Walk on Water, directed by Eytan Fox, begins in Istanbul, where Mossad agent Eyal (played by Clive Owen lookalike Lior Ashkenazi) gives a lethal injection to a Hamas terrorist in a public park. Returning to Tel Aviv, he finds that his wife has committed suicide; he shows no emotion, just an unwillingness to continue as a hit man for Mossad. His next assignment is to bring to justice Alfred Himmelman, who was responsible for the execution of Jews in a certain part of Germany during World War II. To do so, he is assigned as a tour guide for Himmelman's grandson Axel (played by Knut Berger), who flies from Berlin, ostensibly on a holiday while visiting his sister Pia (played by Carolina Peters). Mossad believes that Himmelman can be tracked down if Eyal develops a close relationship with Axel and Pia. However, the real purpose of Axel's visit is to persuade his sister to return to Berlin in order to celebrate his father's seventieth birthday, a fact that Eyal learns after planting a bug in Pia's room at the kibbutz where she lives. On the last day of Axel's trip, Eyal also discovers, in a conversation between Axel and Pia, that Pia left Berlin for Israel because she became upset with her parents for hiding away her fugitive grandfather, and that is why she refuses to attend the party. Mossad then orders Eyal to go to Berlin, where he gets dirty looks from a German at passportkontrol for being an Israeli. His mission is to so surprise Axel with his presence that he will be invited to the birthday party; his boss Menachem (played by Gidion Shemer) goes to Berlin separately to tail Eyal and then to give him the final order. Indeed, the plan bears fruit. When Himmelman (played by Ernest Lenart) is wheelchaired into the festivities for Axel's seventy-year-old father (played by Hanns Zichler), Eyal leaves, consults with his boss, and is ordered to return in order to kill the former Nazi. Meanwhile, the sight of his grandfather greatly angers Axel, and he argues bitterly with his mother Sigrid (played by Carola Regnier). Clearly, the climax of the film is what happens to the grandfather, who now has two potential assassins, Axel and Eyal. In addition to spectacular cinematography of Istanbul, Israel, and Berlin, there is an amusing subplot about Axel's amorous preference for persons of his own sex. (Fox is the director of the 2002 gay film Yossi & Jagger.) During his tour of Israel, Axel picks up a Palestinian gay, and Eyal shows some hostility to gays, though based on naivete and stereotypes. However, Eyal later comes to the aid of four crossdressers who are accosted by three skinheads in a Berlin subway. A second subplot, treated with more gravity, deals with the intifada, as many radio broadcasts tell of suicide bombings. Axel is sympathetic to the plight of the Palestinians, and Eyal simply sees them as the enemy without analyzing their political agenda, clearly showing that a contemporary German is now more sympathetic to an oppressed minority than a Jew in Israel. The two subplots are nicely intertwined with the main plot, and a "Two Years Later" epilog puts a happy ending to an otherwise intense film that might otherwise have ended on a sad note. The title refers at first to Axel's attempt to walk on the waters of the Sea of Galilee but also to the upbeat ending of the film. MH
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