Making a film in Israel with Palestinians is problematic. After all, the film could be seen as either too pro-Jewish or too pro- Palestinian by some and as a result, lose a major portion of the potential audience. However, "A Borrowed Identity" manages to create a story that both sides of the ideological perspective could appreciate and enjoy.The story is about a Palestinian boy, Eyad. You see him grow to his teen years through the first portion of the film and he's so bright that he's offered admission to the best school in Israel--and he'll be the only Palestinian in an otherwise all Jewish program. The film follows the young man through high school from his early awkward time to acceptance by his peers until he ultimately does something a Palestinian isn't supposed to do--fall in love with a Jewish girl. At first, things look great for Eyad and his girlfriend, Naomi. However, she is hesitant to tell her parents about her boyfriend and he's also hesitant to tell his family as well. When he loses her over this, he decides on another path...and it involves pretending to be Jewish so that his life will be easier.There is a lot to like about this film as is touches on some divisive topics. It's not just the Palestinian/Jewish conflict but there's also a subplot involving quality of life issues for a friend of Eyad. Yonathan has Multiple Sclerosis and through the course of the movie, he becomes less and less functional until he's just a shell of who he once was. All of this makes for a fascinating film that I enjoyed and which was mostly well crafted. I say mostly because Eyad was played so incredibly detached and non-emotive through so much of the film--a bit too much for me, as this tended to make him seem less real. But the good far outweighs the bad with this one and it's a film that is totally unique and captivating.

Not the best way to tackle a topic about identity. The first act of the movie differs in huge ways from the last and despite a light touch of wry humour applied to the scenes between both, you cannot help but wonder how the one (d)evolved into the other so distinctly. Opening on a comedic tone bordering on the absurd, at the end of the film you're watching a heavy emotional drama about a young man's life altered forever. Of course people change over the years, especially under the less than perfect conditions the protagonist lives through, but the viewer has a hard time accepting the unfolding of events in the way told here, and ultimately feels like he/she is watching two separate movies slapped together. It's not wrong to apply some humour to a topic otherwise devoid of that sense, especially if it helps to underscore both parties have more in common than apart. But it must feel like a coherent whole to make it work for audiences. In some ways, the writer says that any sense of optimism Israeli Arab youths harbour in their country will only be squashed by the rampant discrimination they undergo in their formative years, and thus they will inevitably end up as unhappy, pessimist young adults. Maybe that is exactly what the screenwriter wants us to think, considering it's the conclusion he himself drew eventually, which made him move to the USA for good. At the same time however, the plot tells us there is plenty of positive things that could have avoided the bleak outcome presented here. It's not like the protagonist didn't have any friends or couldn't find love. Eventually, it was his own choices that hindered his career as much, if not more so, as the social exclusion on which the film closes.It's not the Arabs that are dancing in this film, it's the writing that makes the plot dance around various possible outcomes and makes it pick the bleakest where it need not have, and considering the tone of the opening, should not have. Case in point: the life of the writer himself, who did very well in his career despite very similar conditions. And it's the audience that suffers most, by being offered a rather unsettling and unsatisfying close.

Eran Riklis in collaboration with gifted writer Sayed Kashua has brought to the screen a thoughtful and riveting film based on Kashua's 'Dancing Arabs'. Released in North America as 'A Borrowed Identity', it unfortunately is shown only in select art houses, to a limited audience. 'Borrowed Identity' has come on to the American scene at a time of racial and ethnic tension, which in the US context is a reflection of the strain in defining who and what a person is. Kashua's script is informed in the ongoing debate in Israel for its Arab citizens of what its means to be an Israeli, at a time of rabid Jewish nationalism: at a time when the degenerative Zionist elite dreams of expelling 20 percent of Israel's population, i.e., Arabs of the right of citizenship. 'A Borrowed Identity', in a Hegelian trope, in a rude dialectic informs us that the only way Eyad, a gifted Arab Israeli, can find complete fulfillment in Israel is to become a Jew by assuming the identity of Jonathan, his doppelganger, who dies after a long bout of muscular dystrophy, with the complicity of the deceased Israeli's mother. Riklis' film should strike a chord in America in the light of the Rachel Dozeal brouhaha, whereby a white woman passes as black. The connection is problematic? And the climate in the US is hardly welcoming for understanding the plight of Arab citizens of Israel, who, as it turns out, are 'les negres d' Israel'. There is nothing to fault in the probing eye of Riklis' camera. Yael Abecassis is as ever the embodiment of discernment as Jonathan's mother, the young Tawfeek Barhom has a shrewd understanding of the film's protagonist Eyad; he infuses his character with a delicate understanding of the transformation of what Hegel calls the alter ego and then becoming Jonathan. However the love angle is predictable, but creditable, and shows the limits of Israeli liberalism. Above all, the talents of Riklis and Kashua have produced a film worthy of prizes, which the hands of less talented artists would render 'Dancing Arabs' cartoon like if not soppy in sentimentality.

The film started off innocently, much like Eyad / Iyad is at the beginning. It's sweet, funny and almost carefree and gets serious overtime as Eyad grows up and tries to understand and fit into this adult world. Dancing Arabs' comedic tone reflects Eyad's childhood innonce, the tension and drama later on in the movie attests of this young arab's struggles to find his place and his identity around jews in Israel.Eran Riklis succeeded in capturing Iyad's evolution in My son, coherently interlacing different tones and getting a good performance out of Razi Gabareen & Tawfeek Barhom who both embody Eyad's life. Years of Eyad's life are smartly intertwined with the tensions in the region and Eyad's choices. Although Riklis, very skillfully took on a difficult subject and managed to make a movie advocating coexistence, My Son felt at times a bit too sugar coated. There's no denying that it is about Eyad and his journey to self discovery but some of the characters - although secondary - completely lacked substence or development. The mothers for instance, both brilliantly played by Abecassis & Eido kind of lacked personality. The Arab-Israeli tensions are in the film but they are addressed very subtle, hinted. The cast nicely played the bonds and chemistry between the characters. Tawfeek Barhom, awkwardness and isolation in his new surroundings is on point. He is utterly believable and convincing as the good- intentioned young arab who wants to fit in. My Son is a beautiful, funny film shining a good light on both population.@wornoutspines