Director – Yael Melamede – 2024 – US – Cert. 12a – 81m
***1/2
A portrait by her New York-based daughter of top Israeli architect Ada Karmi Melamede – out in UK cinemas on Friday, May 1st
This opens with the filmmaker daughter asking her architect mother if she wants to speak English or Hebrew. The mother is happy to speak both. For the titles, we watch her hands drawing / designing buildings on white paper as we hear various one-liners about her qualities as an architect.
Daughter Yael lists “ a few things you should know about my mother.” Ada Karmi Melamede is eighty and goes to the office every day. She is one of a family of architects who built Israel from the ground up. She left Israel twice, once to study in London and once to spend time in New York, where Yael and her family grew up. She returned to Tel Aviv in 1983 and her career took off: she has been working ever since. The Israel Supreme Court. Airports. Universities.
Architecture seems to be her model for discussing the world. She talks about the importance of roots in buildings, decrying glass towers that have no roots, of which she clearly thinks there are too many.… Read the rest