Oxygen

Netalie Braun

Producer

Adi Bar-Yossef

Lab Edition

2021

Production

Country

Israel

SYNOPSIS

Synopsis
Chani, a teacher from Haifa, a poetry lover and a single mother to Ido, is impatiently waiting for his discharge from the army. But exactly on the due date for his release, the third Lebanon War breaks out. The condition of her shell-shocked father, Yakov, starts to deteriorate and Ido calls to say that all discharges have been put on hold. The angst-ridden Chani tries to get him back home, appealing to the kindness of the clerks in charge and commanding officers. Ido returns. Chani is ecstatic believing her attempts were successful only to discover that he returned for just one night to demand of her to stay out of it. Her spirit is broken when she discovers that in fact discharges were not suspended but it’s Ido who volunteered to fight. Their symbiotic relationship goes downhill, and that is a chance for Michael (whom she met at the poetry group) to reach her heart. Ido returns to his border post and the battle on that front flares up. A few days before he is to be sent into Lebanon, Chani decides to take matters into her own hands.

DIRECTOR'S NOTE

Director’s Note
I was asking myself, for many years, why Israeli parents, especially mothers, cooperate with the stark reality of conscription to the army – the potential sacrifice of your own children. The silence about it hovers across all socio-economic classes in Israel. All young men go to the Army. And it is still considered an honor to be a fighter, or a mother’s fighter. Even in our literature there are few critical references, and in our cinema, there are none at all. Into this vacuum enters my main character - a single mom, surrounded by men who are connected to the army in one way or another: Her father sufferers from PTSD from the Yom Kipur war; her son is an enthusiastic combat fighter; her Ex (her son’s dad) is also, at arms length, committed to the army; and her new lover lost one leg in one of the Lebanon wars. My character, Khani, needs to find her own real voice, in order to keep her son alive. An organic voice that is connected to the first and very initial step of being a mother – which is to give life, and nurture it. This is a political film, a call for revolution. I want to expose the collective repression of mothers in Israel, as maybe, if they begin to refuse sacrificing their children, war will not be the main solution to our conflicts.

ABOUT THE FILMMAKER

PRODUCER

Adi Bar-Yossef

Producer profile
Adi Bar Yossef, Producer Israel
Adi Bar Yossef is a graduate of the Jerusalem Sam Spiegel School Film School. In 2019 Adi founded BARYO - a film and TV production house. As an independent producer she produced numerous films including both features and documentaries. As an executive producer at Endemolshine Israel, Adi produced TV drama series for public and cable TV.

PRODUCTION COMPANY PROFILE

Production Company Profile
BARYO is an emerging film and TV production company that emphasizes developing new voices, and based in Tel-Aviv, Israel. BARYO was founded recently (2019) by Adi Bar Yossef, a well experienced producer in the past 10 years, who worked on numerous large scale, award winning, Israeli productions, among other, The Little Things (2019) a documentary feature directed by Michal Aronzon, premiered at Docaviv film festival 2019 and Four Mothers (2020) a documentary feature directed by Rafael Levin and Dana Keidar for HOT cable TV, premiered at the Docaviv film festival in 2020. Between the years 2016 to 2019 Adi was an associate producer to Greenproductions in several feature films; Cinema Sabaya by Orit Fouks Rotem, Shake your cares away by Tom Shoval, Scaffolding by Matan Yair, screened at the Cannes Film Festival and won the best film at the Jerusalem Film Festival and Voice Over directed by 5 Sam Spiegel School Alumnus.

BARYO specializes in art house feature films and documentaries, aiming for international co-productions, in all projects, working with countries across the world .
BARYO is looking to tell stories mostly based on character driven plot, with a strong and condensed drama mechanism, preferably stories about women and their place in society, stories that challenge social conventions.
The creative collaboration with the director/writer is at the heart of each project, which gives the process of development and production a sense of intimacy and genuinity. BARYO concentrates on a limited number of projects in order to give maximum attention to the creative process.

Production Company
Baryo film & TV productions, Tel Aviv, Israel
adibaryo@gmail.com
+972-50-7-348900

PRODUCTION BUDGET

Production Budget
$883,000
Secured funds
$305,000 Israeli Film Fund

LANGUAGE

Hebrew

GENRE

Drama

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