Μύ User Rating 
First-time filmmakers Dalia Hager and Vidi Bilu break fresh ground with Close To Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ, bringing the lives of Israel's female soldiers to the screen for the first time. Drawing on one of the writer/directors' own army experiences, it charts the slow-starting friendship between Smadar (Smadar Sayar) and Mirit (Naama Schendar), two 18-year-old conscripts assigned to scout the streets of Jerusalem together. More a buddy movie than a political one, it nonetheless captures the festering tensions of a divided city.
There's unease at the outset as we see Smadar nosing through an Arab lady's possessions during a border inspection. A rebel uncommitted to the cause, Smadar meets her opposite in the extremely conscientious Mirit. It's hate at first sight as the pair are partnered on street patrol, checking the IDs of Palestinian passersbys. Eventually, grudgingly, they become firm friends.
"FLIRTS WITH FRIVOLITY"
The film highlights the numbing drudgery of the job ("Don't sit down, don't talk on your cell phones, don't eat, don't smoke," barks hardcase commander Irit Suki), as well as the responsibilities and dangers it entails. Arguably, though, it risks losing a sense of the bigger Israeli-Palestinian picture in focusing so closely on the girls' everyday trials and tribulations. A terrorist bombing, for example, segues into a somewhat inconsequential romantic sub-plot. Still, while the picture flirts with frivolity, it doesn't descend into Private Benjamin-style farce, ending on a pointed, troubled note. What's more, there's a convincing chemistry between the leads (the feisty Sayar is especially watchable) that bonds the episodic story into an engaging whole.
Close To Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ (Karov La Bayit) is released in UK cinemas on Friday 6th April 2007.
