Aya: Imagined Autobiography

Aya: Imagined Autobiography (Hebrew: איה: אוטוביוגרפיה דמיונית‎, tr. Aya: Autobiographia Dimionit) is a 1994 Israeli independent underground dramatic art film directed by Michal Bat-Adam. The titular character is the same one from the director's earlier film Boy Meets Girl, now haunted by her past.[1]

Aya: Imagined Autobiography
Theatrical release poster
איה: אוטוביוגרפיה דמיונית
Directed byMichal Bat-Adam
Produced byMarek Rozenbaum
Written byMichal Bat-Adam
Starring
  • Michal Bat-Adam
  • Michal Zoharetz
  • Shira Lew-Munk
  • Liat Goren
  • Gedalia Besser
  • Levana Finkelstein
  • Alexander Peleg
  • Keren Tenenbaum
  • Zahi Har-Nevo
  • Menashe Noy
  • Davida Karol
  • Elvira Kohnof
  • Avi Kleinberger
  • Uri Gottlieb
  • Tzak Berkman
  • Assi Hanegbi
  • Nurit Shtark
  • Adam Blich
  • Shmuel Shaked
  • Yossi Ashdot
  • Pnina Tolshinski
  • Shelly Varod
Music byAmos Hadani
CinematographyYoav Kosh
Edited byBoaz Leon
Production
company
  • Transfax Film Productions
  • Israel Film Fund
  • Mimar Film Production
  • G. G. Studios
Distributed byNational Center for Jewish Film
Release date
Running time
87 Minutes
CountryIsrael
LanguageHebrew
Budget$ 650,000

Synopsis

Aya (Michal Bat-Adam, played by Michal Zoharetz as a teenager, by Shira Lew-Munk as a child, and, inside the fictional film, by Keren Tenenbaum), a thirtysomething film director, married and mother of one, is shooting a film about her life. The film presents the story of the filming of this fictional film while intersecting within it her dreams and delusions from her life and relations with her father Gedalia Besser, played inside the fictional film by Alexander Peleg) and her mentally ill mother (Liat Goren, played inside the fictional film by Levana Finkelstein). Aya sees her life as a striving to exist, namely, to do something important in life, both in her eyes and in her father's. However, while making this film, Aya understands that all of this striving for something large is pointless, and, that what really matters is the ability to experience every moment of life, finding meaning therein.[2][3]

Reception

Writing in Haaretz, critic Uri Klein opined that the film is director Michal Bat-Adam's best one so far,[4] while Ha'ir critic Dr. Shmuel Duvdevani wrote that it was her most personal as well as her most interesting one to date.[5] Time Out Tel Aviv critic Yair Raveh noted that watching this film "is like meeting for the first time someone who insists on telling you about a very intimate dream he had had, while exposing you to his unedited and private world of fantasies and associations."[6] Abroad, Variety stated that, in this film, the "clash between film and reality is really the core of the movie, with scenes from the autobiographical film clashing with scenes from Aya’s memory. Sometimes the memory is harsher and sometimes the film is, as if Bat-Adam doesn’t trust either as a source of truth."[7]

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References
  1. Sason, Yasmin; Parkhomovsky, Marat (20 December 2010). מיכל בת־אדם. Israeli Cinema Testimonial Database (in Hebrew). Retrieved 31 March 2017.
  2. Shin, Uri. שלוש פנים לאיה [Aya's Three Faces] (PDF). Davar (in Hebrew). Tel Aviv. Retrieved 22 March 2017.
  3. Munk, Dr. Yael. איה: אוטוביוגרפיה דמיונית. Cinema of Israel (in Hebrew). Retrieved 22 March 2017.
  4. Klein, Uri (26 October 1994). רגעים קטנים של רגש [Little Moments of Emotion] (PDF). Haaretz (in Hebrew). Tel Aviv. Retrieved 22 March 2017.
  5. Duvdevani, Dr. Shmuel (28 October 1994). בסרט הזה כבר היינו [We Have Already Seen This Film] (PDF). Ha'ir (in Hebrew). Tel Aviv. Retrieved 22 March 2017.
  6. Raveh, Yair (28 October 1994). סרט בתוך סרט בתוך סרט [A Film Inside a Film Inside a Film] (PDF). Time Out Tel Aviv (in Hebrew). Tel Aviv. Retrieved 22 March 2017.
  7. "Review: Aya: Imagined Autobiography". Variety. Penske Media Corporation. 6 November 1994. Retrieved 23 March 2017.
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