My First War
The grim story of the Second Lebanon War as depicted from one soldier's personal video camera
At 28, Yariv Mozer is suddenly drafted as a soldier in the Second Lebanese War between Lebanon and Israel. Instinctively, he grabs his video camera and threads a shoelace through the handle, securing it around his neck and next to his rifle. As the days drag by, he begins to realize how unplanned the war is and how each of the those who serve and survive pay a price. This is his personal earthquake and the nation of Israels as a whole.
"In the summer of 2006, at the age of 28, I was suddenly drafted as a reserves soldier in the Second Lebanon War. Instinctively, I grabbed my video camera and secured it with a shoelace around my neck, holding it next to my rifle. I said to myself: this camera will be a tool with which to mediate between myself and the reality into which I was thrown - the reality of war.
I served as part of an artillery regiment. As days went by, I understood that the war was not as it was planned. With conflicting orders, more and more fallen soldiers, mess and disorder came to be the buzzwords of the war. And as the war evolved, bringing about more chaos and more destruction, I continued to shoot with my camera. I filmed the faces of exhausted and overwhelmed soldiers. I heard their desire to tell their story - to talk about what they had witnessed. They spoke of a pointlessness war with a strong and clear sense of failure.
Months after the truce, I was compelled to find the individuals who served with me: those whom I had followed during the war, those whom I had met accidentally while wandering, those whose faces and souls had been branded into my mind. They were my principal obsession and the characters of the film. I then followed them in their daily lives. They recalled the images of the war and how they currently relate to them.
My characters and I entered this war naïve with a definite purpose. We instead woke up, shaken and shocked with doubts and regrets. In the end, even those who survive pay a price."
- Yariv Mozer, Director
FULL SYNOPSIS