I am a little worried this review may get me in some trouble no matter how I end up wording it. Let it be known that while An American Hippie in Israel may be the supposed "worst Israeli movie ever made," as far as I can tell, its internal politics are firmly of the hippie creed. I don't know anything about the history of the hippie movement in Israel but if this movie is any sign, it existed. The hippies didn't seem to be too keen on nationalism and so this movie is, in a lot of ways, pretty apolitical to modern contexts. (Plus, the name "Israel" is never spoken--everyone just says "our country.") At the same it is also very political, as it is probably the most stereotypical hippie movie possible. You want pot and acid? Check. You want ugly people getting naked? Check. People yelling from car windows about "BEAUTIFUL FEELING"? Check. Hideous and depressing pop song that worms its way into your head till the end of time? Check. Angry young people blaming the audience for 'Nam? Check.
Actually, the most stereotypical hippie movie possible would be less entertaining than this movie, because this is also the most awkward movie ever. But let's take it easy--I'll discuss the plot first, while reaffirming those theses self-evidently. Mike is an American hippie traveling in Israel. He meets an actress named Elizabeth who basically immediately wants to bone him. She does so even after he talks about how he started killing people in Vietnam when he was 19, and how he lost count of how many people he killed. Part of this speech involves breaking the fourth wall and yelling "YOU FOOLS! STOP PUSHING BUTTONS! FOOLS, FOOLS, FOOLS!" Mike and his new lady-friend then party with some more hippies for a long time while a song we get to hear many times cautions us, "Someday we'll have to pay / For taking time to play / Just when we thought we'd seen the day / We kept the wolves at bay." Yeccchhh. It's okay, though, because two mime-faced Men in Black show up and shoot all the hippies. This leads Mike and Elizabeth, along with two others, Francoise and Komo, to go on a fateful road trip...and the movie becomes something entirely other. Friends become foes, and morals become confused.
Along the way, there are plenty of cringeworthy and hilarious moments to supplement the freakshow gawker we all have. "I'll head out of here when I get what I want: pretty girls," Mike says. Both he and Elizabeth chuckle, then look away from each other with boredom in their faces. Later, as the hippies begin to turn against one another when they strand themselves on an island lake in an acidic attempt to build a utopia, there is a five minute sequence where Komo and Mike argue. Komo speaks Hebrew, Mike speaks English. This leads to Mike chanting, "I don't get ya, man! It's like Chinese to me, man!" The dialogue was written by someone hip to the hippie lingo, but who also wanted to insert some dramatic dinner theatre moments too. Plus, they probably didn't have too much of a brain. All the same, the awkwardness and the repeat head-bludgeoning of the hippie peace creed (to the point where even I got annoyed) make the film seem incredibly earnest more than anything else. I'm not the first person to say that, I know, but it is shocking how wide-eyed and inspired the film is. It is incredibly clumsy and hamfisted, of course, but in a way that is sincerely charming.
Which makes the ending really weird. Basically, Komo and Mike kidnap the ladies all Tor Johnson style and wage war on each other. Eventually a goat comes along that I guess they all want to eat, and while fighting over the goat, they rip themselves apart. Then, the two mime-faced guys, who are probably supposed to be Death, huh?, drive off. The ending is foreshadowed in silent psychedelic slowmo scenes that imply that Mike still loves killing and that he fantasizes about murdering his comrades. In a lot of ways, I take the ending to be a pretty intense anti-hippie message. That is to say that youthful foolishness stranded them on their island, and because they were pursued by the MIBs they were always doomed to die for it. Peace and love doesn't pay the bills and it doesn't get food on the table, especially when it gets you stranded on an island surrounded by sharks. (They coulda eaten the sharks. I don't like sharks being killed but there were a lot of sharks in this lake in the middle of the desert.) It also seems to be saying that those who seem to love peace the most may be the most violent. Someday they'll have to pay for taking time to play, indeed.
This movie was made in the '70s, right on the cusp of being hit with the tsunami of punk nihilism. It's funny to see this movie be so quiet with its apparently hatred of liberal ideals (for better or worse) when just five years later, Nick Zedd released They Eat Scum, a movie where leather-clad Nazi twenty-somethings cut off people's dicks and destroy cities with nukes. Instead of songs about paying for playing, it had "YMCA." (Is there any other "YMCA" besides THE "YMCA"?) It played while the Nazi punks were being torn apart by lobster mutants. That is, assuming that this movie does have a touch of bitterness to it? Because of how genuine and innocent this movie is in its first two-thirds, I have to question my own interpretation that it is bitter in the first place. I think it's actually rather confused about itself, in truth. Maybe someday I'll learn more about the production and that will solve the mysteries. For now, I apply to this film, my theory that confusion is the response of an audience that has encountered something genuinely artistic. An American Hippie is open to many contradictory interpretations. Therefore it is inherently valuable, entertaining, and "good."
"Good" in this case simply means that I like it.
This movie can be incredibly tedious. I can't watch it as often as I do many other films on this blog, because as a general liberal I find some of the dialogue in this film emblematic of the empty nonsense that a lot of the hippies (stereotypically) believed in. In truth it represents the fact that a lot of the hippies were hypocritical, and were in large part responsible for the elections of Reagan and Thatcher. But I am dipping into hypocrisy myself, by becoming political in this entry despite my concern of taking flak for that. Suffice it to say that yes, even I think hippies are/were obnoxious, even as someone who believes that love and peace are important things. Also, a lot of scenes are obvious filler. People sitting around shouting "WONDERFUL FEELING" comes to mind. And, you do hear that song a lot and it's such an earworm. So. Feel free to skip around, but please do make sure to have one watching where you endure the whole thing. It will reward you.
It is very dumb. It is also faux-artsy in a way that is still dumb, but also charming. It sticks for the wrong reasons, and it makes me want to probe further into Israeli cinema. After all, Plan 9 from Outer Space, Manos: The Hands of Fate, and Troll 2 are, despite the frequency of their reception of the title, not the Worst Movies Ever Made. Certainly not the Worst American Movies. So I hope sincerely that An American Hippie in Israel is not the Worst Israeli Movie. Because if it's not, that means I have something to look forward to.
(Yes, that really is the title card on my copy. N American Hippie in Israel it is, then.)
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