By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4.75 cats
Director: Eytan Fox
Starring: Lior Ashkenazi | Ohad Knoller | Orly Silbersatz Banai | Oz Zehavi
Original language title: Ha-Sippur Shel Yossi
Country: israel
Year: 2013
Running time: 83
IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1934269/
Bruce says: “I’ll admit to a bit of skepticism when I saw that a sequel to Eytan Fox’s wonderful 2002 film YOSSI AND JAGGER would be made. Sequel can be a very bad word for a film buff. Very few sequels ever measure up to their predecessors. The good news is that YOSSI, the new Fox film, is even better than its forerunner. This puts YOSSI and YOSSI AND JAGGER in the rare company of Denys Archand’s THE BARBARIAN INVASIONS and THE DECLINE OF THE AMERICAN EMPIRE and, to a lesser degree, Cédric Klapisch’s RUSSIAN DOLLS and L’AUBERGE ESPAGNOL. While not an absolute necessity, I highly recommend that each of these pairings should be seen in sequential order.
“Yossi Guttman (Ohad Knoller) is now Dr. Guttman, a cardiac specialist. He works non-stop out of choice. Off hours he goes home watches porn, eats fast food and watches bad TV programs. He is totally dedicated and extremely depressed. His best friend, a fellow doctor, is Moti (Lior Ashkenazi) who wants Yossi to let loose. Moti tells him when they are out at a bar one night, ‘You’re getting a blow job tonight even if I have to do it myself.’ It appears that straight men aren’t as uptight as they used to be. Human Resources reports that Yossi has not taken his vacation; his boss tells him that is more dangerous than eating chocolate. A nurse gently makes advances thinking that Yossi is shy.
“Running away is Yossi’s first reaction to every situation. Several events conspire to profoundly change him. He recognizes a woman who has come for a heart check-up. He finagles a shift change so he can examine her. She says, ‘Do I know you?’ Yossi replies, ‘I don’t think so.’ He is lying. She is the mother of his former partner. He gives her a lift home then one morning, after a drunken binge, he awakens in front of her house. He knocks on the door and she lets him in. She and her husband are having morning coffee. Yossi joins them and what follows is heartbreaking on several different levels. Yossi pulls himself together and tries an on-line dating site. He hooks up with a guy and goes to his home. The guy is rich, successful, very buff, sophisticated and disgusted that Yossi used a picture that was several years old.
“When Yossi comes close to botching a stint insertion, he takes some time off. He decides to go to the Sinai. At a rest stop he meets four soldiers who miss their bus. He offers them a ride and ends up going to a resort where they are staying while on leave. Yossi is shocked that ten years after his service army buddies are now totally comfortable with one of their group being gay; however, he is so shut down that he can’t face joining their activities even when invited. But he doesn’t run away.
“Eytan Fox has a gift for describing the human condition. He and screenwriter Itay Segal zero in on the pathos the Yossi is forced to bear. Their storytelling is tender yet never saccharine. Of course additional praise must be give Ohad Knoller who carries Yossi’s grief and despair with absolute magnificence. Change comes to Yossi but it is not the variety of a light bulb switching on to banish the darkness; his change is more like a dimmer switch that lightens the room ever so gradually. 5 cats
“(YOSSI screened as part of the 2012 Tribeca International film Festival.)”
Thom says: “I’m a big fan of consistency, thus my passion for so many quality television series where I get to see fascinating characters grow over a length of time. In non-fiction there’s the revered 7-UP series & in fiction there’s the unforgettable BEFORE SUNRISE & BEFORE SUNSET (with a reported 3rd film to follow) series, now this fine entry. Fox is my favourite Israeli director and it was YOSSI & JAGGER back in 2002 that first introduced me to both Fox & his character Yossi who in the earlier film was in love with his Army comrade Jagger who dies in the field. It’s been 10 years & Yossi Hoffman has become a doctor but he’s still in love with Jagger & goes so far as to track down Jagger’s parents to express his still deep feelings of loss & regret. As he sets off on a much-needed holiday he runs across a group of young soldiers and follows them to their vacation spot. He connects with one of them, Tom, starts an awkward affair with him and that’s the entire film. But in its simple structure it strongly tells a story I cared about. It was nice connecting with Yossi again in spite of his having chubbed it up a bit. I didn’t really understand his need to disclose his relationship with Jagger to his parents but the scene was dramatic and haunting. The great flow of the film was such that it seemed like only 30 minutes had elapsed rather than 84. 4.5 cats”