8/13/2014

"Mistakes happen. But family is the one that loves you and raises you"

Title: Le fils de L'autre (The other son)
Year: 2012
Genre: Drama
Director: Lorraine Lévy
Writer: Noam Fitoussi (original idea), Lorraine Lévy and Nathalie Saugeon (screenplay)
Runtime: 105min
Cast: Emmanuelle Devos, Pascal Elbé, Jules Sitruk, Mehdi Dehbi, Areen Omari, Khalifa Natour, Mahmud Shalaby, Ezra Dagan
Produc.: Rapsodie Production, Cité Films, France 3 Cinéma, Madeleine Fims, Solo Films, Orange Cinñema Séries, France Télévision, Useful Production, Hoche Artois Images
Budget: $2.700.000 million dollars approx.

About to turn 18, Joseph Silberg (Jules Sitruk) takes a routine medical checkup, seeking admission by the IDF. The results are received by Orith (Emmanuelle Devos), his mother, who realizes that there´s something that´s not right. Her son´s blood type doesn´t seem to match with hers or her ​​husband´s, so she decides to find out what´s happened, in fact, afraid to know.
The moment of the truth arrives when the Silberg´s, along with another couple, the Al Bezaaz, are received by the current director of the hospital, where Orith and Leila (Areen Omari) had given birth, and so that unfortunately they are confirmed of the worst. In that distant day, newborns Joseph and Yacine (Mehdi Dehbi) had been whisked to a shelter during a bombing, so that later, with all the commotion, were to be given to the wrong mothers.
Having the doubt been removed (and with the boy´s pictures having been exchanged in the middle), they are diplomatically offered an apology, but as thing´s gone, the damage is already done.
If we were to define life circumstances that are within the completely unexpected and difficult to bear, I think that what was experienced by the Silbergs and the Al Bezaaz qualifies. If it´s hard enough already to learn how to be a parent, or having to decide, for example, to adopt, to find out after 18 years that your biological child has been raised by others and that you´ve been raising theirs, must be a dreadful finding.
The other son tells about how difficult it could be to get to assimilate this situation, both from the point of view of the parents, of their children or their siblings. If as a father you´ve lived moments of father and son, you did it with the person with whom in principle and biologically speaking, you were not supposed to. If you had him in your belly, it´s quite sad to know that who called you "mommy" for the first time was not the same child. But living all that aside, if as a child you grew up in a certain culture, language and ways of thinking, perhaps it´d be even harder to absorb if your real parents were of a different one, and probably tougher would be to internalize it as a teenager. Unless one had quickly matured and had another kind of understanding.
In any event, the above would actually be attached to a package of emotions that would be within the logical and expected. This movie, however, goes beyond this pose given the geographical space where it happens.
Hand in hand to what is told to us has also been to show us some of the socio-political and cultural situation, of these Israelis and Palestinians faced today. Watching myself the film and with all the respect that these cultures deserve, I just couldn´t help it but to feel grateful for being born in the Río de la Plata.
Many things might be said of the Uruguayans. That we´re racist, that we are this or that… but I think that in no way we are as culturally close as these people in anyway, which is a privilege. And it goes without saying that, the more open is a culture the more likely one is less attached to certain guidelines from the ones that rule coexistence.
In The other son, already the starting point is a human error occurred during a "human horror", that is, war. A conflict which, with its ups and downs, has been going on for decades and of which here is spoken from a little discussion between fathers, to when we are shown the border crossing and a section of the West Bank Barrier.
The other thing that is put into evidence is how terrible would be something like this in the Middle East. What I mean is that, of occurring between a Uruguayan and an Argentinean family, other than the obvious shock there would not be such a big cultural change. Inversely, the religious frame surrounding Joseph and Yacine is very strict. To the extent that for some is difficult to focus on helping them feel good, above what they might choose to believe or not, according to their now, true roots.
For my liking, first should be the individual´s welfare as a person, and only then our own spiritual belief. Unless that his welfare itself was linked to his own spirituality.
Here, speaking with a ravine, given his identity crisis, Joseph Silberg goes in search of guidance. Although, more than anything, wanting to be told that everything is fine and that he can stay the same, for his already taken path, for his attachment to Judaism and for his attitudes towards the cause. However, more aware of his millenary rules, this old man chooses to explain him how is it that you are or aren´t Jewish, scaring him even more, rather than empathize and tell him something like "Don´t you worry. Today is not about God, but about you". I´d like to suppose that, for the non-fundamentalist believer, a person is more valuable than his beliefs, where this doesn´t seem to be the case.
The other son then, speaks of all this. We are briefly described the political and geographical derivations of this war, while it deepens into the critical and irreversible situation, sadly, a direct result of the confrontation. Situation which, if ever happened to us, could have us wondering why, for a lot of time. Then if we were Israelis or Palestinians, we´d be thanked that our children, at least, despite the mistake were able to survive the day they were born.
Parents, on the other hand, I think it´s worth saying that will always be those who raised you and loved you, and whom you called mum and dad from the beginning. What later might happen in the future is analyzed at the moment. But the one which supported you will still be your family.

My rating: 7/10


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