 A play directed and filmed in Gibellina, Sicily, in July of 1992. It is an adaptation of a text by Flavius Josephus, The War of the Jews, and The Dead Sea Scrolls.
In AD 70, the Romans invade Jerusalem. After four years of war, the fortress of Massada, the last bastion of Jewish resistance, is besieged. The men, women and children choose to commit suicide rather than submit to the Romans. "The War of the Jews, by Flavius Josephus, is an account of the destruction of Jewish sovereignty and of the first Jewish city, Jerusalem, in 70 AD. The Massada story is about the suicide of seven hundred women, men and children. They decided to die rather than to become slaves of Rome. After Jerusalem had fallen to the Romans, Massada had continued the rebellion. The Romans had already destroyed most of the country and exiled massive parts of the population, but they were obsessed with this tiny country, Judea, and the Roman general went back just to conquer this insignificant mountain in the middle of nowhere. This disproportion in the Massada story made it an excellent myth for the new state to grab. Modernity recycles many of the old myths and the Massada mythology is one of them. It had been totally forgotten for centuries. The Diaspora was not interested in a suicidal mythology."
Amos Gitai, in Yann Lardeau , "Les Films d'Amos Gitai", unpublished |
