Saba

Ninety-two-year-old Avraham Ezequiel was born in Iraq. After studying in Singapore, he arrived in Palestine in 1929, where he worked as a journalist with the Palestine Bulletin during the 1930s. He chooses to recount his life story to his grandson, interspersed with English quotes from Robert Frost and readings from the holy texts in Arabic and ebrew. In the shadows of his book-filled study, his old typewriter is sleeping. His story speaks of bridging cultures, of peace and modesty. Avraham carefully tends his olive grove, listens to the birdsong and the rustling leaves. At the end of the film, a bulldozer uproots an olive tree. “My grandfather is a man of words, and that’s why he speaks very little. He knows and understands the value of words, be they written and signed or spoken, which may detract from their power. His words come from entirely different places, that are unknown, so content with themselves, precise and accurate, that it is hard to believe that human lips uttered them.” Amram Jacoby won the first David Perlov Grant with this project.