The Nimrod Kamer Blog

2011

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 07 Dec 2011 22:43:00 +0000

nnimrodd.tumblr.com

twitter.com/nnimrodd

New Fan Page

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 14:37:00 +0000

.

http://nimrodkamer.com

Nimrod Kamer on Facebook

Lover's note to Olja

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 22:01:00 +0000

Olja.

For me you are kind of a convenience product,

Dior Diorshow Mascara, to be precise.

=======

Flaccid as you take me to be,

My hope is that one day I'll be for you what Obama is for the U.S,

A Romanian you can believe in.

=======

my poem in Japanese \ translation: Motoko Sugase

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 10:04:00 +0000

ポスト／　ニムロッド・カメル

僕たちが付き合った期間

洗濯を一回して

シーツを一回取り替えて

僕のおばあさんを一回訪ねて

家賃を一回払って

ゴミを一回出して

この街から一回出て

スーパーに一回行って

ヒゲを一回剃った

でも、メールは６２，４５９回チェックした

あらゆるポストの中の

ニムロッド・カメルは、ルーマニア出身の映像作家でジャーナリスト。ホームページは　nnimrod.com

================================

This was a translation of my poem "Te'va" (Box) published in 'Maayan Magazine' Vol. 4 (Hebrew) March 2008, to Japanese.

================================

english version:

Te'va (Box)

While we were dating

I did my laundry once

Changed my sheets once

Went to visit my grandmother once

Payed my rent once

Emptied the garbage once

Went out of town once

Went to the supermarket once

Shaved once

But checked my email 62,459 times,

in all of my boxes

====================================

maayanmagazine.com

OLIVIA - Sefi & Nimrod new video, song by Roy Arad

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 22:07:00 +0000

video clip by for "Olivia" (original song by Tzvika Pick) performed by Roy Chicky Arad.

In the video are Sefi and Nimrod, part of the duo camera Nimrod Kamer video clips serious.

========================

אוליביה - קליפ של נמרוד קמר וספי ארליך לשיר של צביקה פיק בביצוע של רועי ארד,

=======================

other videos from the serious:

Alma & Nimrod -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ri2Y5t-e0lg

Meital & Nimrod -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtXVjPEA_MA

====================

=======================

Original Svika Pick song.

=============================

A certain tendency in Israeli Cinema

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 29 Aug 2007 23:03:00 +0000

Article by Joshua Simon published in Maarvon [1] film magazine.

Joshua Simon, Maarvon's Editor, examines the esthetics of "fund films", an international movement of peripheral mainstream.

"Taste is made up of a thousand of distastes"

Paul Valéry

In the preface to the Hebrew edition of Robert McKee's book Story (Gordon publishing) TV presenter Yair Lapid writes about the importance of the script in the film's quality, and states: "The year 2004, for example, was the best year for Israeli cinema this decade, with Walk on Water, Turn Left at the End of the World, Colombian Love, Ushpizin and Camp Fire."
In this article I would like to draw attention to these films – or rather to the mechanism that led to their production. I intend to focus on "funds films" and the way the method of financing dictates the esthetics of Israeli cinema.

In his opening words Lapid mentions those particular films also because of their box-office success. On the question of the quality of the Israeli films in 2004, the judgment of Lapid, who wrote the script for the TV drama War Room, is questionable. However, there is no denying that the claim for the superiority of the script, on which most of his preface is based, has become dominant among film creators and viewers.

Fund films : Proper management – the birth of a genre

The success of Israeli cinema in the past few years, regarding presentation and distribution opportunities, can be attributed to the activity of the film fund as well as to Israel's relative advantage of being a hot spot. It is preceded only by the United States and Russia in generating news. Israeli cinema will never lack topics, because this is quite an interesting place, as people say.

The New Israeli Foundation for Cinema and TV calls on film creators to direct stories by Nobel laureate S.Y. Agnon, and it has also launched a project tying Israeli cinema with the Hebrew novel, in order to direct films from the catalogue of major publisher Keter.

Beyond the literary tendency seen in these projects initiated by the New Israeli Foundation, Israeli cinema gives great power to the script. The script criterion is central and significant in the film's production and has turned into the basis of public film making and financing in Israel.

The website of the largest fund, the Israeli Film Fund, says that "Every year the fund receives around 120 scripts with a request for support. Of them, 6-8 scripts will be chosen this year as suitable for the fund's support… The fund invests in the development of some 20 scripts every year." Therefore, the central criterion is submittal of the script, and the fund decides whether to produce the film based on the lectors' opinion on it. Of course, there are other factors involved in the decision whether to support a film's production or not, but it is still accepted that the submitted script is the non-filmed-movie.

I do not intend to claim that script-based films are worse than other films that choose to experiment and improvise on the set. The script's precedence as a structure inclined to another structure is an accepted tool like a recipe for a meal. If so, fund cinema is first and foremost a cinema of script submitting, and to a certain extent perhaps just cinema of a submitted script.

Francois Truffaut's 1954 essay "A certain tendency in French cinema" enables an understanding of most of the trends in Israeli cinema today. Truffaut says about the directors of "quality cinema" of his time, who he attacks: "When they submit their scripts, the film is already ready; in their eyes the director is only a person carrying out the shooting… and sadly, it's true!" In Israel "they" are the funds and directors (who are, in most cases, the script writers too.)

The central esthetic characteristic of Israeli cinema will is, by all opinions, "dialogue cinema". There is hardly any picture in the Israeli fund cinema – the dialogue inundates and rises, surrounds and rotates, comes and goes and it seems as if there is no place for a scene that doesn’t contain any talking. It's as if no moment in the film has cinematic existence unless someone is speaking in it. Although a firm script base does not require constant dialogue, it seems that the origin of this trend is in determining the submitted script to be a founding criterion for the viability of the film. The trend is connected first and foremost to the type of scripts chosen, and not to the script as a structure in itself. In the screen test – on screen, the dialogue cinema exists at the expense of other cinematic expression possibilities, including photography, directing, editing and the use of sound.

Yair Lapid, in his preface, ignores the films Or (Keren Yedaya, 2004) and Atash-Thirst (Tawfik Abu Wael, 2004) two remarkable films different than the Israeli fund films he mentioned (the two were supported by the Yehoshua Rabinowitz Foundation and foreign funding). However, despite their courage, the special form that characterizes both and the measured use of dialogue, they are also films that could have come under the definition of "fund films." Both state-of-the-art films, which have a lot of character, won prizes at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival : Or won the Golden Camera award and Atash-Thirst won the international critics award. Through both of these films, which are exceptions to the crop of Israeli films of recent years, the "fund films" rules can be identified – first of all regarding the framework of their family story and regarding the way they deal with death. "The family" is almost a basic framework for the cuckolded Israeli film (Turn Left at the End of the World; Broken Wings, Camp Fire, Ushpizin). Story-wise - it's all families. It will not be an exaggeration to say that the ten films produced in Israel every year tell the exact same story. Tone-wise they can be more or less aggressive – to pull toward the soft, hugging genre (Broken Wings) or a more sophisticated direction (Nina's Tragedies) – but they will almost always rotate around the "family".

Another issue that moves the film Atash-Thirst closer to fund films is the need to show the father's murder allusively, despite the subdued drama between the father and the son. Death appears in Abu Wael's film as a fantasy or as an editing manipulation, and it is not dealt with directly. In this sense the film, which does not strive to be "hugging", and despite its impressive stylistic severity, still exists within the denial of death that surrounds fund films in which death is at the most a plot trigger, like in the case of Broken Wings.

Peripheral mainstream: The birth of a cinematic movement from bureaucratic unification

The phenomenon currently experienced by Israeli cinema is not a new one. It has already managed to euthanize French and German cinema. The Film Law's first success was in the unification of bureaucracy – Israel is now at the same level of European cinema regarding bureaucratic structures and it can now communicate with it on different levels – through the funds, independent producers, conferences, co-productions etc. Bureaucratic unification is part of the aspiration for esthetic unification – for the camera to be stable, for the focus to be smooth and for the sound to be clearly heard. In all these fields Israeli cinema has made a good part of the way on the road to the longed for "professionalism" – and now the time has come to look at the films themselves.

After the question of public funding was answered, the Film Law was legislated, funds for supporting films were established and films were produced using these funds, Israeli cinema can be viewed within the global context. Changing the organizational structure of the funding institutes according to an international standard made co-productions possible. In the film Metallic Blues, starring Avi Kushnir and Moshe Ivigi, for example, the joint production conditions determined not only the number of crew members from the different funding countries (Israel and Germany) but also the number of filming days and the ratio of screen minutes for each country.

In a co-production, the Israeli director's wet dream, the contract writes the script. Familiarity with the method of funding enables viewers to guess the end of the storyline – the film unfolding before our eyes is a series of contract clauses.

Consequently, what turns Israeli cinema into "European Cinema" is first and foremost the structure of the film support funds. The identical structures of the Israeli and foreign funds increase the potential for co-productions but at the same time create an identical esthetic platform – more meticulous films, less coarse and even less adventurous in terms of their language. The German film Martha's Kitchen (Sandra Nettelbeck, 2002) and Whale Rider (Niki Caro, 2002) from New Zealand, co-funded by Germany, successful or not – are not any different from the Israeli fund films and are characterized by the same "relaxed esthetics" similar to that of films such as Nina's Tragedies. The funds' package system and the way budgets are made dictate an almost identical form of fund cinema around the world: script, budget, casting, production, editing. Each stage exists as an almost separate unit without any relation to the other stages and without any room for creative mistakes. And thus we get the style common in art-house –a kind of small-scale Hollywood convention, without any ideological tension. A more or less fixed standard of the way in which the story is told, ornamented in each country with the folklore unique to the location – this is "peripheral mainstream".

The first goal of every fund is the full utilization of its yearly budget with proper management of its dealings. Thus, fundamental cinematic questions are sometimes replaced by administrative needs. French cinema is a convenient example for this upheaval in European national cinema – in the transition from the post-WWII cinematic adventures to the depressing routine of the castrated crop of the past 10 years. Bureaucratic coordination enables creativity but at the same time affects its character until its final anesthetization.

National cinema: Center and center

In Israel, a country with six million citizens, there are 13 film schools. In comparison, Germany, with its 80 million people, rich cinematic past, grand tradition and achievements today in the field of short films, student films and even commercial cinema, has only 6 film schools and they are talking about the market being saturated and that film school graduates cannot find work in the field.

American director Quentin Tarantino stated that the thing that makes the world's three cinematic industries – Hong Kong, Bollywood and Hollywood – profitable is that fact that they are all star-based. All the rest is world cinema. A film creator, even if he claims and strongly believes that he has no interest in nationalism, will quickly find that nationalism has an interest in him. The world is whatever exists beyond Hollywood. There, the distribution system is based on the sentence: "Mr. So and So, the Belgian/Romanian/Chinese/Israeli etc. director" or "The new Russian/Moroccan/Brazilian/Palestinian cinema." We will always try to understand the film according to where it came from.

The structure of "national cinema" is based on the idea of center and periphery that inspire each other. In the framework of the seemingly "healthy" national cinema, alongside the hegemonic, mainstream products of the center there are also experiments and attempts that debate, dispute and undermine the reigning esthetics in the periphery. However, it seems as if fund cinema has chosen to turn to the periphery. Haaretz newspaper's film critic Uri Klein has noticed the trend that took over Israeli cinema since the end of the '90s in his 2002 article "Israel is there", and Goel Pinto, a writer for the newspaper, has further clarified the point in his 2005 article "Ultra-Orthodox, gay, and crazy Moroccan". In his article, Klein claims that the Israeli cinema's increased occupation with the center and the periphery reflects an attempt to find orientation coordinates in order to form a stable identity; a defined demarcation of the center and the periphery. In his opinion, films that direct their storylines to whatever is conventional in the periphery express the confusion and introduction of radical reforms experienced in Israel starting in the '90s.

Pinto in his article already understands the deep conservatism at the base of the appeal to what is called the periphery. When he reported about the Israeli Oscar ceremony last year he wrote "Whores, Arabs, religious Jews, settlers, homosexuals and two Israelis go out to sell an American car in Germany are at the center of the five films nominated for the award". He was referring to the films Or, Atash-Thirst, HaUshpizin, Camp Fire, Walk on Water and Metallic Blues.

Dealing with characters that do not come from the "center" does not make this cinema multi-cultural or diversified, but perhaps rather the opposite, it unifies it and emphasizes the way the film was formed from a treatment of script that try to attack a peripheral issue (or to "deal with a problem") in hegemonic methods of expression. In other words, it is a hegemonic film in which the scenery is replaced by an exotic one in order to apply oneself to the "other" and the "social". In fund films there is nothing more similar than the "other" – there is an insistence on its presence and it is sterile, standard and apolitical.

Dramaturgically speaking, this is cinema that has undergone "Sam Spiegelization" – family dramas that contain "the character's gamut", conflict and all the rest of the script jargon. These are family films and when politics makes an appearance in them, it appears as an issue – there is no politicism. The film is not defying, conflicted or independent and it does not diverge from political correctness. "If the audience likes to become corrupt under the auspices of literature's alibi, it likes to become corrupt also under the auspices of the social alibi" young Truffaut claimed in his essay. The cinema of the "hugging genre" and the "soft esthetics" is a cinema in which the center does not yet inspire the periphery, because it is itself peripheral to a large extent. It is peripheral because it does not create powerful metaphors but rather packages for script submitted within the framework of proper administration. This cinema of the center has hollow metaphors – it does not enable to indulge in polemics.

Was published on Maarvon – Israeli magazine for cinema, 2006.

Translated by Anat Rotem.

Beat69 video - Meital & Nimrod

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 16 May 2007 12:27:00 +0000

"Kmo Shelach"
A tribute video for Beat 69 - Israeli band.

Made in the cross camera manner by Meital Gambasho and Nimrod Kamer, using a pear and Pnina Rozenblum deodorant.

May 2007, Tel Aviv.

==========================

Beat 69 MySpace:
http://www.myspace.com/beat69

===============================

Virgina Tech Murderer Killed Web 2.0

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 30 Apr 2007 13:25:00 +0000

Many claim that Seung-Hui Cho, the murderer responsible for the Virginia Tech Massacre on April 16th 2007, is an example of the growing power of the Web 2.0 culture of personal video and manifestos, self made and self distributed globally through the net.

In fact, Seung-Hui case has nothing to do with Web 2.0 and the new viral video culture. Why? Cause Hui used the mail - meaning regular mail, a real envelope to send his “multimedia package” to a national television station. He did not upload it - he chose to manually mail it. Why else Seung-Hui is not Web 2.0? Cause he used a DVD, classic video format easily made and hardly shrunk. Very un-web and very far from Youtube or Meta Café, the popular "default" video distribution systems. Also - Seung-Hui did not upload his manifesto to a blog. He printed it old fashion way, assembling the text and photos using a PDF file. He also didn't use web applications such as Google Docs and Spreadsheets. To be frank - Cho uploaded nothing to the net and had nothing to do with it while planning and committing his horrific manslaughter.

Seung-Hui Cho, VT Murderer in NBC

Not only that he secluded YouTube from his package, he picked, from all the medias available - NBC, and by that proving that even a maniacal murderer wishes to go public in the most traditional manner, with a commentator voice following him. Real news go apparently to real default distributors - the national TV networks. Moreover - I believe that had the murderer uploaded his videos to YouTube the website might have censored it and call it unsolicited material due to its harsh decent content policy. Accordingly, had Seung sent the package to NBC by email, they may very well would have ignored it. To be realistic it might have even gone unnoticed for weeks, because of the enormous amount of email that the network receives every day. Had there was a video attachment NBC almost certainly would have regarded it as spam. Come to think about it a package like that would have had all the spam meta tags possible for the automatic spam killer filters get ride of it: low quality video attachment, harsh words such as "Virginia" and "Tech" and "gun" written in it, and above all the legitimate fear of the spam robot that an impostor to Seung-Hui could have send the mail.

This actually reminds us that since established, no truly original news video has ever been uploaded exclusively to YouTube or to Google Video (or to any other viral video website). YouTube always gets the historically significant videos from the big networks after they were already aired nationally.

So here Seung-Hui wins twice: first he uses a big network to get the maximum image quality broadcast (and YouTube too in the backdoor) and secondly he uses regular mail to make sure that the package will not go unnoticed. Indeed NBC news room received the ironically erred postcode envelope a couple of days after the act and immediately identified it, humanly wise, in the post room and kicked it up stairs.

Norris Hall, Virginia Tech Campus

Again it is proven, maybe too clearly, that when you send printed photos and a DVD people that receive it are bounded to look at it. Decisively enough it shows the non relevance of the web as a first hand update network, exposing its naked hype and high false hops of becoming more significant and influential than television. No act can be less Web 2.0 than Seung-Hui Cho’s one. It is unimaginable how it could have gone any other way. Bottom line and fundamentally so, the mass murderer used classic communicating methods and not new ones.

It’s not only technically difficult to upload\email large files and to get them watched uncensored. The setbacks that made Cho put his manifesto in an envelope and go to a close-by post office have to do with instinct thinking and basic human "sane" behavior in extreme situations. This is why I offer to psychologically eliminate the theory of the necessity of Web 2.0 applications and or their connection to basic human behavior.

Essentially - again, an envelope was unfolded here. It seems that no personally created news can ever be emailed. They must be placed in an envelope and sent to their national respirators to get real attention. Cho case proves that the new concept of personally created and published news is false. To use the blunt activist term here - "the revolution will be televised", probably nationally. Seung-Hui Cho brutally killed 32 students in Virginia tech but he also killed the hype and frenzy that surrounded Web 2.0 in the past couple of months.

If wikipedia is the mechanism that most symbolizes Web 2.0 culture, it is save to say that Cho won in this arena as well. While most of the Virginia Tech victims articles are up for deletion on the not notable cause, Seung-Hui Cho article is save and sound, it's significant clear and it's editing blocked, accessibly only to elder editors, such as (allegorically speaking) the NBC news editors.

====================

Nimrod Kamer, May 2007

Article in Hebrew in Yedioth Ahronoth - YNET, 29.04.2007

=========================

Virginia Tech Massacre in Wikipeidaa
Seung-Hui Cho video from the NBC website
An example for a deletion vote on a wikipedia article on one of the victims

Stephanie Kaye Smiles

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 15 Apr 2007 23:35:00 +0000

Stephanie Kaye

In retrospect, the pause scene that most affected me growing up, and also the most conclusive TV moment I remember is when I saw Stephanie Kaye, most popular girl of Degrassi Junior High smiles embarrassingly after going on a date with Wheels (Derek Wheeler).

In the episode, called "The Best Laid Plans", there is a rumor all over school that Steph is going to go "all the way" with Wheels. While Wheels is buying a condom at Steph's mom drugstore Stephanie herself wares the most shining pink pens. The date goes wrong and never profiled.

Stephanie's smile at the end of the episode when Voula asks her "Stephanie, you weren't really gonna do anything, were you?" is so charming and correct, it embodies every aspect of that first season of Degrassi Junior High.

It's not clear what would have happened; if Stephanie and Wheels's date would have gone down as planed - yet still the mere unanswered question of Voula and the look on Steph's face at the end pulls out this smile from her, unparalled in television standards that known in any other school TV drama.

============================

Degrassi Junior High Serious 1 torrent, Stephanie Kaye in wikipedia.

Israel Blogosphere

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 12 Apr 2007 20:12:00 +0000

Wikipedia article created by Nimrod Kamer:

Israel's blogosphere is a small community of blogs that comment largely on Israel politics, media, society and occurrences.
The first noticeable blog that is recalled is the 2005 Velvet Underground blog [1] by journalist Dvorit Shargal. That blog used the "velvet" pseudonym and published never before written daily media news and behind the scenes action in Israel's biggest media corporate boards.

The most famous blog hosting websites in Israel are: Israblog [2] (in hebrew: ישראבלוג), Notes [3] (in hebrew: reshimot, רשימות), Blogli [4] (in hebrew: בלוגלי), TheMarker Blogs [5] and Tapuz [6] (in hebrew: תפוז).
There are two blog tracing websites for Israeli blogs: Webster - (hebrew) [7] and (english) [8], and Isralated (english) [9].

Notable Blogs

Academy and Politics
Benny Zifer, in Haaretz newspaper website [10].
Gadi Taub, self made, [11].
Mati Shemoelof, in Notes, [12].
'Lahats Hevraty' by Yoav Ribak and Yair Tarziski, in Israblog, [13].
Nimrod Kamer, in Blogli, [14].

Cinema
Cinemascope by Yair Raveh, self made, [15].

Business
Jonathan Klinger, in TheMarker Blogs, [16].

Technology
Andi Gutmans, in blogspot, [17].
'Room 404', self made by Ido Kenan, [18].

English Israeli Blogs
Am Echad, in blogspot, [19].
Simply Jews, in blogspot, [20].
Lisa Goldman, in blogware, [21].
A Soldier's Mother in blogspot, [22].

================================

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel_Blogosphere"
Categories: Wikipedia spam cleanup Israeli bloggers Israel blogosphere Internet terminology Blogs

I Love Yiddish - Tel Aviv night life

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 10 Apr 2007 19:12:00 +0000

Nimrod Kamer, Dana Guidetti

"I Love Yiddish" is the slogan written on shirt on the left. It is similar to the popular "I Love NY" (New York) and "I Love NJ" (New Jersey) T-Shirt slogans. This I Love Yiddish shirt is widely popular in Tel Aviv. It is an initiative of the Leyvik House - the city's center for Yiddish culture.

Dana Guidetti (right in the photo) is a local debutante. She is seen sitting in the Cantina [1] restaurant, Tel Aviv's central scene of good time and Cava champagne.

=================================

Leyvik House website, Debutante in wikipedia, "A Night in Ashdod" - video starring Dana Guidetti, Asaf Galay & Nimrod Kamer with the Yiddish shirts.

Brown Envelope

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 29 Mar 2007 00:52:00 +0000

Article from wikipedia, created by Nimrod Kamer, 27.2.2007.

Brown envelope - a term to describe a brown colored envelope. It is used in and known in government, business and popular culture as a mean to deliver concealed material - bribe money, secret papers or any sort of "under the table" transfer.

Yes Minister
In the 1980s BBC television situation comedies Yes Minister and Yes Prime Minister the term "Brown Envelope" is mentioned frequently by Sir Humphrey Appleby. It is also defined on a Yes Minster fansite [1] as a "Brown Envelope Job" - "Action that is performed very secretively. It refers to slush money that is usually delivered in brown envelopes. Mentioned in the YM episode The Challenge regarding the plan of Dr. Cartwright on pre-set failure standards. In the Yes Minister episode The Moral Dimension brown envelopes are also supposedly used with the bribery for the British Electronic Systems contract with Qumran."

Yes Minister, BBC

UK news rhetorical references
In news rhetoric and especially in British broadcast news the term Brown Envelope is traditionally used in connection to top secret documents. For example: "For the journalist in search of a story to beat his or her rivals, there is nothing more welcome than the brown envelope with the classified documents, the tip off about a big inquiry's findings or the tale of Cabinet Room bust-up." [2].

Other popular culture use
In the ABS-CBN soap opera Maging Sino Ka Man the term in mentioned in an unidentified episode, again as a mean to pack concealed information (in this instance - stolen shots): "Corazon Roxas Vda. De Berenguer: Good for the company? Or good for you? (slams a brown envelope containing stolen shots of Jaime and Celine at the resort.)". from wikiquote.

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brown_envelope"

Categories: Postal system, Stationery, Paper products, Office equipment, Envelopes.

new Hebrew blog at Blogli.co.il

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 27 Mar 2007 21:21:00 +0000

A collection of articles by Nimrod Kamer - for example - the forbidden Time Out Tel Aviv column, Walla and Globes interviews, letters and notes. Everything from 2002 is due to be documented in this blog.

Nimrod Kamer - Articles Archive.
http://nnimrodd.blogli.co.il

================

No for Normalization, Yes for Normality

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 06 Mar 2007 23:51:00 +0000

article by Nimrod Kamer and Sari Golan \
published in the Egyptian magazine of Nael Eltoukhy \
January 2007 \

Upon visiting Cairo last month with a group of Israeli artists and filmmakers we have reached the conclusion that to officially normalize the cultural relations between Egypt and Israel is not advisable.

We are, however, in favor of a different kind of normalization - normality. Normality is not just a different declension. Normalization sounds like mobilization and hints to a master plan. Normality is more of a sane state of mind, not at all planned. It is simply normal ties being formed between ordinary people rather then bureaucrats. It can even be, in this case, just a municipal connection instead of a government sponsored one. Or, in fact, any kind of relationship - as long as it is not essential and patronizing, or funded by outside factors. My claim is that a state-sponsored embassy exchange and\or co-productions in the film industry and art between Israel and Egypt would surely become such a patronizing link, and both sides should reject it in advance.

Sari Golan, looking upon the inside of the City-Stars Mall,

Heliopolis, Cairo, December 2006

Why does a state-organized and money-based cultural relationship turn out to be so bad and lead to even greater hate between the two nations? For the simple reason that every Israeli producer initiated to do business with Egypt, most of them would be artists chosen by the Israeli foreign office to lead the way, will be obliged to have, overall, a patronizing and superficial approach toward Egypt, and will quite probably act with a sense of saving Egyptian culture by Israeli and\or European money and wisdom, rather than enjoying it. This will undoubtedly lead to an insensitive consumption of Egypt's resources and good hospitality, and to the demand for cheap labor. Israelis "investing" in this kind of peace will prefer seeing the country through its ancient pyramids ruins rather than its constructed buildings and society. They will find the historical side of Egypt culture far more important and extraordinary, dismissing contemporary politics. In other words - a fake atmosphere of peace, a politically correct one.

Better business does not necessarily mean better peace - this is clearly a cliché spoken by the interested ones. We argue that romantic ties, for instance, are much more committing. This essential business argument of developing Egypt might convince some Egyptians, regardless of the fact that Egypt is not at all a developing country (no more than Israel is - that’s for sure) and does not need Israeli money and expertise to make it more western.

People at the Cairo National Stadium, February 2006

An example of this kind of demeaning and exploiting relation between Israel and another "less developed zone" can be found in Romania. There, a group of Israeli business men has taken over the Romanian real estate market, soft drinks and also, soon - the film industry, creating growing resistance in many communities, in what can be described as a new kind of reverse anti-Semitism.

I offer, thus, a different kind of exchange: for example, a specific symbolic connection between the cities Tel Aviv and Cairo, between two streets maybe. Many claim that Tel Aviv is much closer, culturally, to Beirut and to Cairo than to London or New York. I therefore offer normality - first of all between two random people (and artists and so on, but also worker unions and small industry - more symbolically and less binding the better). Just not government - and big businesses. For the first time, as a start of getting to know our neighboring country, we ought to try doing it without any financial push. I even offer it as policy of the Egyptian cultural associations to change nothing in their official boycott policy against Israel, the reasons for its existence are clear, and just encourage specific people to come and meet other relevant people. In the matchmaking process they will avoid doing any empty oriental gestures; in Cairo they shall visit the City Stars mall, the Gezir country club and actual homes - not the pyramids or the main touristic Khan El-Khalili market. Same as in Tel Aviv. To one another they may refer to just by "colleagues" and say "Hi, how are you" not in order to win a co-existence Jewish-Arab peace fund or any other non-realistic western money, that can only do harm.

===========================

* The writers, 25, are living and working in Tel Aviv, Israel. Nimrod Kamer is a business journalist and a filmmaker. His video "Girls At The Cairo National Stadium" [1] was discussed in 'The Daily Star Egypt' [2] and other Middle Eastern papers. His colleague Sari Golan is a curator and art teacher.

Photo: GAD restaurant, downtown Cairo

Shani \ A film synopsis for Berlinale \ Feb 2007

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 14 Feb 2007 17:33:00 +0000

Fiction \ full length \ Israeli -German Co-Production 2007\8

Plot outline:

Shani and Ron are engaged to be married. They are living together in a wealthy area in the city of Tel Aviv, Israel. Ron is an IDF air force transport pilot, Shani is an art graduate. They've been a couple for two years.

As situation in the Gaza strip is getting worse every day, dozens of people are dying from shells and helicopter rockets in the 2006 Israel-Lebanon crisis, criticism on the pilots, as well as their commanders is getting stronger also at home. Still- situation at the actual home of Shani and Ron remains constant - Shani is waiting for Ron to return home in weekends, while understanding the reasons why she can not see him as often as she likes.

Shani is not troubled by the fact that her fiancé is an IDF pilot, but rather from the fact that he is not taking her out and refuses to put on his shoes when ever he's home, relaxing his feet on the table. He is even not keen to have sex with her, yet ultimately he never refuses. She sometimes feels that for him she is just another joystick target, a mate to show off with to pilot friends.

On a daily basis Shani wonders around the city, meeting artists and local non-drafted celebrities. They frustrate her even more. Shani is a very sexual person. She reaches an agreement with Ron to allow her to have sexual relations with at least one girl that she is attracted to.

The film turns to it's finale as Shani is having her birthday. Since the birthday falls on the annual mourning day of late prime minister Rabin (the couple's apartment is located right across his assassination square) Shani decides to postpone the party for a week. Ron is taking special leave from the army to attend.

All of Shani artist left wing friends attend the party, as well as all of Ron's IDF commanders and co-pilots. The two groups are quite friendly to one another. No one talks politics for the entire night. Shani is getting drunk and feels free to have sex with every one of her friends during the party, boys and girls; since Ron is there she doesn't see it as going behind his back. She does it on the roof and in the toilets, in the kitchen and on the back yard. All the people that she used to tease suddenly become a target. Funny enough - Ron is in the living room with his friends, noticing it all but keep on talking to his friends. Finally she has sex with him as well, shouting as hard as she can, trying to tease her friends even more.

Film Objectives

"Shani" aims to portray the ordinary life of a pilot's fiancé in Israel. Typically she is studying art and managing a life of ignorance and restraint. Shani does not want to disappoint anyone - neither her friends nor her husband. In modern day Tel Aviv it doesn't seem to be a problem. Shani is a teaser, caught in a cycle of ambivalent society and a very fading husband to be.

Creator: Nimrod Kamer ©

Beautiful Tamarhindi \ جميلة تمر هندي \ (undone film)

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 24 Jan 2007 22:43:00 +0000

A film proposal by Nimrod Kamer (2005 pitching attempt), sequal to Nimrod Kamer and Yuval Zuker's short film "Beautiful Tamar" (Tel Aviv 2005), [website].

Brief Synopsis:

Zuker and Nimrod, two Israelis, arrive to Amman from Tel Aviv in order to escape the exhausting Jewish holidays. In a local Carob juice-shop, downtown Amman, they meet Tamarhindi and fall in love with her at once.
Together the three embark on a triangular hang-out journey throughout Amman’s scenery's and night life, vividly exploring new frontiers, restraint, and awareness, in this Israeli-Jordanian, yet totally Arab - love story.

Final length: 80 minutes \ 35mm \ Color \
Language: 95% Arabic (with Hebrew and English subtitles)
Director & Writer: Nimrod Kamer (Israel)
Producer: ?
Cinema-Photographer: (Israel) \ ?
Cast: Nimrod Kamer \ Yuval Zuker \ Jordanian Girl (still to be decided)
Editing: In a Jordanian film studio (still to be decided)

Casting & Location Touring Time: 1 week
Rehearsals Time: 5 days of learning Zuker & Nimrod how to say their lines in Arabic.
Shooting Time: 1 week (Amman only) - exact dates still to be decided.
Editing Time: 3.5 weeks
Total working time: 5.9 weeks

Downtown Amman, set for "Beautiful Tamarhindi".

Beautiful Tamarhindi \ A rough scene description

scene 01
Zuker and Nimrod are on the back sit of a Jordanian taxi. They are on their way to Amman. They are impressed by the scenery's and try to explain to the taxi driver that they are originally from Romania (Nimrod) and Poland (Zuker), and not form Israel. The driver, convinced that they are Israelis, is driving very fast and constantly testing their national knowledge of Romania & Poland.
When the taxi reaches Amman center it appears to Nimrod and Zuker that they have only shekels (the Israeli currency) and the driver is willing to exchange it to Jordan dinar only if they admit that they are Israelis after all.

scene 02
Zuker and Nimrod are on the main street of downtown Amman. They buy galabiyas and then enter a juice stand. The juice stand owner is very nice and has a photo of his father and of king Abdullah on the wall. Zuker is ordering a Carob drink and Nimrod orders a Tamar-Hindi drink. They drink from each other’s glasses in order to taste both flavors.
An the corner of the shop appears to sit a beautiful girl, drinking some other kind of flavor. Nimrod asks her (in Arabic) for her name, and she answers him - “Tamarhindi”. She then asks Nimrod of the name of his friend Zuker, Nimrod tells her the name, and Tamarindi makes fun of it, telling an Arab joke about it. Zuker is baffled and confused by the joke.

....

...

.

For full synopsis of the planned film: [pdf].

new: MAAYAN vol.3, MAARVON vol.2

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 18 Jan 2007 00:20:00 +0000

A new vol. of "Maayan" - Poetry Magazine and "Maarvon" film magazine are now out in Tel Aviv.

MAARVON - Edited by Joshua Simon [1] and coordinated by Nimrod Kamer is now the only film journal in Israel.

Maayan and Maarvon website:
www.maayanmagazine.com

On wiki:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maayan

===============================

* Photo above (Maayan Magazine back cover) by Lydia Lymbourides, Zürich , 2005.

Nimrod Kamer's Grandfather Frantzisk "Phishi" Deutsch photoroll

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 14 Jan 2007 01:32:00 +0000

1953, originally uploaded by Nimrod Kamer.

A collection of photos now available on the Nimrod Kamer flickr -
http://flickr.com/photos/nnimrodd.

Night In Ashdod \ documentary video \ 1:32 hours \

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 05 Jan 2007 00:27:00 +0000

Shot in Ashdod*, Israel, July 2006, a city in which the ratio of women to men is 1,046 to 1,000. A group of three party-goers from Tel Aviv come to experience and enjoy the local night life and people.

The three are: Nimrod Kamer (25, A journalist and a junior high school teacher), Roy 'Chicky' Arad (29, A poet and a TV script writer) and lovely Dana Guidetti (a Julie Andrews style IBM worker and local Tel Avivan debutante).

As Kamer takes the camera most of time and Dana drives the car the three are able to reach out the sexiest most desirable locations in Ashdod: A Beach Car-Pool party, 4 of the hottest clubs, most beautiful Ashdodian dancers and - A fancy fish restaurant.

This is a documentary - and takes an hour and half, as no essential parts were cut from the almost real and original time of the night.

The video is a part of The Middle East Night Life Serious by Nimrod Kamer and Roy Arad. Other episodes: http://video.google.com/videosearch?q=night+chicky+nimrod.

*Ashdod in wikipedia: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashdod.

The Tel Aviv Post Massacre

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 02 Jan 2007 00:15:00 +0000

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Tel Aviv Post Massacre (in Hebrew: טבח הדואר של תל אביב) is an attempt to make a first full length Zionist horror picture show in the city of Tel Aviv, Israel according to the "Avriri Manifesto" [1] and as a soft remake of the American genre establishing film The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974). The project creator was Nimrod Kamer.
The film is an attempt, since it was never completed. It was due to be screened in the Israeli complex of "Cinema-City" in the summer of 2006. Only one shooting day had taken place, but the "film" got enormous treatment by Israeli press and cinema societies. A short story was also published depicting the process of it's script writing and production. A story on the director Nimrod Kamer was broad-casted on Israeli TV on february 2006, comparing him to Peter Jackson.

External Links
The Tel Aviv Post Massacre website (Hebrew)
"The Tel Aviv Post Massacre - an Avriri film in production" - A news coverage from Israel's HOT3 channel. (Hebrew)
Behind the scenes video and video clip from film (English)
"When Madeleine Stowe Cries: Short Stories on Cinema" a cinema related story book published in 2007, including the fictional story "From The Production Of An Israeli Horror Movie" by Nimrod Kamer. Direct link: [2].

Categories: 2006 films Unfinished films Slasher films Texas Chainsaw Massacre Israeli films Israeli culture

video 1 - behind the scenes of the 2nd murder scene + editing attempt
video 2 - behind the scenes of the 1st murder scene and the chase through Raines St.

Letter to the Egypt Daily Star, by Nimrod Kamer. First Published: June 3, 2006

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 26 Dec 2006 23:14:00 +0000

In response to the story entitled “Filming gone too far?” [1] in the February 27, 2006 issue of The Daily Star Egypt:

In February 2006, during the African Cup of Nations, I created a video called "Girls At The Cairo National Stadium" [2], as an artist.

The video was shown in several exhibitions and in Google Video and generated some responses that also led to The Daily Star Egypt.

I would like to respond to some of the claims against the video:

As a fan of the Egyptian soccer team (in the African Cup of Nations tournament), I arrived in Cairo for a weekend, with a friend, in order to see a match live, for the first time in my life. I also decided to record the experience on video.

First of all I would to say that I am sorry if any of the girls shown on the video were offended by it. I can say for myself that I am not a stalker, and the video was edited in a documentary style and not in any other style.

I mainly chose the footage of the girls in the stadium, since this is the issue that fascinated me the most, and was the reason that drove me to create this work. I believe that this footage catches the atmosphere and general feeling of victory in the game in quite a convincing manner.

In Israel it is very rare to see this enormous amount of women in football stadiums and I wanted to show the Israeli people back home that this liberal approach to soccer exists in our neighboring country from the south. The video may represent "the new Egyptian" - that for me symbolizes Egypt the most.

All of the people who watched this video in my presence loved it and did not see anything wrong or dishonest with it. As for the nature of this kind of art, I see myself as an artist working in the Middle East; I continuously try to present my film and video works to Israeli, Jordanian and Palestinian friends.

I am full of appreciation for Egypt and for its hospitality, and for Cairo especially, which to me is the number one city in this region. I would be happy to invite all of Egyptian football-goers to Israeli football games, but they would be disappointed and bored when they see that they are 99 percent full of men.

With love and regards,

Nimrod Kamer

Mini Israel \ (aka: 'Hofit') \ \ 19 min. \\ film by Nimrod Kamer \\ (English Subtitles) \ \

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 26 Dec 2006 23:12:00 +0000

For better 768kbps video quality use this link.

Hofit is a waitress at a coffee shop in the city of Tel Aviv. She is totally sick of the big city; the boys, the beach, the sushi bars - she can't stand it no more. The thing is that: in Israel there are no other options. If you want to find a job or to live on your own - Tel Aviv is the default location.
One day Hofit finds an escape hatch to the dilemma - she will move over to 'Mini Israel': A miniature 1:25 size model of Israel, and live in a smaller and lighter Tel Aviv.

Some of her friends try to make her stay in real-size Tel Aviv. Among them are poet Roy 'Chicky' Arad and the paintings of Roee Rosen.

Malki Tesler plays Hofit, the genre is a Mockumentary.

Photography: Nimrod Kamer
Editing: Avi Schneebaum
Soundtrack: E.B Dan
Sound Editing: Eli Pikover

The film is a part of the AVRIRI filmmakers group, 2006.

Film's website: http://hofit.nnimrodd.com.

Avriri Manifesto [1] , Avriri Website [2].

A speech, held by Nimrod Kamer, at the Tzavta hall at the Directors Union forum to go on strike against "Hot", 13.1.2006

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 22 Jan 2006 14:28:00 +0000

Dear Friends,

My name is Nimrod Kamer and I am 24 years old.

I am actually the youngest member of the board of directors, and also the youngest speaker here today.

In these days I am directing an horror
movie, along side with my friends and colleagues, under the independent body that we have founded named “Avriri Cinema”.

Up ‘til one year ago I was a film student in the Jerusalem, and can not think of a less profitable period of my life..

Not only that I had to spend a fortune on my films, I also had no possession on them, as they were the sole property of the school.

I thought, very naively so, that it is natural, that as a student I have no rights on my works, and that after school things would obviously change.

Apparently I was wrong.

Yesterday I decided to disengage from my “Hot”* account. Eager enough to do so I dialed asterisk 6900 and began to wait. 80 nis** I used to pay “Hot” every month, only for my internet account, and today I am no longer willing to pay them even this small amount. Still, after not being able to get any answer from the “Hot” customer hot-line I am still a paying member, for the sole reason of not being able to get them on the phone.

During that hanging period, waiting for the operator, I understood the meaning of some of the power held by the cable companies. Also, I understood that by waiting for “Hot” for forever we will not achieve any of our goals.

The ultimatum, about to presented to you by my friend Amit Lior, in the end of today’s assembly, is the way to divert the clock in our favor. From now on we can be the ones holding the stopper watches, dictating the disengagement schedules. We must be stubborn and tough enough ‘til the very submission of this conglomerate.

We will strike, bite, convince and change this reality. We will protest and get arrested. We shell demand our rightful rights.

This Union will no longer be a depressing and an asexual institute. Today, with your help, the union changes it’s face.

Thank You.

* ”Hot” is Israel’s leading cable TV company.
** ”NIS” is the Israeli currency.

This speech was held at the “Tzavta” hall in Tel Aviv, Israel, at the Writers and Directors Union forum to go on strike against “Hot”, 13.1.2006.

details on Nimrod Kamer from english wikipedia

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 22 Jan 2006 14:23:00 +0000

Nimrod Kamer, (נמרוד קמר, also known as nnimrodd, born 23 December 1981), is an Israeli artist, film director, film teacher and journalist.
Contents[hide]

Early Life
Kamer was born in the Israeli city of Petah Tiqwa. His father (an architect), mother (a veteran ground steward) and other members of the Kamer family had immigrated from Romania in the late 1960s and settled in Petah Tiqwa.
In 1988 Nimrod joined the local elementary school production of "Salomon". In 1993 the Kamer family decided to move to the city of Tel Aviv, as Nimrod was getting more and more involved in the local culture and cinematic scene in spite of his young age. Back in those days he recieved several nicknames from freinds, such as Nimi, Shimi, and Shimshon, yet none of those stuck by him over the years.

Israeli Army
In the Israeli Army (2000-2003) Kamer was released as a first-sergeant and was well known across the army for the letter he sent to the Ramatcal (Chief of staff) of the IDF, informing him of his concerns of future earthquakes in the Golan Heights (where Kamer's base was at) and from active geysers in the area. The letter was spread throughout the IDF and is considered to be the first ever spam email message sent over 'Tsahal-Net' (The IDF internal network).

The Move to Jerusalem
After his Army period, in February 2003, Kamer moved to live in the city of Jerusalem, to learn philosophy in the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. His studies there ended in a disciplinary hearing committee where he was charged with conducting an unauthorized photo exhibition in the campus main hall.

RAW
On may 2003, with friend Ariel Lindauer Kamer founded, in Jersualem, the squat-party-line of RAW (also known as 'Friday Night Raw'), making history by holding the first ever rave underneath the holy city of Jersualem on july 2nd, 2004.

Film Student
In October 2004, Kamer began to study cinema at the Sam Spiegel Jerusalem Film School. After one year he decided to drop school and to pursue a filmmaker career independently. In his last day of school he handed out the institutes's principals a document called the "Avriri Manifesto"; a set of twelve cinematic arguments and agenda (/or dogma), designed to change the nature of film making. The first sentence on the list was: "An Avriri film is a social event. A flyer is no less important, by Principal, then a production, or then the film itself...".

Back to Tel Aviv
In the winter of 2005 Kamer returned to the Tel Avivian cultural scene, and joined The Free Academy Israel, aligning himself with the performer artist Kiki and several other film figures such as Ari Libsker and Joshua Simon. Under The Free Academy they publish and co-edit "Maayan" - A magazine of poetry and ideas, and Maarvon - the only film magazine in Israel, destined to "Change the face of Israeli Cinema" (from Maarvon introduction, Issue #1), and not only to explore it. Kamer is the coordinator and vice-editor of Maarvon.

Berlin
In Berlin, where he spent August and September of 2004, he opened his first official website from his dormitories in the squat house in Friedrichshain. Kamer once claimed that his website is the most frequently updated website in Israel Today. After spending one more month in berlin (and Poland) he creates, along side his friend and colleague Yoav Tal, the short contemporary documentary video My Neo-Nazi Friend and return to Israel.

Television Actor & Film Director
Kamer featured in the youth television show "EXIT" on Israel's channel 3. After two months of playing the role of Yuval Zuker philosophical side-kick he left the show under disputed grounds.
As a director/cinematographer Kamer created several short films. His first project after school was the the award winning film Beautiful Tamar (April 2005). The film showed the influence of Fran?ois Truffaut's film Jules et Jim (1962) on the artist, as some regarded the film as a pure example of simulacrum. Kamer won the Max Shtern prize for short Israeli Cinema. Kamer 2nd film after school was Ilan The Security Guard (october 2005), That film was a mockumentary, on Ilan, A lonely student in the city of Jerusalem, that impersonates to be a public bus security guard in order to feel a genuine part of modern Israeli society.

The Sudoku Period
After spending another month abroad, in Switzerland, on june 2005, Kamer returned to Israel to become the so called "first ever Israeli teacher of Sudoku". Kamer called himself "Captain Sudoku", claiming that more and more people have started to salute him in the streets. To Maariv daily newspaper, he said, "Sudoku or sex? Sudoku".

Today
Along with his other activities, Kamer is also a member of the board of directors of Israel's Film and Television Directors Guild and works as A film teacher in an Herzliya Junior High School.

External links
Nimrod Kamer homepage
Avriri Cinema homepage
A speech, held by Nimrod Kamer, at the Tzavta hall at the Directors Union forum to go on strike against “Hot”, 13.1.2006
A Collection of Nimrod Kamer's Film & Videos from Google Video
Website of the film Ilan The Security Guard
Maayan Magazine - of Poetry and Ideas
The story about Captain Sudoku from the French newspaper of Le Temps

Categories: Israeli film directors Israeli people Television actors