Footnote (2012)
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Synopsis:
Footnote (Hebrew, translit. He'arat Shulayim) is a 2011 Israeli drama film written and directed by Joseph Cedar, starring Shlomo Bar'aba and Lior Ashkenazi. The plot revolves around the troubled relationship between a father and son who teach at the Talmud department of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
The film won the Best Screenplay Award at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival. Footnote won nine prizes at the 2011 Ophir Awards, becoming Israel's entry for the 84th Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film. On January 18, 2012, the film was named as one of the nine shortlisted entries for the Oscars. On January 24, 2012, the film was nominated for an Academy Award in the category of Best Foreign Film, but lost to A Separation from Iran.
Eliezer Shkolnik (Shlomo Bar Aba) is a philologist who researches the different versions and phrasings of the Jerusalem Talmud. He and his son Uriel (Lior Ashkenazi) are both professors at the Talmudic Research department of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
Uriel, a young charismatic academic, is extremely popular in his sessions with the department's students and the general public, and is also recognized by the establishment when he is elected member of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities. The father, on the other hand, is a stubborn old-school purist in his research methods. He is unpopular, unrecognized, and frustrated by his would-be lifetime research achievement having gone unfulfilled, as a rival scholar, Prof. Yehuda Grossman (Micah Lewensohn), published similar results one month ahead of Eliezer with only a footnote reference to the man he (Grossman) bested. Eliezer is also highly critical of the new methods of research used by his son and other modern researchers, as he considers them feather-light and superficial. His greatest ambition is to be recognized by being awarded the Israel Prize, but he is bitterly disappointed every year when he does not win it. His stubborn nature and lack of recognition have made him bitter and anti-social, and envious of his son's popularity.
During his routine afternoon walk from the National Library back to his Rehavia home, Eliezer receives a phone call from an adminstrative assistant of the Minister of Education. She tells Eliezer that he was elected this year's laureate of the Israel Prize, and congratulates him.
The following day Uriel is summoned to an urgent meeting with the Israel Prize committee. In the meeting Uriel is told that a grave error had occurred, and that in fact it was he, not his father, who was elected laureate of the Israel Prize. The committee wishes to discuss ways to correct the error, but Uriel objects, saying that the revelation would devastate his father. Uriel and the head of the committee, Eliezer's rival Professor Grossman, argue bitterly over the issue, until Uriel loses his temper and punches Grossman.
Regretting his outburst, Uriel relents, but asks that he break the news to his father personally. The committee grants him that. We here discover that not only has Uriel been submitting his father's name for the Israel Prize every year, but that Grossman has been vetoing it every time.
Uriel goes to the National Library to break the news to his father, but finds him raising a toast to winning the prize with colleagues, a toast which he reluctantly joins. Unable to break the news, he once again meets with Grossman, asking that the prize be given to Eliezer nonetheless. Grossman eventually relents, but with two conditions: one - that Uriel would write the committee's recommendation, and Grossman would only sign it; and two - that Uriel himself would never be a candidate for the Israel Prize. Though horrified by the second condition, Uriel agrees.
Uriel writes the recommendation text on his word processor, debating its phrasing with himself, picking and choosing every word carefully; at the same time Eliezer, finally recognized, is interviewed by the newspaper Haaretz, during which he denounces the scientific and academic validity of his son's research. When the interview is published, Uriel initially takes the punch and keeps his secret. Later, unable to endure the insult any longer, he whispers the secret to his mother, Yehudit, revealing the error.
During preparations for a television interview, Eliezer is dumbfounded by a word in the Israel Prize committee's recommendation. He flees the television studio and returns to his study. As a philologist, he examines the word, cross-checking its published uses, and realizes that the text must have actually been written by his son. In his memory he reconstructs his phone conversation with the Minister of Education, realizing she had addressed him by his last name only. He concludes that the minister thought she was talking to his son, not to him, when she broke the news about the Israel Prize.
On the day of the prize ceremony, Eliezer and Yehudit arrive at the Jerusalem International Convention Center to prepare for the ceremony, with each knowing Eliezer's prize is based on an error but not discussing it; Eliezer is excited but also highly stressed, and perhaps devastated. The movie ends a moment before the laureates are called to the stage. It therefore remains unknown whether Eliezer actually received the prize, knowing it was based on an error, or eventually declined it.
Critical reception
The film received high critical acclaim. At Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds a rating of 91%, based on 75 reviews and an average rating of 7.7/10. It also has a score of 82 on Metacritic based on 27 reviews.
Hannah Brown of The Jerusalem Post called the film "brilliant and audacious", and wrote: "Cedar uses dramatic cinematography, music and visual effects to signal that this is a film about an earth-shaking battle, at least in its protagonists’ hearts and minds. The acting is outstanding, notably by Bar-Abba and Ashkenazi." Cedar received the Cannes Film Festival's Best Screenplay Award.
Directed by Joseph Cedar
Produced by David Mandil, Moshe Edery, Leon Edery
Written by Joseph Cedar
Starring
Shlomo Bar'aba
Lior Ashkenazi
Music by Amit Poznansky
Cinematography: Yaron Scharf
Editing by Einat Glaser Zarhin
Studio: United King Films, Movie Plus
Distributed by Sony Pictures Classics (United States)
United King Films
Release date: 14 May 2011 (Cannes Film Festival)
2 June 2011
Running time: 107 minutes
Language: Hebrew
Box office: $1,915,563
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