A catatonic, shell-shocked Israeli army veteran undergoes a three-week military rehabilitation before being sent back to the Lebanese front in this well made but not very subtle examination of wartime trauma. The battleground is specific but the issues are universal (for Lebanon read Vietnam or Kuwait or even Afghanistan), and the film's outspoken criticism of the military mind can be translated into any language. A strong ensemble cast of (mostly) sympathetic characters makes the dynamics within the group therapy sessions more involving than the individual neuroses of each soldier, and the strong, forthright approach to the subject doesn't prepare one for the surprising note of grace on which the film ends. When I saw the film (at San Francisco's Castro Theater in 1989) it was shown alongside the twelve-minute short 'Deportation': a brief, wordless drama about a border incident that plays like the last half reel of a much longer feature.
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