
compelling drama is that of the teenager whose father inadvertently implicates
her in a criminal act. She had before regarded her father as a figure of
authority, strength, and morality, but now she sees that he is far from
infallible. Up to this point she has been dependent on him, and he has been in
charge of her destiny. But now she must recognize his frailty and assert her own
strength. This theme of the treacherous bond between parents and children, more
than its ingenious interweaving of incidents, unifies "Dusk" into a provocative,
satisfying whole and makes it an excellent choice to cap off this always
rewarding annual event.
"Dusk" screens Saturday,
November 12 at 8:30 pm at the Museum
of Fine Arts.