Divine Intervention is a clever example of how human intelligence on behalf of a filmmaker is crucial for making a film which is enjoyable, successful,popular,crowd puller and of course followed by hard to please critics.Normally it is seen that very few film directors work hard on the overall development of their scripts.It is this issue which has been deftly handled by Elie Suleiman. He has given ample breathing space to all his characters regardless of their order of appearance. That is why there is no reference to neither major nor minor characters.There is no doubt that in terms of content,narrative style and visual presentation it is a different film. What makes it unique is that in some manner the director has resorted to cheap gimmicks.For example-when the film starts there is hardly any glimpse of Israel-Palestine conflict but as it progresses this conflict comes in the foreground.This is something which can be easily detected.The best thing that can be said about Divine Intervention is that it can be watched by all and sundry. This is not at all a mean achievement for a film from Palestine.

Brilliant politics mixed mixed with very black, subtle comedy make up this very slightly surreal and funny movie about life and love in Israel.However, I wouldn't recommend this film for everybody, don't watch it if you're looking for an easy movie, it takes a lot of mental energy to really understand this movie, however if you're in the movie for an intellectual treat, its quite fun.This movie has the subtle humor and lack of dialogue of a tati movie with the politics and vignette fashion of a Bunuel.Overall, it's good, yet many of the political references are extremely obscure and the metaphors aren't always clear.

Whoever thought it was boring missed an important point: The movie itself (the rhythm, the structure, "no point") is a metaphor for the lives of those people. If it were any more lively or "entertaining" it would have been completely inconsistent.It is not just the (very funny) jokes that make the movie interesting, but the attitude it emanates. The individual scenes (which are ALL linked to others by the way) express the feeling of indifference developed by the characters after years of living in a land torn by conflict. But they can't just stop living. On one hand, the immensely amusing daily situations prove that they're alive. But on the other hand, everyone in the movie seems to have grown immune to humour. This movie not only unites strong elements, like hidden symbols, attractively filmed shots, great music, and occasional bursts of humour and action. It also paints a subtle portrait of characters that may or may not reflect reality. It conveys a certain mood with remarkable coherence. The state of mind of people who are living surreal lives but can't take it any more. When will the boiler explode? How long can this go on?Divine intervention contains poignant scenes of humiliation, defiance, love, insanity, and also scenes of simple mundane living. All that with as little words as possible. I saw it for the first time at a European film festival in Beirut two years ago. I've seen it three times since, and every time I laugh less, but my admiration grows a little for this rich movie.

This was a strange movie. When it came out in the theatres I never saw it. I had heard good things about it though so when I saw it on DVD at the rental store, I thought it would be a sure bet. But boy, were we surprised.I agree with some others here that it's hard to describe the movie. I also thought it was way too slow, and it would have worked as a short movie, not a 1h40' one. And laugh? Not once. I didn't think it was funny at all. Strange, yes, funny, no! To me the movie was a bit like a dance, modern ballet. As that, it could have been interesting, but I'm not sure it was interesting as a movie. Then, I had expected a movie that was subtle in depicting the Isreali-Palestinian conflict, some political correctness and some evidence of understanding 'the other side'. However, there was little of that! It was very pro-palestinian in not a very nuanced way.All in all, I think the idea was interesting but it was too long, and nothing happened in the beginning for a long long time. It was simply boring! ***** out of 10.