So, What's A Footnote Anyway?

If you go here, you'll read an explanation of the new Israeli film, "Footnote", which won its screenwriter, Yosef Cedar, an award this year at Cannes.

And just to illustrate how important a footnote can be, well, here is a "footnote-within-a-footnote" tale from Ze'ev Gries' 1989 book, "Conduct Literature (Regimien Vitae)" (buy it here)

Here, then, is footnote 164, on page 91:

and the underlined section explains that the sole difference between two editions of the same book of Meir Benyahu, "The Sabbatean Movement in Greece," (see here on the subject) that Gries claims to find in a book printed at the same publishing house, with the same text and the same pagination is that footnote 4 is shortened which "is not a matter of research but rather a concern of the wars between researchers".


And by the way, on the question of politics and Israel and the film industry, read this:

The question of country, of course, can never fully be ignored when filming in Israel. Ashkenazi admits he didn't expect "Footnote" to make it to Cannes, because the typical questions -- politics and Palestinians -- don't enter the frame.

"Our little movie is about the Talmud," he says. "If an Israeli movie goes to Cannes, like "Waltz With Bashir," it's about the conflict. So I was very surprised."

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