The beauty of the young girl – her smile, the freckles
beneath her eyes, her French accent.
This is what stays with us. It’s always
impossible to separate the appeal of beauty from its evanescence, but to have
it torn away so abruptly, where is the lesson?
Blues by the Beach
is about the loss of innocence. If innocence
is music and dancing and laughter then that is what countless patrons, an
eclectic, global crowd, found in a Tel Aviv pub called Mike’s Place until the
night was shattered by a terrorist bomb.
Blues by the Beach
is an accidental documentary. Jack
Baxter came to Israel from the Bronx intending to do one documentary, got sent
in a second direction, and ended up with something completely unexpected and
revealing. He stood before the audience
and explained this, leaning on a cane, his constant companion since the blast
injured 50 and killed three, including the French waitress with the smile.
This screening was one of Cinemonde’s unique evening productions,
#49 to be exact. It took place in the
penthouse of the Roger Smith Hotel on Lexington Avenue. Glasses
of wine and hors d’oeuvres shared by an enthusiastic group of select moviegoers
led up to the viewing. Afterwards, the
publisher and the artist of a graphic novel called Mike’s Place that re-tells the story in the movie answered
questions for an audience that included the doctor whose quick work saved lives
at the scene.
The publisher told us that he had chosen the project because
of the three love stories it tells. The
artist told us something about his process that involved 1,000 drawings that took
a year to complete and about what kinds of slight changes to a script the
graphic novel format occasions. The
owner of the bar towards the end of the film tells us how the bomb shattered
more than physical things that could be repaired – that relationships
ended. The publisher reminded us that
one of those relationships was still intact, even stronger. Events have consequences; the filmmaker walks
with a cane.
Graham Greene comes to mind, superficially because “The
Third Man” is the best example of a novel appearing after the movie. But more than that, Greene’s central
characters always arrive in a foreign place and bear witness. Jack Baxter even sounds like a name out of a
Graham Greene novel. For me, Blues on the Beach drives home more
viscerally than any other film of its type the documentary camera as witness
that turns all of us into witnesses.
Cinemonde is the brainchild of Jerry Rudes, a consummate
showman with something substantial to show.
It calls itself “a smart, elegant private film series in New York City”
to which, after one experience, I can attest.
It is produced by Rudes' company, Mistral Artist Management, aptly named
for the strong wind that blows across southern France with positive, lasting
effects on the climate of the region.
The next time a Cinemonde invitation pops into your email inbox,
consider going. It’s well worth it.
