Black to the Promised Land

Running time: 98 mins

Let me give you the recipe for one very strange -- and potentially volatile -- cocktail. Take a group of black high school students from Brooklyn's notorious Bed-Stuy section. Drop them on an Israeli kibbutz for ten weeks. Mix vigorously. Serve. It's easy to wonder: why Israel and not, say, Africa? The answer seems fairly simple to the person behind this rather novel idea -- the students' teacher, Stewart Bialer, himself a Jew. Why not? Things get off to a rocky start. Misconceptions abound on all sides. The Bed-Stuy kids expect the kibbutz to be made up of mud huts with straw floors. Some Jewish teenagers expect a group of thieving drug dealers to show up at their gates. After all, as one makes clear, that's just the way "they" are. There's a lot of staring; there's very little communicating. Then, one day, things start to thaw. People begin to interact, using whatever tools -- language often not one of them -- that are available. A transformation begins, one that will leave you exhilarated and more than a bit moved. If you're worried about this being a candy-coated message film, don't! It's very real, very honest, and holds no punches. It doesn't take the easy route; it doesn't offer all the answers. What it does offer is a ray of hope, and that ain't bad. --John Porter