A robotic vacuum cleaner is a must-have item for every Israeli family in the middle class and above, but it has hardly received any cultural representations yet. “Concerned Citizen”, the film by Idan Hagoel that was released last weekend after a world premiere at the Berlin Film Festival and a local premiere at the Jerusalem Film Festival, corrects this injustice in its very first scene. The electrical device is the first thing we see, and it is likely that this is no accident. It is standing here as a symbol of the local bourgeoisie, which the film will disassemble for the next 80 minutes.
Immediately afterwards, we also get to know the proud owner of the vacuum cleaner, and we are not at all surprised to find out who it is. We are dealing with the poster boys of privileged Israeli liberalism: Ben Varez, a white-haired couple who live together in the south of Tel Aviv in an apartment decorated to the fullest, just like their clothes and their bodies, which one of them cultivates in a gym. Most of the residents in the neighborhood, meanwhile, are immigrants from Africa, but the real estate agent promises that soon this will change and the area will become “the hottest place in town.”
The gay couple invites a straight couple to dinner. The man is stressed by what he sees around him on the street, and sweats at the entrance to the building until the gate is opened for him. The woman is calmer, but makes a face when her friends tell her that they are entering into a surrogacy procedure, and wonders if it is not about exploiting the surrogate.
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While the proceedings are underway, another drama shakes the life of one of the heroes. He sees from the window one of the immigrants leaning against a tree in the street. Being a “concerned citizen”, as the name of the film implies, and especially being an enlightened liberal who cares more about trees than people, our friend calls the municipality and asks that they take care of it – and they do take care of the disproportionate violence that characterizes our area recently. Now, the enlightened hero will have to deal with the feelings of guilt over The violence that started because of him.
The guilt of the privileged is probably the most common sentiment in the popular culture of the last few years – from “The Triangle of Sadness” through “The White Lotus” to this film. The uniqueness of “Concerned Citizen” is that it places all of this in a specific Israeli context, and also that it is not satisfied with one regret only.
The protagonists here feel that they are complicit in various injustices: the exploitation of the surrogate, the gentrification of the neighborhood and the harm to the immigrant leaning against a tree.
To this, Haguel’s script adds another layer. The hero’s feeling of laxity, who takes a passive part in all the injustices around him instead of rebelling against them, harms his relationship and his sexual function. Only when he begins to take responsibility for his actions and what is happening around him, does the erotic desire reawaken in him, which in the context of the film is necessary for the operation of the prostitution procedure, and thus “Concerned Citizen” also becomes a film about the connection between the collective and the personal and the political and the sexual.
Haguel’s script is complex and brilliant. He manages to be witty and sharp without patronizing the characters or degrading them, and his performance is brilliant. The director makes good use of all means of expression. The film is engrossing throughout its 80 minutes, and full of power, strength and other spirit. The music is the icing on the cake. “Concerned Citizen” uses original music written by Zoe Polanski, and adds drama, mystery and melancholy to the result, as well as some familiar hits, whose presence here is surprising.
To demonstrate the character and power of “Concerned Citizen”, I would like to use one scene from it. This will not be a spoiler, because it appears right at the beginning and also in the clips that the film’s production released as part of its marketing campaign. Nor does it necessarily have anything to do with the development of the plot. What is her role? This is a good question, indicating the ambivalence that exists throughout this pearl.
Well, during the dinner where the protagonists are hosting their straight friends, the pair of guests break into a dance, and dance to the tune of “I’m jumping” by the Melol sisters, a song we hadn’t heard before in an Israeli film and probably didn’t expect to see in such a festival drama, and that’s the beauty of it. The choreography here is meticulous. and mesmerizing. The duo dances like unrestrained animals, with the lack of taste and tact that characterizes people who are beautiful souls only in theory. The cinematic expression is full of meaning. It seems that the two are aware of the existence of the camera, and aware of the existence of the audience. They dance for us and against us. They occupy the entire space and cannot be ignored of them, but it is also impossible to know what exactly they want.
The dance is aggressive and unpleasant, where does it come from? Does the aggressiveness express the arrogance of the two privileged, who are convinced that everything belongs to them and that they are the kings of the world? Or maybe the two are actually consumed by mental and sexual complexes and the dance releases their frustrations? A few more such dizzying and enigmatic scenes will follow. They all testify to Haguel’s intelligence, his cinematic talent, and his ability to fuse form and content, images and sounds, camera and movement. In all of them there is a statement and power, destruction and venom, but also enough space for the audience to insert their own interpretation. All these make “Concerned Citizen” one of the best Israeli films of recent years.
The crazy pair are played by Oriya Yablonovsky and Lena Freifeld, who also excelled this year in “Valeria Gets Married”. Ben is played by Shlomi Bartonov, usually a theater star, and next to him is Ariel Wolff who plays Raz. They are all great. The African immigrants have less space in the script, except for one scene where we get to hear the victim’s personal story. This is the weakness of “Concerned Citizen”, which does not develop its non-white characters, and mainly uses them as a background for the story of the privileged. On the other hand, it is, after all, an 80-minute low-budget Israeli film, and it is clear that the canvas is not wide enough for additional storylines.
Be that as it may, the real star of the film is of course the robotic vacuum cleaner, who appears in the first act, returns in the second act and appears again in the third, and this time his symbolic role changes. In the end, it symbolizes not only the bourgeoisie of the heroes, but also their approach to life. They litter, dirty and make a mess, then someone comes and cleans for them, so they can continue their daily routine and make more children who will grow up to be like them.