|
|
The story is known: on Yom Kippur 1973, Israel endured a surprise attack from Egypt and Syria. After a few days of often tough fighting, the IDF prevailed and then made its own gains on both states. In the end, it was an even more impressive show of Israel's force that brought Sadat to the table at Camp David in '78 and left Assad only enough room for some side-shows (aka meddling in Lebanon).
What the series appears to be doing with this history (judging by the first 2 episodes) is to leave the grand narrative to the side and focus on what was going on on the ground. So, we're invited into the barracks and get to know Israeli soldiers, some of whom are not, in fact, Jewish - and some, too, might be personally opposed to Israel's expansionist policies. In other words, if you know James Jones' "Thin Red Line," you know what to expect. The enemy is treacherous, but easily overpowered - in one of the early scenes of combat, 3 Israeli Centurion tanks survive a bomber attack and decimate a Syrian brigade of Soviet T-55s (I think), suffering exactly 0 losses. The fight is tough, but rarely hopeless - as when the listening post/fortress in the Golan Heights is overrun by a Syrian commando, but the defenders hold out for what looks to be hours, enough to plot an escape.
What's admirable about the series is that it makes a genuine effort to tell a complex story. This isn't yet the Israel of today, veering ever further toward right-wing dystopia, but a country that is still reconciling its Enlightenment ideology (of creating a new land with science and effort) with its tenuous hold on a tiny sliver of land lodged between the Arab "wolves." The problem is, the series tends to look as naive as some of the characters. When you shift focus from the macrohistory of the planners and generals to the microhistory of unit leaders and soldiers, you should not only experience the manias and anxieties of individuals caught in the middle of something they can't control, but also get to know the trade-offs that go with being inside a war. The series does show us the inhumanity of this conflict, but it lacks that element of darkness, something that Jones brought into "TRL" by way of irony bordering on satire. It's too painfully straight, even when the characters themselves are dumb or twisted, like the intelligence man with his white rat or the two childish tank commanders who only pretend they're adults.
I don't know, it just doesn't feel like a meaningful contribution.
score 6/10
jammasta-1 17 November 2020
Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw6281647/ |
|
23-11-2020 03:07:07