An American Hippie in Israel 1972

Mike, Mike, a young American hippie and Vietnam War veteran, travels to Israel shortly after his involvement in Vietnam. He hitchhikes and bums around, and his path crosses with three Israelis along the way: Elizabeth, a stage actress; Françoise, another female hippie friend; and her Hebrew-speaking boyfriend Komo. Together they join a larger group of wanderers and dream of carving out an isolated community on a deserted island, a place to live in peace.

“without clothes, without government, and without borders.”

The plan is soon tested as two gun-toting, top-hat-clad, mime-like enforcers appear from nowhere, intent on making Mike’s life miserable. Reviewer Brian Orndorf notes that Sefer doesn’t explain who these guys are or what they’re ultimately after, hinting that the duo might be the personification of “the Man” out to silence the hippie uproar.

Led by Mike, the quartet of hippies survives the attack and flees toward the uninhabited island. On the drive along the Israeli coast, they shed more than a few worries, tossing their clothes in the wind and reveling in the ride in her chic convertible car. They pause along the way to share moments of intimacy and to gather supplies—groceries and a live lamb—preparing for life on their promised island retreat.

When they finally reach the shore, they park the car and use a small dinghy to row out to the tiny landmass. The moment is electric as they celebrate with a free-form dance, skinny dipping, and a fireside meal of canned goods. That night they declare their love for freedom and for each other, and they refuse the world as they know it. > “full of shit” the world is.

The following morning brings a harsh disruption: their boat and the lamb have vanished overnight. Mike makes a valiant effort to reach the mainland, but shark-infested waters block any escape. As hunger gnaws at the group and tempers flare, the men scour the coast for sustenance, ending up with little more than a handful of barnacles scraped from rocks. The revival of the lamb appears as a grim turning point, signaling the apocalypse that follows. The idyll dissolves, and the film exposes the dark underbelly of humanity beneath the hippie rhetoric—the idea that paradise is easy is swept away, and the true nature of unregenerate man is laid bare.