I was genuinely moved by this sweet, funny, poignant movie, even while not believing a word. Sounds crazy to say this about a mobster film, albeit Hebrew mobsters, shaking down the local merchants and resorting to gun violence to ensure cooperation.
But these two yokels, Steve (Steve Savyon) and Chuma (Guy Amir), survivors of a terrorist attack at a Jerusalem restaurant, decide to mend their ways and atone for their sordid past. Determined to pay it forward now, they visit the Wailing Wall and retrieve prayers left in the sacred stones, using their ill-gotten money to fulfill the wishes intended for God’s ears. These guys have more money than God, so they become flesh and blood angels for those who have left prayers.
Amir and Savyon, already a successful Israeli TV duo, are the screenwriters, and they bring a kindred spirit and goodfellas-camaraderie to this ditzy, sentimental movie. The Hebrew maktub means “letter,” and the Arabic maktub means “fate.” In other words, it is written. It’s obvious that the screenwriters and director Oded Raz are working both sides of the middle Eastern street here for the letters tucked into the crevices of the wall really do determine the fates of those who left the letters and these two goofballs who read and react.
Although it has more than its share of blood and gore and brutal mob-violence, it's offset by the genial, generous spirit of both these good fellows as they work out their destinies to help others, thus helping themselves. It’s fun watching their antics as they return again and again to the wall to find another letter and thus another target of their angelic endeavor, even while avoiding the big mob boss still trying to get his money. Of course, it requires that each man plays his role in drag at one point, and it gets a bit convoluted when you learn that Steve has neglected, if not abandoned, his own son even while being fairy godfather to others, and even while Chuma nags him to change his ways.
You won’t be surprised to learn that the neglected son puts a letter in the wall, and well, we know what fate is likely destined here.
This article appears in Apr 19-26, 2018.