THE DIVE (HATZLILA) New Auteurs

Leaving Tel Aviv to return to the small kibbutz near the Israel-Lebanon border where he grew up, sensitive, battle-scarred veteran Yoav knows all too well the emotional (and literal) battleground he’s about to step into. With gung-ho, my-country-right-or-wrong brother Itai and youngest brother Avishai, who’s deeply ambivalent about his upcoming tour of duty, the trio discover they’ve been charged with fulfilling their recently deceased father’s final wish: to leave his bodily remains in an underwater cave last visited in the boys’ youth. With resentments bubbling over and tempers flaring, the brothers struggle to make things work against the thrum of bomb blasts and text alerts — and wildly different ideas of masculinity, the world and their place in it — in this funny and deeply felt autobiographical debut feature from director/writer Yona Rozenkier. – Cedar Sherbert