USA: Isreali-American filmmaker Ari Sandel's award winning short film, "West Bank Story" hopes to see winning streak continue at the Academy Awards

Award winning short film, "West Bank Story" hopes to see winning streak continue at the Academy Awards. Isreali-American filmmaker Ari Sandel's "West Bank Story" tackles the serious issue of the conflict in the Midde East with a healthy dose of humour." The short film, which is nominated for an Oscar at this year's Academy Awards, runs just 22 minutes, but is powerful in its content and satire. "One of the things I wanted to do was combat all of the negative news that's constantly in the news about the situation, and I felt that the best way to do that would be through comedy. And I feel like if you do it in an even handed way, then the comedy is accessible and acceptable. And what I have found is that audiences have really grasped onto that, and have enjoyed looking at it from a different light," Sandel told Reuters. Sandel called the honour of actually being nominated a dream. "You know when Kim Ray, the other writer and myself wrote the film, we kind of hoped it would have a great response. We never in our wildest dreams thought it would go to the Oscars. I mean, when I got the phone call telling me it was even being considered I couldn't believe it. So it's been a real honour, it's been quite a shock, it's been an amazing two weeks," said Sandel. In "West Bank Story," Sandel spins the classic love tale of "Rome and Juliet," applying its storyline to two competing falafel stands while at the same time taking on the political and ideological issues of the day. The director was also pleased to actually find a location in Los Angeles to shoot the project. "Initially I thought about shooting it in Israel. It was too difficult for a short film, and probably would have been too expensive. So I looked in LA. It's very hard to find anything that will pass for the Middle East in LA. And luckily I found a guy in Santa Clarita, which is a suburb outside of Los Angeles, who built an Arab village on his ranch, and he built it specifically to shoot movies." While "West bank Story" is a satire, it also has an underlying theme of hope. "I really wanted to convey the idea that I don't believe the situation between Israelis and Palestinians is going to go on forever," explained Sandel. "I think peace between the two sides is inevitable. If you watch enough news, you'll be led to believe that this is going to go on forever. So I was hoping that this would be a drop in the bucket for the other voices." This year's Oscars take place on Sunday, February 25th.

ITN Source | February 15, 2007

Tags:. .response. .outside. .peace. .ray. .content