It used to be that in your Academy Awards pool you could
place good money on any Holocaust-themed or Israel-as-terror target movie to win the Documentary Feature award. It is perhaps a little too revealing of general
sentiment toward Bibi Netanyahu’s administration and its policies toward
Palestinians, the peace process, and settlements in the West Bank that not one,
but two documentaries that are critical of Israel have been nominated for the
award. The first is an Israeli and Palestinian co-production called 5 Broken Cameras. It is pure documentary
in its most simplistic format, featuring personal footage shot by Emad Burnat, a
resident of Bal’in, a Palestinian village in the West Bank. His cameras
document weekly protests of the settlements that continue to encroach upon
their land and the separation barrier that cuts them off from their livelihood.
The film is divided into segments each one marked by the destruction of one of
his cameras. In the end he displays them all on a table, some broken by the
Israeli Army, one shot, one destroyed in a car accident. All filmed with a
sixth camera that we’re told is still filming today. Burnat’s co-director is
Guy Davidi, who stepped in to help with the editing, the translation of the
Hebrew spoken by Israeli citizens and soldiers, and the voiceover narration
that steadily defines the narrative.
