Lost, But Not in Translation: What Happens When the Band Visits

Israeli cinema produces its fair share of escapism: family dramas, romantic comedies, juvenile humor. But to film festivals and American art-house theaters, the country exports movies soaked in topicality, politics, and conflict. About a group of Egyptians visiting Israel, The Band’s Visit seems to fit into the latter category. Expect cross-cultural understanding, interfaith dialogue, and one or two impassioned exchanges on war and justice. Expect significance. But, in the case of first-time filmmaker Eran Kolirin, don’t. The film begins with the following words, serving as both introduction and disclaimer, scrolling across the screen in Hebrew and Arabic: “Once, not long ago, a small Egyptian police band arrived in Israel. Not many remember this...It wasn’t that important.”

Invited to Israel by a local Arab cultural center, the band—the Alexandria Police Ceremonial Orchestra to be precise—arrive at Tel Aviv airport expecting VIP treatment. But they are met by no one. The image of eight stoic Egyptians, clad in identical powder blue uniforms and lined up all in a row, has the tragic hilarity of a silent movie. In fact, the film’s first twenty minutes are largely wordless, relying on visual incongruity and pitch-perfect timing for humor.

Forced to use their halting English to reach Petach Tikva, the band ends up broke, on a bus to Bet HaTikva instead—a tiny desert town with “no Israeli culture, no Arab culture, no culture period,” as we are told by local restaurant owner Dina (Ronit Alkabetz). What ensues isn’t epochal: culture clash gives way to common ground. But Kolirin forgoes treacle for drollery, and the film’s lingua franca remains the uncomfortable silence. The salty Dina finds beds for the eight Egyptians, out of amused boredom as much as goodwill. She herself hosts the band’s two polar opposites: bandleader Tawfiq (Sasson Gabbai), a man who won’t take off his hat and who calls Dina “Madame,” and Haled (Saleh Bakri), the band’s skirt-chasing screw-up. Instead of going after the heartthrob, she pursues the wizened Tawfiq, and their relationship forms the emotional center of the film. Poor Haled is left to find out what passes for nightlife in the desert—a roller disco straight out of ’76—and play Cyrano for a local Israeli boy, in one hilarious scene demonstrating what to do with a woman.

The film alternates between the tragic, the absurd, and moments that manage to be both. The Band’s Visitis mostly in broken English, the only language the musicians and the locals share. In fact, the film was disqualified from the Oscar’s foreign film category for that reason, and Israel had to submit the Lebanon war movie Beaufort instead. Politics remain under the surface, though popping up in a few clever vignettes, such as the obvious discomfort of one orchestra member forced to eat under posters celebrating the Six Day War. But ideology never quite simmers to a boil—the film dramatizes the unease of strangers forced into close quarters, not the meeting of enemies. Perhaps this is only possible because the Egyptians are stuck in a desert backwater, far from political arguments and far from the Zionist dream. The Bet HaTikva citizenry are more bedeviled by domestic problems, by the dead-end town they live in and the dead-end lives they lead. The young Israelis the band interacts with were born long past kibbutznik glory and far away from settler pride. They were raised on a steady diet of disillusionment and broken promises, and when they meet eight Egyptian musicians dressed in powder blue, no one talks about guns or wars. Instead, they sing.

And I mean that literally. Haled’s favorite pick-up line involves singing “My Funny Valentine.” The dinner-table awkwardness between three band members and their hosts is diffused when they all channel Ella Fitzgerald and break into “Summertime.” Yes, these scenes are a bit too cute, a bit too obvious, but they work. And what else do you expect from a movie about musicians? When asked why the police would need an orchestra, Tawfiq responds, “It’s like asking why a man needs a soul.” Music and art and culture—if there is any hope for peace, maybe that’s where it lies. Or not.

Towards the end of the movie, we find out the source of Dina’s Egyptian attraction. As a child, she used to watch Egyptian movies on the Israeli TV station every Friday afternoon, and since then she has dreamed of “big Egyptian love.” The streets of Israel would empty out because everyone was inside, watching Omar Sharif with Hebrew subtitles. Dina wants Tawfiq to be a movie brought to life—minus the subtitles. In some ways, the musicians’ entire visit takes place in the shadow of those Arabic melodramas. That’s all that art can hope to do—cast a shadow larger and stronger than politics can.