The way we were: Netflix’s ‘Kissufim’ an eerily prescient story of kibbutz next to Gaza

When writer and director Keren Nechmad began working on her film about young Israelis living in Kissufim in the late 1970s, the idea that thousands of terrorists could invade the southern kibbutz and neighboring communities and carry out untold massacres was still in the realm of fiction too outlandish for even Netflix.

Six years later, with Israelis marking a year of mourning since the once-thinkable onslaught and still suffering through a wrenching hostage crisis, Nechmad’s film is finally being released, providing audiences in the US and elsewhere with a fresh historical perspective on life in the so-called Gaza envelope.

Nechmad shot the film at the kibbutz in 2021, two years before Hamas terrorists murdered 17 people there and kidnapped Shlomo Mansour, now 86 years old and still held captive in Gaza. In all, some 1,200 people were killed and 251 taken hostage in southern Israel in the surprise attack on October 7, 2023, which left Kissufim and other kibbutzim badly scarred and largely uninhabitable.

Back in 2021, Nechmad had set out to tell a version of her father’s story, about a group of young soldiers and German volunteers living in the southern kibbutz on the border with Gaza, around the time when Israel and Egypt signed the 1979 peace treaty.

“My father was part of this group of volunteers in Kissufim. I knew his stories and how much it affected his life,” said Nechmad, during an interview with The Times of Israel.

Auditions for the film were held three years ago, with actor Swell Ariel Or (“The Beauty Queen of Jerusalem”) taking the lead role of Eli, along with Mili Eshet, Yehonatan Vilozny, Erez Oved and others.

The alternately touching and harrowing coming-of-age story was shot in August 2021 at Kissufim, showing the young soldiers frolicking in the pool and with one another, meeting young German volunteers, traveling into Gaza to buy pita and falafel, and sitting on the Mediterranean beach, uneasily, alongside young Gazans.

There’s tension, drama, and eerie prescience in the story being told, as the young soldiers navigate the pressures that have always existed between Israelis and Palestinians living in the region in and around.

The 88-minute film was scheduled to be screened in Israeli theaters last fall, just as the Hamas attack took place on the morning of October 7.

At the time, Nechmad was home in Tel Aviv. She spent the first day in front of the television and on her phone, trying to understand what was happening.

The next day, she joined the public relations war room, an ad hoc effort organized to help families figure out what happened to their loved ones. Nechmad created social media stories and videos that provided content about the tragedy that was unfolding.

“I did it for three weeks. I didn’t sleep at all,” she said.

She and lead actress Or were scheduled to travel to Orlando, Florida, to present “Kissufim” at the Orlando Film Festival, where the film won Best Foreign Feature and Best Cinematography.

“We went, and it was intense to show it at a regular festival, to speak to Jews and non-Jews about what happened, and how this film relates to all of it,” said Nechmad.

Actress Swell Ariel Or (left) and writer-director Keren Nechmad of ‘Kissufim,’ a Netflix movie set in late 1970s in the southern kibbutz (Courtesy)

During the months after October 7, Nechmad and Or screened the film in Los Angeles and New York, raising money for Kibbutz Kissufim.

It was clear the film couldn’t yet be released in Israel, but then Netflix expressed interest. The streaming giant wanted to release “Kissufim” only in Israel at first, and then expanded it to 15 countries worldwide, finally releasing the film this month.

The movie remained unchanged, except for the removal of one scene at the very end of the film, which Nechmad felt wasn’t fitting after the October 7 Hamas massacre.

She hosted several Kissufim members at a premiere screening in Israel and also mourned a a member of the kibbutz security team who had briefed the film crew on security precautions, who was killed trying to protect the community on October 7.

“I always thought it was an important story to tell,” said Nechmad. “That feeling is just stronger since the 7th.”

Swell Ariel Or, lead actress in ‘Kissufim,’ a Netflix movie set in late 1970s in the southern kibbutz (Courtesy)

Or recalled reading the script for “Kissufim” several years ago during a visit to a kibbutz down south, and immediately appreciated the modern pace of a story drawn from the past.

“I loved the way it goes from character to character and you experience something different with each of them,” said Or.

The film is set in the years after the 1973 Yom Kippur War, and the trauma, drama, and tensions of that time are apparent in the film, said Or, as well as the characters’ innate happiness and desire for peace and calm.

“It’s hard to see this right now, as we mark a year from October 7,” said Or, who was in Los Angeles on October 7 when she heard about the Hamas attack and spent the next days using her social media following to explain the unfolding tragedy and raise money for reserve army units.

“I really hope that from this trauma of October 7, the future holds good things for the people of Israel in terms of peace and quiet,” said Or. “I hope we’ll see a way to keep living here and people can sleep in their homes without fearing anything. There have been wars in Europe for centuries and now those countries coexist, so hopefully we’ll find a way there in the future. ”

The main characters in ‘Kissufim,’ a Netflix movie set in late 1970s in the southern kibbutz (Courtesy)

Nearly a year after October 7, Nechmad said she trusts audiences to understand the messages in the film and hopes it can serve as a form of background to what happened in Israel on October 7.

“It’s important to show ‘Kissufim’ because October 7 didn’t happen out of nowhere,” said Nechmad. “I want all kinds of people to see it.”