Hugo 2

72 Minutes, 2008
Genre:
Documentary

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Directed by: Yair Lev
Production:David Deri
Photographer: Yair Lev
Original Music: Yonatan Bar Giora
Language: Hebrew
| Subtitles not available

Twenty years after first turning the camera at his father in Hugo (1989) – one of the first films to have explored the lives of children of Holocaust survivors – director Yair Lev returns to his paternal protagonist in the hopes of striking up a closer relationship, only the task at hand, this time, seems even more insurmountable than previously. Lev’s mother also reveals that the father has grown that much quieter of late – with old age having majorly impacted his mobility, not to mention making him that much more cantankerous.
The film presents two competing modes of masculinity, seeking to bridge the divide and communicate with one another: the stoic father, a former boxer, who wonders whether his sensitive and physically inferior son would have survived the Holocaust. In Lev’s voiceover narration, he recalls how he and his father would never hug and that the only thing they had in common was the Holocaust; with the camera being the sole reason they’ve managed to strike up something resembling a close relationship.
The film is bookended by white noise, symbolising all the damage and wear-and-tear inflicted on the original video copy of Hugo by the passage of time. It is also a potent reminder that Holocaust survivors’ video testimonials are also under existential threat. At a time when survivors’ numbers are steadily depleting, Lev seeks to preserve even a fraction more of his father on celluloid.

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