Mechina provides new view

Mechina, a documentary by senior Maital Guttman, will premiere tonight at 7:30 p.m. in Griffith Film Theater. Her powerful film, a culmination of nearly a year of production, explores the issues Israeli teens face as they prepare to begin their required army service.

Shot primarily over the summer of 2004, Mechina tells the story of six youths: Amitai, Ayelet, Vered, Yoav, Benji and Shaked. These six Israeli high school graduates deferred their mandatory military service for one year as part of a new program that incorporates work, study and volunteerism. The goal of this mechina, or preparation, is to focus on readying themselves for the service and reflecting on what that duty means.

Guttman develops tension within the film by delving into the differences between American and Israeli ideas about becoming an adult. Guttman, raised in Israel until the age of seven, puts herself in front of the camera and confronts the reality that she would have shared her subjects’ experience had her family not immigrated to the United States. Through this intra- and interpersonal exploration she is able to raise questions of duty, responsibility and mortality.

The film succeeds primarily because of the openness of its subjects. Guttman’s camerawork and interview style allow audiences to connect with these teens as they are: mature, confident, vivacious and scared. These are young adults much like those one might meet at Duke or on any college campus, but the issues they face run much deeper than choosing a major or finding a Friday night party.

When Shaked talks of the implications of simply choosing whether or not to ride a bus, for fear of a bombing, his uncompromising sincerity sustains the moment. And when Benji, the barrel-chested emergency medical responder, speaks of providing aid to injured Israelis and Palestinians, his jovial smile reminds the audience that he is still a child at heart, through all that he has seen.

After staying through the end of the group’s mechina, Guttman returns to Israel again in January, this time with the film’s editor and co-producer, senior Madeleine Sackler. They were able to capture Amitai’s departure, his final moments as a child. The scene brings together all that the film stands for, because as he climbs onto his bus, it is painfully clear by his demeanor and new haircut that his trip will transform him.

Mechina, through Guttman’s intimate, probing style, provides audiences with a view of a life most will never have to face. Perhaps no place is the film’s power more palpable than in a moment in Amitai’s room. As loud cracks and pops can be heard in the distance, Guttman asks how he knows they are fireworks and not gunshots. Jokingly, but with a touch of undeniable truth, he replies, “Only a child of conflict could know the difference.”