A documenatry about women who train some of the Israel’s most troublesome recruits into the military, Yes, Miss Commander! makes its local debut at 1:30 p.m. today at the Cleveland Museum of Art’s Lecture Hall. Here’s our review of the film.
Yes, Miss Commander! (Israel, 2009) In the opening scenes of Dan Setton and Itzik Lerner’s documentary, we meet the new recruits as they arrive at Israel’s Havat Hashomer army base for training. Turns out they’re a group of troublemakers from broken homes. Ironically, the commanders who have to whip them into shape are young women. As you can imagine, just getting the guys to wake up in the morning is a struggle. Filmed like a reality TV show, the movie has plenty of drama as the soldiers are constantly bickering with their commanding officers. And it’s a frank look at how hard it is to become a good soldier. But there are too many scenes of conflict between the soldiers and their officers. You can only see so many examples of men behaving badly — and consequently getting court-martialed — before your patience wears thin. ** 1/2 (Niesel)
This article appears in Apr 14-20, 2010.
