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"Carthage" plays with the loaded past - and it's just great - voila! culture

2022-12-19T08:17:35.048Z


Carthage is a superbly produced, superbly written and very funny period comedy. It's just a shame that she gives up the accuracy in the historical details


Teaser for the series "Carthage" (here 11)

This is one of the most fascinating, esoteric and yet wonderful chapters in the history of the underground.

Hundreds of ETL and Lehi operatives, including very senior commanders, were exiled to detention camps in East Africa, and stayed there for several long years - Sambal in Eritrea, Carthage in Sudan and Gilgil in Kenya.

The hardships of imprisonment, and especially the stories of the daring escapes of Yaakov Meridor and Yitzhak Shamir under the noses of the authorities became stories of heritage and worship that generations of Israelis grew up with, and they were immortalized in books such as "The Long Road to Freedom" or "The Escape to Freedom".

There was not only hardship there, but a full cultural life: books and poems were written in these camps, a library that included thousands of titles operated, prisoners studied degrees in correspondence with British universities, sports competitions were held, and more (spectacular, comprehensive and fascinating documentation on all of this is accessible and scanned by everyone on the Z archive website Botinsky, by the way).



Now something of this strange occurrence is coming to the screen in "Carthage", a new international historical comedy series created by Rashef Levy, Yenz Levy and Tomer Shani for Kaan 11 and centered on the relationship between the various groups in the detention camp - the terrorists from Eretz Israel, Italian fascists, Nazi prisoners and the guards on behalf of His Majesty's Government.

These and those are fighting symbolic battles for national honor as well as resources and influence, and of course everything is personal.



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Carthage (photo: courtesy here 11)

The plot converges on two unexpected heroes: Elijah Levy (Uri Gov), a comedian who grew up on the streets, an actor in the broom theater, who somehow gets caught up in a failed assassination attempt on a British intelligence officer and his wife, which leads to his exile;

and Thomas Edinburgh (Oliver Beckner), a Brit who turns out to be a Nazi spy with a complicated backstory.

Around them: a gallery of crazy characters, including the commander of the Etzal in the camp, played by Rashef Levy himself, who helps explain this extreme microcosm; attempts to escape; a crazy love triangle; internal codes of honor; and the unbelievable nature of the camp - and all in a comedy Wild. In other words: there isn't a bad moment here, and we won't reveal anything beyond that.



It is impossible not to be impressed by the level of production: "Carthage" looks excellent, well edited, and very rhythmic.

She easily draws the viewers into the world in which she conducts herself.

But it's not just the platform: there's a good and interesting story here, written in a witty and entertaining way and pulling out a new surprise every few minutes - an amazing discovery or an unusual background story.

Occasionally, between jokes, she also manages to touch the heart, for example in the part dedicated to the description of Elijah the boy and the friendship that develops between him and his lover.

More in Walla!

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To the full article

Carthage (photo: courtesy here 11)

Being a wild but not empty period comedy, "Carthage" deviates from the landscape twice.

First of all, because it does not come out of the generator of society's lessons from which many of the Israeli series come out, and it is free from the wars of the Jews of our time.

Second, and this is already quite rare: she is not afraid to look at the charged Jewish past - undergrounds, World War II, Nazis, Jewish terrorism - and decide that enough time has passed and it is possible to laugh at this collection of people and present them as complete idiots.

How wonderful and refreshing and healthy.



Two problems detract from the enjoyment.

The first: the game tends to exaggeration, especially by Gov and Levy, and in some parts the tone of the whole series leaves the realm of comedy and enters the realm of parody, and even slips into infantile areas ("2,000 years ago the Greeks tried to exterminate us, so we sent them to fuck goats in the mountains").

The series has so many good dialogues and great scenes, and in front of them these parts seem like unnecessary neglect.



The second problem is more negligible but noticeable: your history should be consumed from another source.

For some reason, the plot is set precisely in 1942, even though the deportation of Etzal and Lehi prisoners mainly took place only about two years later, and at a stage when the African front had long been decided.

"Anthills" that appears in one of the episodes of the series is actually a song from 1945, and the "Carthago" camp in Sudan was not in the jungle at all - but in the middle of the desert.

The road to artistic freedom is probably not that long.

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Source: walla

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