Israeli filmmaker Talya Lavie brings wit, charm and a healthy dose of silliness to this year’s BFI London Film Festival with her second feature film.
Noam (Ran Danker) and Eleanor (Avigail Harari) have just gotten married. On the night of their wedding, an evening which should be filled with love and happiness, the two find themselves roaming the streets of Jerusalem after a gift from Noam’s ex-girlfriend brings both of their insecurities to the surface.
Taking the place over the course of one night, Honeymoon doesn’t waste any time in getting to the heart of Noam and Eleanor’s dysfunction. From the very beginning, this night seems destined to have one thing go wrong after another, with the couple fumbling the tradition of crossing the threshold of their swanky hotel suite, a place where they end up spending very little time.
A picture perfect couple on the surface, Noam and Eleanor’s relationship is slowly revealed to be one that is more driven by instinct and gut decision, then it is one built on a great deal of trust in one another. Both invited their exes to their wedding, and it is the distrust around their previous relationships which fuels much of their paranoia, and sends them out across the city of Jerusalem on their wedding night.
Their adventure across the city is one filled with witty detours, trying to find their exes, all the while also crossing paths with significant people in their lives. For Noam its his parents, for Eleanor her students from the High School where she teaches drama. Both of these pockets of relationships accentuate Noam and Elenor’s inherent childish behaviour that demonstrates their state of arrested development in often very funny and revealing ways.
Following two self destructive, selfish and childish adults around for an evening where they increasingly make matters worse for themselves are the ingredients of a classic screwball. As with any screwball, a lot of the dysfunction and behaviour can be a little irritating, as Noam and Eleanor’s lack of self-awareness leads them into more chaos. Across their travels in Jerusalem, Lavie constructs a city that thrives on a genuine sense of life, and also a small dash of surrealism. It makes for a vibrant environment, one where everyone’s lives feel like they’re on-going, acting as a refreshing antithesis to the self-centered behaviour of the two newlyweds.
The lead performances from Avigail Harari and Ran Danker are both impressive, even if you find you don’t always enjoy your time within their dysfunctional existence. Their chemistry is very convincing in conveying the sense that this relationship is fuelled by passion and a sense of drama. While it may look like their marriage is unravelling from day one, the pervading sense is that they actually thrive on the conflict and the chaos. That makes it all that much more fun, seeing them spiral in a whirlwind of their own making. It’s a fun ride for the audience to be on, a ride that also proves to be thematically rich and pleasantly odd.
Honeymood is a very breezy means in which to kick off your film festival. It has an exuberance to it that is infectious and keeps things wry and just the right amount of silly throughout. The lead characters stay just on the right side of being charmingly childish, as they let their anxieties get the better of them. Being thrust amidst their juvenile behaviour, making for a night out in Jerusalem that will make you cringe and laugh in equal measure.
Honeymood
Summary
This wild night out in Jerusalem, which has just about the right amount of silly, will make you cringe and laugh in equal measure.
