Lost Islands

Love brings together two young people but poisons the relationship between two siblings in this nostalgic drama from Israel. Cranky Avraham Levi (Shmil Ben Ari) and his wife Sima (Orly Silbersatz Banai) are raising five children in Kfar Saba in the early years of the 1980s. Two of their sons are twins, but Ofer (Oshri Cohen) and Erez (Michael Moshonov) have precious little in common — Ofer is handsome, confident and good at sports, while Erez is slim, studious and often bothered with health problems. Both brothers are smitten with a beautiful new girl at school, Neta (Yuval Scharf), and though she displays an initial interest in Erez, Ofer ultimately wins her hand. But fate and familial rivalries deprive Ofer of a happy ending to his love story; his brother succeeds in the career he wished for and an indiscretion threatens to tear the family apart. Featuring a soundtrack of period-appropriate pop tunes, Iim avudim (aka Lost Islands) received its United States premiere at the 2009 San Francisco Jewish Film Festival.